Johnny Skeptic

First of all, it is not encumbent upon skeptics to reasonably prove that a contradiction exists. Rather, it is incumbent upon inerrantists to reasonably prove that no contradictions exist. He who asserts first must defend first. That is the way that it works in courts trials. The Bible asserted first, and inerrantists have asserted first by claiming by the Bible is inerrant. Second of all, I mentioned an apparent contradiction about God's failed promise to give Egypt to Nebuchadnezzar as compensation for Nebuchadnezzar's failure to defeat Tyre. You suggested that I start a new thread on that topic, so I did. So far, you have not made any posts in that thread. This suggests that the only reason that you suggested that I start a new thread was so you would not have to to discuss the apparent contradiction. You have certainly been happy to discuss many other issues, so why didn't you want to discuss the issue that I brought up? Obviously, because your intent is to cherry pick only issues that you know you can successfully debate.

punk77

Thanks for the reply. I have already read the various reasons why the KJV is not to be regarded as the best translation/version but the people that I debate/argue with are KJV "onlyists" (is that an actual word?) and so I use that.

I don't want to change their views I just want them to stop trying to impose their religious beliefs on me. Therefore if I can show them where they are wrong by quoting other bits of the KJV then they will find it harder not dismiss my points out of hand. Also, no matter what the 'experts' say, a lot of them believe that it is the other, newer versions that are inferior. They are very calvanistic where I live :banghead: .

rhutchin

Jesus appears to two disciples on the road to Emaus.

- After that, [Jesus] appeared in another form to two of them as they walked and went into the country. (Mark 16:12)

- Now behold, two of them were traveling that same day [when Christ was risen] to a village called Emmaus, which was seven miles from Jerusalem. (Luke 24:13)

The two go back to the “eleven” and tell them what happened.
- So they rose up that very hour and returned to Jerusalem, and found the eleven and those who were with them gathered together,
- saying, “The Lord is risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!”
- And they told about the things that had happened on the road, and how He was known to them in the breaking of bread. (Luke 24:33-35)

- And they went and told it to the rest, but they did not believe them either [as they did not believe the women earlier]. (Mark 16:13)

Jesus appears to the”ten” as Thomas is not present.
- Then, the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in the midst, and said to them, “Peace be with you.” (John 20:19)

- Now as [the two from Emaus] said these things, Jesus Himself stood in the midst of them, and said to them, “Peace to you.”
- But they were terrified and frightened, and supposed they had seen a spirit.
- And He said to them, “Why are you troubled? And why do doubts arise in your hearts? (Luke 24:36-38)

- When He had said this, He showed them His hands and His side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord. (John 20:20)

- “Behold My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself. Handle Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have.”
- When He had said this, He showed them His hands and His feet. (Luke 24:39-40)

- So Jesus said to them again, “Peace to you! As the Father has sent Me, I also send you.”
- And when He had said this, He breathed on them, and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.
- “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” (John 20:21-23)

Thomas’ absence noted.
- Now Thomas, called the Twin, one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. (John 20:24)

Jesus eats with the “ten.”
- But while they still did not believe for joy, and marveled, He said to them, “Have you any food here?”
- So they gave Him a piece of a broiled fish and some honeycomb.
- And He took it and ate in their presence. (Luke 24:41-43)

The “ten” tell Thomas what has happened.
- [Later,] The other disciples therefore said to [Thomas], “We have seen the Lord.” So he said to them, “Unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe.” (John 20:25)

Jesus appears to the “eleven" at a later date (eight days?).
- Later He appeared to the eleven as they sat at the table; and He rebuked their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they did not believe those who had seen Him after He had risen. (Mark 16:14)

- And after eight days His disciples were again inside, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, “Peace to you!”
- Then He said to Thomas, “Reach your finger here, and look at My hands; and reach your hand here, and put it into My side. Do not be unbelieving, but believing.”
- And Thomas answered and said to Him, “My Lord and my God!”
- Jesus said to him, “Thomas, because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”
- And truly Jesus did many other signs in the presence of His disciples, which are not written in this book;
- but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name. (John 20:26-31)

Jesus meets the “eleven” at Galilee.
- And [Later in Galilee] He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature….(Mark 16:15)

- Then the eleven disciples went away into Galilee, to the mountain which Jesus had appointed for them.
- When they saw Him, they worshiped Him; but some doubted.
- And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.
- “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations,… (Matthew 28:16-19)

Your claim is, "It can't be Jesus' 2nd appearance to them some time later (as recorded by John) since in that incident Thomas is the only one still doubting and thus the only one receiving Jesus' rebuke for unbelief. "

The issue is what Mark means in v16 when he writes, "Later,..." How much time elapses between v15 and v16. The context in Mark does not tell us. From John we learn that Thomas was absent when Jesus first appeared and that Jesus did not confront him until eight days had passed. Given the information that John provides us, Mark would have to mean eight days later when he writes, "Later,..." John is an eyewitness to the events since he is one of the "eleven" and there is no reason for us not to believe him. Given the specificity in John's account and the ambiguity in Mark's account, we should understand the ambiguous Mark in light of the specific John.

rhutchin

Earlier, you said that the one making the assertion has the burden of proof. We start with the Biblical account. Skeptics assert a contradiction. The burden is on them to, at least, explain the contradiction.

Johnny Skeptic

Obviously not since on a number of ocassions you have argued that the universe is not naturalistic, not to mention numerous other occasions where you were not content for the Bible to stand on its own, and not to mention the fact that you will never let the Bible stand on its own. I could easily post dozens of examples where you did not let the Bible stand on its own.

No, it is "alleged" that God inspired them to write what they wrote, which was most likely not the case. No rational person would ever become or remain a fundamentalist Christian who was aware of the following arguments, which apply to Calvinists and to all other fundamentalist Christians.

Argument #1

As a Calvinist, you believe that God only reveals himself to people who he wants to reveal himself to, and all fundamentalist Christians believe that God wants them to spread the Gospel messge. You need to explain why in the first century that God preferred to reveal the Gospel message to people who lived closer to Palestine. If the God of the Bible does not exist, the first people who heard the Gospel message would have lived closer to Palestine. In addition, if the God of the Bible does not exist, the only way that anyone would be able to hear the Gospel message would be if another person told them about it.

Kosmin and Lachman wrote a book that is titled "One Nation Under God." The authors provide a lot of documented evidence that shows that in the U.S., the primary factors that influence what people believe are geography, family, race, ethnicity, gender, and age. Those factors are obviously secular factors. Kosmin and Lachman show that a much higher percentage of women become Christians than men. This means that either God discriminates against women, or that that is to be expected since women are generally more emotional than men are, and since emotions are an important part of religous beliefs. The authors also show that when people become elderly, they are much less likely to change their minds no matter what they believe. This means that either God discriminates against elderly skeptics, or that it is genetically normal for elderly people to become set in their ways.

So, not only does God have odd and unexplained preferences based upon geography but also based sex, age, race, and ethnic group.

Few Syrian children who are raised by Muslims parents are taught the Gospel message. Why is that? What does God have against revealing himself to Syrian children who have Muslim parents? It is much too convenient that God just so happens to want to reveal himself to more children who have Christians parents than to children who have Muslim parents. If the God of the Bible does not exist, far more children who have Christian parents would be taught the Gospel message than children who have Muslim parents.

If the God of the Bible does exist, then you need to explain why he mimics the ways that the Gospel message would have been spread if he does not exist.

Argument #2

James says that if a man refuses to give food to a hungry person, he is vain, and his faith is dead, and yet God refused to give food to hundreds of thousands of people who died of starvation in the Irish Potato Famine. This means that God is only concerned with people having enough food to eat if another human gives them enough food to eat. That does not make any sense either.

What we have here is that God wants people to have enough food to eat, but only if another person gives them enough food to eat.

Just like in Argument #1, God is more concerned with METHODS than he is with RESULTS. That is an utterly outrageous conclusion, but fundamentalist have no choice except to make that conclusion. The best conclusion is that if a God exists, he is not the God of the Bible.

Why do you suppose that God inspired James to write that if a man refuses to give food to a hungry person, he is vain, and his faith is dead?

Argument #3

It is my position that there are not any fair, worthy, and just goals that God cannot achieve without killing people and innocent animals with hurricanes. If you have any evidence to the contrary, please post it.

Argument #4

If the God of the Bible exists, all tangible benefits would be indiscriminately distributed at random according to the laws of physics without any regard for a person's needs, worldview, or requests. Either all tangible benefits are indiscriminately distributed at random according to the laws of physics without any regard for a person's needs, worldview, or requests, of for some quite odd and unexplained reasons, God has chosen to mimic a naturalistic universe in which all tangible benefits would be indiscriminately distributed at random according to the laws of physics without any regard for a person's needs, worldview, or requests.

That was another example that if the God of the Bible exists, he mimics a naturalistic universe.

It the God of the Bible does not exist, no Christian could ask God for a tangible benefit and expect to receive it. The only kind of benefits that a Christian could ask God for and expect to receive would be subjective spiritual benefits.

Argument #5

Your apparent interest in evidence is obviously a masquerade. If the Bible said that God will send everyone to hell, you would not be promoting it. You would be using some of the same arguments against it that skeptics use. Why?, because your emotional perceived self-interest has caused them to accept any promises which ultimately will benefit them, and reject any promises that will ultimately harm them. You have sacrificed logic and reason at the expense of emotional perceived self-interest.

Argument #6

No skeptic would oppose a God who treated people right. If a God inspired the Bible, and wants people to accept him, all that he would have to do would be to tangibly show up in front of everyone in the world and treat people right. The same goes for a President, a man on the street, or an alien. All that people want is to be treated right. Neither God nor anyone else has anything to gain from his refusal to do that.

Even if a God inspired the writing of the Bible, there is not any credible evidence that he is moral, and that he is not amoral, mentally incompetent, or a benevolent but inept bunglar who botched his attempt to created a much better world than the world that he created.

Argument #7

God needlessly kills innocent animals. That is wrong.

Argument #8

No rational God would ever use the Bible as a primary means of communicating with humans. He would know that doing so would needlessly cause hatred and wars even among Christians. The use of the Bible as a primary means of communicating with humans has needlessly caused confusion regarding authorship, interpolations, lying, and innocent but inaccurate revelations. A rational God would supplement written records with frequent personal appearances, or he would do what liberal Christians claim he does and communicate with people spritually, and with non-literal interpretations of the Bible and other religious writings.

The following arguments are for you, not for all fundamentalist Christians:

In this thread, or in some other thread, I asked you why God never gives amputees new limbs. You said that people should ask God to prevent them from becoming amputees. That was one of the worth arguments that you have ever made, especially since sometimes God causes people to become amputees by attacking them with supernatural disasters. In addition, the Old Testament indicates that God killed babies at Sodom and Gommorah and at Tyre.

Johnny Skeptic

Yes, when skeptics assert that there is a contradiction, it is up to them to reasonably back up what they claim. When I mentioned the contradiction that God failed to give Egypt to Nebuchadnezzar as a compensation for Nebuchadnezzar's failure to conquer Tyre like he promised to do, you evasively suggested that I start a new thread. I started a new thread, and just as I suspected, you have not made any posts in that thread. Here are those arguments again, and please reply to them this time:

http://www.infidels.org/library/maga.../992front.html

Here is what you said again:

Are you not aware that the Biblical accounts are assertions, and that inerrancy is an assertion? Using your own arguments as a basis, the burden is on you to, at least, to explain why the Biblical accounts and inerrancy are true. Fundamentalist Christians are notorious for being evasive, and trying to put the burden of proof of skeptics.

I seldom debate Bible contradictions because 1) it is not emcumbent upon skeptics to reasonably disprove PRIOR assertions that are in the Bible, and because 2) there are many ways to adequately dispute the Bible without discussing contradictions.

At the very least, the Bible is needlessly confusing.

rhutchin

The Bible is simply a collection of historical documents that record eyewitness accounts of individuals. As any other such historical text, one may assert that they contain inaccurate, false, or contradictory information and explain why the information is inaccurate, false, or contradictory. So long as you treat all historical texts as assertions, that is fine. But, so what?

I guess you don't debate contradictions, despite your meager efforts to do so in previous messages, because of the burden placed on you to substantiate any assertion that a contradiction exists.

Dogfish

So, you assert that the bible stories are eyewitness accounts. I find that hard to believe. Substantiation?

rhutchin

Fine. What do you think an "eternal sin" is compared to your ordinary, everyday sin? What do you think it means to be guilty of an "eternal sin" or to "lie under the guilt of eternal sin"?

We have a clear statement made by Jesus -

Mark 3:28 Verily I say unto you, All sins shall be forgiven unto the sons of men, and blasphemies wherewith soever they shall blaspheme.

If we take "all" to mean "each and every" then "all" encompasses any sin that a person might commit.

The difficulty is in the clause that follows -

Mark 3:29 But he that shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost hath never forgiveness, but is in danger of eternal damnation.

Did Jesus mean this to be the exception to the "all" rule He had just explained? or Did Jesus mean to emphasize the grave danger a person fell into by blaspheming?

Does Jesus mean to say that blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is the exception to the "all" rule or does He mean to say that the blasphemous person can never be forgiven so long as they blaspheme?

Blasphemy is attributing the works of God to Satan (or basically something other than God). Everyone with an ounce of knowledge about the Bible commits blasphemy if they reject that which the Bible says, because they are calling the Holy Spirit, who is the source of the Bible, a liar. Otherwise, no one ever really blaspheming the Holy Spirit because no one is really attributing the miracles of Christ to Satan.

Is that something you are doing or does Joan of Bark think that is what she is doing?

rhutchin

A few examples (I hit the submit button before I was ready, but you can basically read the introductions to most books to establish the source of the account).

Luke 1
1 Inasmuch as many have taken in hand to set in order a narrative of those things which have been fulfilled among us,
2 just as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word delivered them to us,
3 it seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first, to write to you an orderly account, most excellent Theophilus,
4 that you may know the certainty of those things in which you were instructed.

Romans 1
1 Paul, a bondservant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated to the gospel of God...
7 To all who are in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

1 Corinthians
1 Paul, called to be an apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of God, and Sosthenes our brother,
2 To the church of God which is at Corinth,...

Philemon
1 Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother, To Philemon our beloved friend and fellow laborer,
2 to the beloved Apphia, Archippus our fellow soldier, and to the church in your house:...

Revelation
9 I, John, both your brother and companion in the tribulation and kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was on the island that is called Patmos for the word of God and for the testimony of Jesus Christ.
10 I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s Day, and I heard behind me a loud voice, as of a trumpet,...