Johnny Skeptic

Here is proof that arnoldo contradicted himself at the GRD Forum:

That contradicts the following argument that arnoldo used in another thread:

If the best evidence is Christians, why is arnoldo so interested in Jews?

Johnny Skeptic

Message to arnoldo: Why does God predict the future?

arnoldo

If you have ever read the old testament a lot of the "predictions/prophecies after the fact, whatever" were warnings to Israel that they would be scattered to all nations for breaking the mosaic law. In fact, Yeshua himself "predicted" that "no two stones would remain of the Jewish temple" and that the Jews would be scattered to all the nations. The Romans were responsible for scattering the Israelis/Jews to all nations around 70 AD. By using your warped sense of history I suppose you believe that the Israelis/Jews had no right to return to their homeland the day after the Romans forced the Jews into the Diaspora,right? Of course they had every right to return to their homeland then as then did in 1948. Remeber, might doesn't make right so just because the Romans had the might to force Israel into exile didn't make it right.

Johnny Skeptic

But why would God want to help Jews and no one else?

At the GRD Forum, I said:

You replied:

That contradicts the following argument that you used in another thread:

If Jesus had accurately predicted what the names of the Roman emperors would be for the next 200 years, and their dates of birth and death, surely more people would have become Christians. That is a reasonable assumption since historically, many people have accepted all kinds of outlandish religions based upon much less convincing evidence than that. In addition, Nostradamus and Edgar Cayce attracted a lot of followers based upon a lot less convincing evidence than that.

Consider the following Scriptures:

John 20:24-29

“But Thomas, one of the twelve, called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said unto him, We have seen the Lord. But he said unto them, Except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into his side, I will not believe. And after eight days again his disciples were within, and Thomas with them: then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be unto you. Then saith he to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side: and be not faithless, but believing. And Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord and my God. Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.”

Matthew 14:28-31

“And Peter answered him and said, Lord, if it be thou, bid me come unto thee on the water. And he said, Come. And when Peter was come down out of the ship, he walked on the water, to go to Jesus. But when he saw the wind boisterous, he was afraid; and beginning to sink, he cried, saying, Lord, save me. And immediately Jesus stretched forth his hand, and caught him, and said unto him, O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt?”

Matthew 17:20

“And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you.”

Mark 16:14

“Afterward he appeared unto the eleven as they sat at meat, and upbraided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they believed not them which had seen him after he was risen.”

Hebrews 11:1

“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”

The preceding Scriptures emphasize the importance of faith, but strangely, the following Scriptures emphasize the importance of faith AND tangible, firsthand evidence:

Matthew 4:23-25

“And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people. And his fame went throughout all Syria: and they brought unto him all sick people that were taken with divers diseases and torments, and those which were possessed with devils, and those which were lunatick, and those that had the palsy; and he healed them. And there followed him great multitudes of people from Galilee, and from Decapolis, and from Jerusalem, and from Judaea, and from beyond Jordan.”

John 2:23

“Now when he was in Jerusalem at the passover, in the feast day, many believed in his name, when they saw the miracles which he did.”

John 3:2

“The same came to Jesus by night, and said unto him, Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him.”

John 10:37-38

“If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not. But if I do, though ye believe not me, believe the works: that ye may know, and believe, that the Father is in me, and I in him.”

John 20:30-31

“And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples which are not written in this book. But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name. ”

Acts 14:3

“Long time therefore abode they speaking boldly in the Lord, which gave testimony unto the word of his grace, and granted signs and wonders to be done by their hands.”

1 Corinthians 15:6

“After that, he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once; of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep.”

John 11:43-48

"And when he thus had spoken, he cried with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth. And he that was dead came forth, bound hand and foot with graveclothes: and his face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus saith unto them, Loose him, and let him go. Then many of the Jews which came to Mary, and had seen the things which Jesus did, believed on him. But some of them went their ways to the Pharisees, and told them what things Jesus had done. Then gathered the chief priests and the Pharisees a council, and said, What do we? for this man doeth many miracles. If we let him thus alone, all men will believe on him: and the Romans shall come and take away both our place and nation."

It is up to Christians to reasonably explain why God refuses to provide additional evidence that would cause more people to love him, and to accept him. It is also up to Christians to explain why Jesus criticized Thomas for requiring tangible, firsthand evidence that he had risen from the dead, but willingly provided tangible firsthand evidence to many people who were not convinced by his words alone.

Sheshonq

And again arnoldo shoots himself in the foot with his own source.

First, it should be noted that the above text is not Kitchen. It is a reprint from the positiveatheism site, which itself is a reprint of a US News & World Report book review, by Jeffrey Sheler.

It should also be noted that Kitchen does not say what Sheler claims he does about the price of slaves - a fact which arnoldo would have found out himself, had he not been too lazy to actually buy the book and read it himself - or even to search it online. Let's go to the deconstruction:

1. What Kitchen actually does is try to justify the price Joseph's brothers paid in the Genesis story by matching it up with Babylonian slave prices, or prices at Mari, Nuzi, Ugarit or the 3rd dynasty at Ur. But the Joseph story takes place in Egypt; not Babylon, Mari or Ur. Different economies, different govt regulations, and different supply/demand scenarios. Kitchen's basis of comparison is broken from the get-go. Given Egypt's vast written records, it's striking (and somewhat suspicious) that Kitchen didn't compare Egyptian prices against this period - ESPECIALLY since Kitchen is a professor of Egyptology.

2. Contrary to Sheler's sloppy summary - which arnoldo lapped up without bothering to verify - Kitchen makes no claim that the price "exactly" matches. Kitchen himself only says "approximately."

3. But in point of fact, his match is a poor one; he places the 20 shekel price for Joseph within a price range of "15 to 30 shekels". But that range is so wide that nothing "precise" can be claimed.

4. It also needs to be noted the obvious bias that Kitchen brings to the work:

5. And finally, a critique of Kitchen's work, from a professor of Jewish studies. Of interest:

angelo

[QUOTE=arnoldo;5180321]Sir, I have already posted for your consideration the tomb of ABRAHAM. Also other archaeological evidence indicates that Israel is a very ancient nation. Keneth Kitchen agrees that archaelogy matches the bible "remarkably well."

Source: Extraordinary insights from archaeology and history by Jeffery L. Sheler

This means nothing. Is this author a christian making a case for his own faith? I have read archeology books that contradicts all that Mr Kitchen assumes. Have a look at a book titled ''The Bible Unearthed'' By Finkelstein, a Jewish archaeologist. [ note; authors name could be Miss-spelled]
That the Hebrews are an ancient people does not make them ''God's'' people. It's probably a tribe who kept better records of their history than their neighbors. Also, they are one of the first, but not unique, people who came up with the idea of one god, not a plethora of them.

Johnny Skeptic

Israel is not proof of God's existence. All that it takes to self-fulfill a prophecy is the belief that it is true, and enough military power to make it come true.

If a God exists, if he wanted to, he would easily be able to convince everyone to believe that he can predict the future. Bible prophecy is a loser because it does not provide any reasonable motives for why God always make disputable prophecies when he could easily always make indisputable prophecies. An example of an indisputable prophecy would be an accurate prediction regarding when and where a natural disaster would occur, month, day, and year. No human would be able to predict a year in advance when and where a hurricane would go ashore, month, day, and year. No religious book contains a prophecy of that quality. That is because they are all false.

angelo

Some of the astrophysicists working for NASA can predict much more than 'god' ever did.
They can predict the time to the hour when a space probe will land on Mars and start taking images of the surrounding country side.
They can predict when an asteroid or a comet will return in our vicinity even hundreds of years into the future. They will name the day and month even.
Imagine someone predicting such events 2 thousand years ago. Surely he would be claimed as mighty 'god'.

DrZoidberg

Israel is only proof of that Jews believe in God and believe in prophesies.

Dogfish

So archeology backs up the validity of the covanent?