Johnny Skeptic

Not at all. Most non-Christian archaeologists and historians believe the King Nebchadnezzar and Pontius Pilate were real people.

Do you think that all non-Christian archaeologists are unreliable?

If a God exists, and wanted to convince as many people as possible to believe that he exists, he could easily have done a much better job of accomplishing that than the Bible writers have. For instance, a God could easily inspire a book that contained many accurate predictions regarding when natural disasters would occur, month, day, and year.

Even if I believed that a God inspired the Bible, I would still reject him unless he answered some questions to my satisfaction. Such being the case, you not only need to reasonably prove that a God inspired the Bible, but also that he has good character. You can attempt to do that at the MF&P Forum if you wish, or at the GRD Forum.

Minimalist

No "great capitol city of an empire" has ever disappeared without a trace. Try to remember that not only do we not have any evidence for such a city but we have found, in its place, evidence of a shitty little village.

You know...I have to laugh at this assertion that non-baptist archaeologists are "out to get the bible." It's so typically Christian of an outlook. The leading scholars in the world who are trying to ascertain what really happened are ISRAELI. They are hardly drawing accolades from the conservatives in their own country. Nonetheless, the evidence is what it is.

reniaa

I think all archaeologists are human and when looking at evidence unless it's completely unarguable so all are in agreement, if there is any subjectiveness involved the archaeologists will be effected by were he stands in his own beliefs.

So no i don't think any archaeologist is unreliable but they can be influenced but if we have two archaeologists disagreeing on the evidence it's only natural that an atheists would agree with the atheists archaeologists and the christian would choose the biblical one to agree with.

And with jerusalem I think there is sufficient doubt on current conclusions because of 200 years of tampering with the so-called evidence and intense population that no archaeologist could be 100 percent sure thats were my doubts are.

-Jay-

reniaa -

You've brought up a very significant issue (a few, actually) with some fairly broad implications.

Considering Jerusalem - yes, it's probably fair to say that there has been some degradation of the site. Maybe even lots of degradation. However, that doesn't make the site useless by any means. What it does mean is that archaeologists have to be extremely diligent and careful about what they conclude. There are still a lot of things that can be determined about ancient Jerusalem even in the face of such degradation.

A mistake that's all too easy for people (on both sides of the discussion) to make is that one missing line of evidence undermines the entire body of knowledge. That's just not the case.

The problem for the average intellectually curious person lies in figuring out just what conclusions are credible and which conclusions suffer from excessive bias - a problem made worse by the fact that those conclusions are sometimes mixed together.

It's also made difficult by the fact that many people tend to avoid conclusions that don't fit with their worldview. (There are a number of reasons for that, some intentional, some not. For example, there is a small Christian school in my area that discourages it's graduates from attending any secular universities, pushing them instead towards places like Bob Jones and Pensacola Christian College.) This is one of the reasons that folks here get short tempered when some Christian posters try to insist that we should go read Josh McDowell and we'll suddenly see the light, but refuse to reciprocate when they're asked to read, say, Dawkins. (Sorry - that was more of a digression than I intended...)

Egypt has some of the same issues as Jerusalem, but again just because there are some compromises to the integrity of the sites doesn't render them useless.

regards,

NinJay

-Jay-

reniaa -

I think one of the things going on here might be that the strength of the evidence (from the perspective of professional archaeologists) and your impressions of the strength of the evidence haven't synched up. Archaeology is one of those fields where what seems intuitively obvious to a layperson such as myself doesn't mean the same thing to a professional. We can invert this statement, of course. Given the same pottery sherd, a professional archaeologist will have a much richer understanding of that sherd than you or I would.

You seem to be sincerely curious and interested, else you wouldn't hang around here asking questions. Do yourself a big favor, and I say this with the best of intentions and nary a trace of sarcasm: get a copy of The Bible Unearthed (or via: amazon.co.uk). Read it. Take some notes on it. Get a feel for what sorts of things Finkelstein and Silberman are keying in on. Even if you come away from the book thinking that their conclusions are complete crap, you'll have a feel for the kinds of things that archaeologists look for. It's actually a fun read and goes pretty quickly, and it's $10 US well spent.

regards,

NinJay

Archer

1.There has never been any evidence that discounts any Biblical event.
2. There has never been any evidence that proves any biblical event.

See how easy one can show the exact opposite of #1

reniaa

Thank you Ninjay, I appreciate your honest opinions, your right I am curious and will look the info up inc josh person haven't read him either. I love history and archaeology and enjoy the debates on here despite disagreements

Johnny Skeptic

That is patently false. You do not have any credible evidence that the skeptic historians are not willing to follow the evidence wherever it leads. As I said, "Even if I believed that a God inspired the Bible, I would still reject him unless he answered some questions to my satisfaction. Such being the case, you not only need to reasonably prove that a God inspired the Bible, but also that he has good character. You can attempt to do that at the MF&P Forum if you wish, or at the GRD Forum."

Which leaves us where? Actually, many skeptic historians argue that there was a historical Jesus, and some skeptic historians argue that there was not a historical Jesus.

Which leaves us where?

Suffice it to say that if a God who inspired a religious book wanted to use it to communicate with humans, he would have inspired a book that has much better evidence than the Bible has. For instance, if a God inspired the Bible, if he had inspired the Old Testament and New Testament writers to write lots of accurate predictions regarding when and where some natural disasters would occur, month, day, and year, there would be far fewer debates today about the existence of the God of the Bible. A God would not have any need of using written records to communciate with humans. All that he would need to use to communicate with humans would be telepathy. He could give consistent telepathic messages to everyone in the world regarding everything that he wanted people to know.

Written records needlessly invite disputes regarding authorship, interpolations, lying, and innocent but inaccurate revelations, sometimes even among Christians.

Johnny Skeptic

Not necessarily. Some skeptic experts claim that a historical Jesus existed, and some skeptic experts claim that a historical Jesus did not exist. A much higher percentage of skeptic experts claim that a historical Jesus existed. Since most skeptic experts accept many Biblical secular historical claims, obviously your claim that "if we have two archaeologists disagreeing on the evidence it's only natural that an atheist would agree with the atheists archaeologists and the Christian would choose the Biblical one to agree with" if false.

If the Bible had much better evidence than it does, there would be little need to debate Bible history. For instance, if the Old Testament and the New Testament contained many accurate predictions regarding when and where some natural disaters would occur, there would not be any need to debate whether or not there is at least one being who is able to predict the future. Another example is that if there had been 1,000 only begotten Sons of God instead of only one only begotten Son of God, and they had performed many miracles all over the world, and were crucified, and rose from the dead, there would be little need to debate whether or not those beings existed.

Regarding the global flood, the Ten Plagues, and the Exodus, is it your position that God requires all Christians to believe that those events happened? Some evangelical Christians do not believe that a global flood occurred, including some evangelical Christian geologists. In addition, some conservative Christians do not believe that the Bible teaches that a global flood occurred.

Are you aware that it is not encumbent upon skeptics to disprove those claims? If it was, it would also be incumbent upon you to disprove deism. What evidence do you have that those events happened other than "the Bible says so."

A God would not have any need of using written records to communicate with humans. All that he would need to use to communicate with humans would be telepathy. He could give consistent telepathic messages to everyone in the world regarding everything that he wanted people to know. Written records needlessly invite disputes regarding authorship, interpolations, lying, and innocent but inaccurate revelations, sometimes even among Christians.

Babylon Sister

Please! For pity's sake lay off the "atheist archeologist" crap. Believe it or not, not every archeologist is an atheist. I'm an archeologist and I happen to be an atheist, but many of my colleagues are Christians, some are Jews and a couple are even Morman.

You probably won't believe me, but not every archeologist working in the countires most Christians refer to as the Holy Land has an agenda.

Archeology isn't about agendas, it's about studying the human culture of the past. We go where the evidence leads us.