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Old 03-02-2008, 05:42 PM   #41
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Originally Posted by Half-Life View Post
Don't worry about that poster. He called my threads bipolar, not me specifically.

however, I can see where the poster would think so. I have been having doubts about Christianity for a while now.

There was just "something" making me cling to the bible.

However, this "feeling" seems to be going away as each hour passes.
Let it go away, but gradually.
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Old 03-02-2008, 07:10 PM   #42
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I am now more confused again.

I was reading some apologetic sites and they said that Jesus' prophecy about the temple had to have been written BEFORE 70 A.D. because if Matthew and the other gospel writers were writing this in AFTER 70 A.D., then they would've been quick to write, "and so the temple was destroyed in fulfillment of the prophecy" as these writers were so keen on doing at every chance they could get.

Now, I can't say that I am back into Christianity, but points like this makes the "feeling" tough to shake. This seems to be a very good point, but yet I still have doubt.

Why are there apologetic websites out there dedicated to proving these evidences if it can be so easily disregarded as myth? Why do these apologists say there is historical evidence and adamantly show it on their sites?

Why do they have sites that debunk skeptical arguments against the historical Jesus?

If it is so plainly seen like I have put it in this thread, it leads me to believe i might've been missing something when I read these apologetic websites and i should still believing fully.
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Old 03-02-2008, 08:00 PM   #43
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The thought that caused my deconversion hit me like a ton of bricks. There had been some minor observations such as a common moral code shared by the major religions and why god treated Job so badly but these didn't shake my faith. I was reading the bible daily and spending a lot of time in prayer. While begging god to change or eliminate Satan and to eliminate evil, I was slapped in the face with the realization that evil exists because god wants it to. Adam fell because god wanted it that way, it was a set up. How could a god who values justice and abhors evil perpetrate such a heinous crime against a creation he loves? BAM In minutes I realized it was a myth. In the next few months I looked at the scriptures with a skeptical eye and my realization that the bible was myth was confirmed.

Half-Life, nothing I say can convince you of anything. This is a decision you must make for yourself. Study the bible carefully, take nothing for granted. Decide for yourself if the actions of biblegod are consistent with the attributes ascribed to him.
 
Old 03-02-2008, 08:05 PM   #44
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Have you noticed that those "in fulfillment of the prophecy" claims these writers were so keen on doing at every chance they could get", almost always refer back to Old Testament writings? (writings which were not necessarily "prophecies" in their original contexts) And are almost never a fulfillment of any New Testament prophecy?
This alone ought to set off a few warning bells regarding this claim.
You need to keep in mind Half-Life, that what you are dealing with is a set of carefully calculated religious propaganda documents, that were composed to subtly mislead the unwary.
They didn't want it to be detected that the stories were written at a much latter date than what the setting would indicate; To allow any indication of their possession of that latter knowledge to carelessly slip through would all too glaringly spotlight their slight-of-hand.
There is NO reason that they "had to be" written BEFORE 70 A.D., other than that of tricking you into so believing , serves the purposes of their propaganda.

You have started to wake up to some of the deceptions that have been going on, and now you let such trivial claims shake your confidence?
Those apologists will neglect ten thousand facts, while trying to suck you in with half a dozen distortions.
What you are missing when reading those apologetic websites, is simply a high degree of skepticism, no one has a right to demand that you immediately join your opinion to theirs. Take your time, consider all of the arguments, and not just any single aspect that is being pushed to the exclusion of considering the contents of the whole bag.
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Old 03-02-2008, 08:33 PM   #45
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Originally Posted by Half-Life View Post
I was reading some apologetic sites and they said that Jesus' prophecy about the temple had to have been written BEFORE 70 A.D. because if Matthew and the other gospel writers were writing this in AFTER 70 A.D., then they would've been quick to write, "and so the temple was destroyed in fulfillment of the prophecy" as these writers were so keen on doing at every chance they could get.
If they would have written that then it would have been a dead giveaway that they were writing it after the fact. Nobody has found even a fragment of that prophesy that predates 70AD. What you have read at the apologetic site is speculation

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but yet I still have doubt.
As you should.

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Originally Posted by Half-Life View Post
Why are there apologetic websites out there dedicated to proving these evidences if it can be so easily disregarded as myth? Why do these apologists say there is historical evidence and adamantly show it on their sites?
They have not proved nor debunked anything. They are not giving facts, it's speculation catered to their point of view. You can't take my word for it and you can't take their word for it. You must honestly research the evidence for yourself in order to separate the chaff from the wheat.
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Why do they have sites that debunk skeptical arguments against the historical Jesus?
People believe the bible to be true, and the bible commands believers to defend the faith

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Originally Posted by Half-Life View Post
If it is so plainly seen like I have put it in this thread, it leads me to believe i might've been missing something when I read these apologetic websites and i should still believing fully.
Critical thinking will lead you to the truth, and the truth shall set you free.
 
Old 03-02-2008, 08:57 PM   #46
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H-life: I sympathize with the quick deconversion. I deconverted about 4-5 weeks ago. I went from believing the Bible was 100% inspired to agnosticism in 2-3 days of reading infidels articles. Then a few days later I began to drift even further to strong atheism. All of the things I read had never been addressed by any of my leaders in church. I took all the things that I had been taught since I was a baby as true and I deeply believed that all the rest of humanity was willfully in deception and rebellion against God. I assumed that God had been very clear with evidence for His existence and that men had messed it up, when in reality there is little evidence for God. In fact, the littleness of evidence for a supposedly clearly revealed God may point to dubious origins of the myth. Perhaps the God concept was invented by primitive nomads in the Middle East who were bored and didn't have TV, books, or things to do after dark beside tell stories and make them more impressive with each telling.

Deconversion can happen very quickly for someone who thinks logically, reads often, and is confronted with sound atheist arguments where they had not been confronted before. Before finding infidels.org I had never read even one atheist article. I was homeschooled and had all Christian textbooks. Evolution was portrayed as a ridiculous theory and other religions as demonic in origin. With that I could offer a few weak and easily refuted proofs for Christianity like 1) The Bible has not changed a great deal since the 2nd century manuscripts, so it must be true 2) complexity evidences intelligent design. 3) Evolution is stupid: we're not like apes, we're smart!!! 4) Only Christians walk in great love for others. 5) Jesus fulfills prophecy 6) Christ was raised from the dead: look at the empty tomb and the "independent witnesses"

On truthfulness: Most Christian believers assume an unwarranted degree of honesty and integrity to the biblical writers while doubting Homeric legends and all other ancient mythical accounts. By that I mean that the whole assumption rests on their truthfulness and secondarily on God inspiring them to write in a way that is superior to other men, which exalts the writers to sainthood and adoration. Of course that's what the second century church leaders would have wanted. They would embellish they stories of their mentors, because then they get glory for being bishops descended from Peter or John or Paul. Maybe it was unintentional. I have many times been guilty of telling a story, leaving out details that were not putting me or my hero in a good light and enlarging and expanding elements that made me or my heroic figure (George Washington for example, or Daniel) stronger, bolder, and more glorious. Why do we assume, without warrant or proof (this unwarranted assumption is called faith), that the Bible is somehow different? Double standard I say! And gullibility!

Much of the Bible miracles have an alarming similarity to pagan myths, the Bible contradicts itself, and even worse still, God is a greater sinner than any human being on the planet. These things are usually ignored and people refer to one of the weak arguments like I listed above that are expressed in eloquent language by Mcdowell, William Lane Craig, or Norman Geisler. Those guys do have good language, but in my experience they neglect to address some of the harder issues so they can get easy converts.
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Old 03-02-2008, 09:28 PM   #47
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I went from believing the Bible was 100% inspired to agnosticism in 2-3 days of reading infidels articles. Then a few days later I began to drift even further to strong atheism.

People usually get angry when they find out they've been conned. Don't worry about it.
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Old 03-02-2008, 09:36 PM   #48
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Originally Posted by Half-Life View Post
I am now more confused again.

I was reading some apologetic sites and they said that Jesus' prophecy about the temple had to have been written BEFORE 70 A.D. because if Matthew and the other gospel writers were writing this in AFTER 70 A.D., then they would've been quick to write, "and so the temple was destroyed in fulfillment of the prophecy" as these writers were so keen on doing at every chance they could get.

Now, I can't say that I am back into Christianity, but points like this makes the "feeling" tough to shake. This seems to be a very good point, but yet I still have doubt.
Care to list these sites?

You realize that merely showing that the gospels were written before 70 CE does not prove that they are a true account of events, or that Jesus existed, or that there is a God.

Quote:
Why are there apologetic websites out there dedicated to proving these evidences if it can be so easily disregarded as myth? Why do these apologists say there is historical evidence and adamantly show it on their sites?
Apologists start with the conclusion that Christianity is true, because they feel that they have been touched by the Holy Spirit, or for some other emotional or social reason. They then try to justify their beliefs in terms that the rest of society can understand.

Apologists are like lawyers. Lawyers can argue a case for whoever pays their bill.

Quote:
Why do they have sites that debunk skeptical arguments against the historical Jesus?
Because it is relatively easy to argue for a historical Jesus, and they need Jesus to exist. If Jesus really didn't exist, they would have to give up at least some of their belief. But the historical Jesus that might have existed is not the Jesus of faith. There are many atheists who think that a historical Jesus existed.

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If it is so plainly seen like I have put it in this thread, it leads me to believe i might've been missing something when I read these apologetic websites and i should still believing fully.
I suspect there is a lot you are missing, but the conclusion you should draw is not that you should turn off your brain and surrender to some belief that you don't understand.

May I point out that a lot of your posts are almost breathless. You give the impression of a need to react immediately to an argument and proclaim your belief or lack of belief. It might be more useful for you to sit down and read a book or two, and let things sink in.
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Old 03-02-2008, 09:56 PM   #49
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Half-Life,
If the bible were clearly true there wouldn't need to be any apologetics. It's because the whole bible story has so many problems that apologetics even exists.

I think that the fact that there is a strong contingent of Christian apologists is a good indicator that it is not true.
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Old 03-02-2008, 10:03 PM   #50
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Half-Life
I am now more confused again.

I was reading some apologetic sites and they said that Jesus' prophecy about the temple had to have been written BEFORE 70 A.D. because if Matthew and the other gospel writers were writing this in AFTER 70 A.D., then they would've been quick to write, "and so the temple was destroyed in fulfillment of the prophecy" as these writers were so keen on doing at every chance they could get.
And I must tell you again for about the one hundredth time that if the God of the Bible exists, he could easily provide additional evidence that would convince more people to love and accept him without unfairly interfering with their free will.

All Bible prophecies are disputable. I wish to distinguish disputable prophecies from false prophecies. A false prophecy is a prophecy that does not come true. A disputable prophecy does not necessarily have to be a false prophecy. Even if all Bible prophecies are true prophecies, they have failed to convince the majority of the people in the world that they are true prophecies. If Pat Robertson accurately predicted when and where a natural disaster would occur, month, day, and year, that would be far less disputable than any Bible prophecy. In my opinion, no prophecies at all would be much better than 100% disputable prophecies. That is because the Bible says that God is not the author of confusion (1 Corinthians 14:33), and yet Bible prophecies have needlessly cause lots of confusion.

One thing is for certain: If a God inspired the Bible, there are not any doubts whatsoever that he would be able to convince more people to love him and to accept him without unfairly interfering with their free will. It would certainly not have been unfair for Jesus to accurately predict what the names of the Roman emperors would be for the next 200 years, and their dates of birth and death, which would surely have caused more people to 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.

Since Jesus made some predictions, Christians cannot get away with claiming that he did not want to use prophecy to try to influence people in future generations.

The best evidence is that if a God exists, he is probably not the God of the Bible. If the universe is naturalistic, or if some other God exists who chose to mimic the ways that things would be if the universe is naturalistic, 1) all religions that have books would be spread entirely by word of mouth, which is the case 2) humans would only able to obtain food through human effort no matter what their worldview is, which is the case, 3) it would not be surprising that the percentage of women who are theists is significantly higher than the percentage of men who are theists in every culture, which is the case, 4) it would not be surprising that the percentage of elderly people who change their worldviews is much smaller than the percentage of younger people who change their worldviews, which is the case, 5) hurricanes would kill people, animals, and plants, and destroy property as if there were not any differences between them, which appears to the case, 6) all tangible benefits would be indiscriminately distributed at random according to the laws of physics without any regard for a person's needs, requests, or worldview, and the only benefits that anyone could ask God for and expect to receive would be subjective spiritual/emotional benefits, which appears to be the case, 7) it would not be surprising that fossils and sediments are sorted in ways that are convenient for skeptics, and have convinced some evangelical Christian geologists that a global flood did not occur, which is the case, 8) no religious book would contain any indisputable prophecies, which is the case, and 9) it would not be surprising that 50% of the genome of chimpanzees and humans are identical, which is the case.

What Christians propose is the existence of the following kind of God:

1 - A God whose thoughts and ways are strange, and are different from our own thought and ways, but is frequently predictable, and who frequently mimics a naturalistic universe, or some other God who chose to frequently mimic a naturalist universe.

2 - A God who only wants people to hear the Gospel message if another person tells them about it.

3 - A God who only wants people to have enough food to eat if they are able to obtain it through human effort.

4 - A God who prefers to make 100% disputable prophecies when he could easily make 100% indisputable prophecies. An indisputable prophecy would be an accurate prediction regarding when and where a natural disaster would occur, month, day, and year. No religious book has a fulfilled prophecy of that quality.

5 - A God who needlessly invites dissent when he could easily discourage dissent.

6 - A God who is not able to provide additional evidence that would cause more people to love and accept him without unfairly interfering with their free will.

7 - A merciful God who endorses eternal punishment without parole.

No rational person would believe such things.
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