cjack

That's the lamest concession I've seen here in quite a long time. That's like saying "okay, I didn't mean all black people are criminals...just most of them...and I'm sure they all would be criminals if they had their druthers."

Here's a suggestion. Stop posting your lame apologetics for a day or two and go read the threads I've suggested.

Here's one:

http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=35947

And the other:

http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.p...alvation+story

Here's another suggestion. Stop being so bloody sanctimonious.

hatsoff

See, posts like this give us hope. We're not looking for you to deconvert for Christianity (although I suppose a few people here are...), but just to be honest and truthful. And you're doing better than most Christians.

Sauron

You'd be wrong about that as well.

Why don't you stop guessing?

mdd344

Well hatsoff, which opinion do I take?Yours above, or cjacks? I think I'll take yours.

diana

You have repeatedly avoided the question of why you presuppose the Bible is inspired but not the Koran.

Feel free to link to the post in which you addressed this question. I stipulate that you said you'd read some of the Koran and had your reasons for rejecting it. However, the question of how you can reject it as undivine after presupposing it was divine (which is as necessary for understanding and accepting it as it is to the Bible), you have studiously avoided.

My point stands.

The strongest case you can make is to provide evidence for your claims and stop avoiding the problems you can't address.

You stated in PM that you weren't posting the links on the open board because you didn't want them torn apart by the more "absurd" posters here. I told you you were required to cite your sources (it's called "academic integrity"). You did not.

Again, when you cite sources, you state where you got the information you use, not where jpholding (or anyone else) says he got the information. And you know it. If you honestly believe I'm out to lunch, consult someone who may have more experience with citation rules.

d

hatsoff

People who try to prove that the Bible is false are just as deluded as folks who attempt the opposite--to try and prove that it is Gospel truth. Absolutes are simply not possible. I'm sorry if you've ever had to deal with people like that.

Well, you have to take emotion into account. Some people, like Diana, are literally "disgusted" with Christianity. It makes calm discussion pretty difficult.

EDIT: Not that Diana is wrong. In fact, she's quite right in most of her arguments. But she is a little spicy.

diana

Which part of "I have nothing but contempt for your belief system and the blinders it gives you" confused you?

When you first came here, you struck me as zealous, but honest.

However, between then and now, you've destroyed my belief in your honesty. How? The evidence, of course, to the contrary.

Really! Then why did you, with your time limitations, produce a long post listing a bunch of unsupportable claims that it has always been in existence? I'm confused.

EDIT TO ADD: There's an old story about a lion proclaiming he's king of the jungle. One by one, the creatures around him contest his claim and he kills them until there are none left, at which point he finds he is the "king" of nothing. There can reasonably be no kingdom if there is no one in it. Can there?

d

Sauron

False? No. The bible gets many things correct. And it is a source of historical information; sometimes it is the *only* source for particular items.

The bible also has a lot of good things in it - I especially like the laws that deal with proper treatment of the poor, the fatherless, strangers and livestock; I think it shows an advanced state of moral thinking that wouldn't appear for centuries in Europe or elsewhere. Edited to add example:

DEU 24:19 When thou cuttest down thine harvest in thy field, and hast forgot a sheaf in the field, thou shalt not go again to fetch it: it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow: that the LORD thy God may bless thee in all the work of thine hands.
DEU 24:20 When thou beatest thine olive tree, thou shalt not go over the boughs again: it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow.
DEU 24:21 When thou gatherest the grapes of thy vineyard, thou shalt not glean it afterward: it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow.


But the bible also gets a lot of history, science and archaeology dead wrong. And it contains some pretty unbelievable stories of cruelty.

No one here is wholesale rejection of the bible, or questioning its importance in shaping western civilization. But the claim of infallibility and divine inspiration flies in the face of historical, linguistic, and archaeological evidence.

"Waiter, I'll have an order of Diana, but only two star spicy, please."

mdd344

Diana,
You are still mistaken. I discussed the Koran not only with you, but with others. Now if you didn't read all of that, I am sorry indeed. But it is there whether you read it or not. Go and find it. Whomever it was I was discussing it with--between the two of us we came to an agreement about the 'divine presupposition.' Perhaps you missed that.

Second, prior to talking to you I had not even intended to parenthetically cite sources. I was merely preparing the best material I found in a report. I was not aware that it was an 'official paper.' It was merely what I had gathered and I never stated differently. After talking to you, I did cite them, in parenthesis. I also, as I have stated now for the third time, avoided using the Holden link source throughout the paper other than on a very few occasions. The other link, Conklin, I used a lot, and noted it throughout. What I didn't want was the links torn up and what I had gathered ruined BEFORE anyone had a chance to read it. That is entirely fair given the treatment I have endured by some.

mdd344

Diana,
Confused is correct. You are confused because you do not know what the Bible teaches about the kingdom, yet you are spouting things off about it as if you do. The Kingdom has not always been in existence, it began on Pentecost A.D. 29 approx. But since that time it has been in existence and always will be. It is made up, you see, of people both on earth (New Testament Christians) and people already passed from this life. The Kingdom of Heaven exists both in the afterlife and the current life.

It will never 'not' exist. Even if every person on this earth rejected God the kingdom, the church, would exist.

For the record, I do not believe any evidence has led you to where you are about me. I believe that comes from within you. I have not knowingly been dishonest at any point on this site.