Toto

I have recently heard Brother Richard of atheistnexus talk about his deconversion. (You might want to talk to him about common interests.)

After he went from a fundamentalist minister to a liberal Christian, he still believed in theistic evolution and felt he needed to be familiar with creationist arguments, so he read some Answers in Genesis material. AIG proved conclusively that Christianity requires a literal reading of Genesis. If there was no Garden of Eden and no fall, then there was no original sin that required Jesus' sacrifice, and no point to Christianity. Since he knew that evolution was based on good science, AIG was the final straw that turned him into a non-believer.

mpb1

Thanks Toto - that makes sense.

I spent a lot of time studying AIG's stuff as well, and put their 'testable Creation model' CHART (from one of their books) online here:
http://www.originscience.com/Creatio...ence-CHART.pdf
(They were aware of my posting it at the time.)

I also had a number of email discussions with one of their researchers. I haven't read their newest book since I gave up on all of it... They may have changed some things since 2006, I don't know.

But I've wondered how long it would take for Fuz or Hugh Ross himself to throw in the towel :)

-

bacht

I was lucky I guess. During my time with evangelicals (Missionary Alliance) there wasn't much discussion about evolution vs creation or other "scientific" questions (this was late '70s, the political climate changed after Reagan)

To be fair, the ancient peoples really had no clue about the origins of the universe, they could only guess. But the geneological tables in Genesis are a different matter; they likely reflect the theological and political concerns of the writers, whose dates are of course much disputed, but are probably centuries later than the Bronze Age period of the pre-patriarchal narratives.

driver8

Congratulations to you, and welcome here. I fortunately never suffered your affliction.

I think that in a sense your list of data points does in fact rise to the level of evidence, though it becomes difficult to convert evidence into proof.

I suspect that at some point man will be able to put the evidence into a proof of sorts, regardless of any biblical/textual data.

Without getting into science, the basic premise of christianity just doesn't even make any sense. I can understand the desire for eternal life, salvation, etc, but the writers really didn't think their story through very well. The invention of the "soul" was the first requirement. While that in itself is presumably a possibility, there is no evidence for it. Where they went wrong was introducing the concept of salvation, but thats just marketing. It does me no good to tell you you have a soul unless I can figure out a way to exploit that news. Hence the means of salvation anecdotes and the introduction of sin, evil, and hell. Every step of the story devolves into more chaos. Now we have to have a devil to manage hell, and we have to explain how that devil came to be. Its all too retarded to be taken seriously.

We have an eternal soul whose eternal judgement is based on its actions when present in physical form for a period equal to the blink of an eye. Reduced to mathematical terms then, zero drives infinity. Pretty astounding news is it not? Your brief little life will drive your infinite existence into one of two boxes. Better be careful. Fortunately, we have divine guidance as to how to arrive in the correct box. Check that book carefully for the instructions. Here are a few ways to be a winner or loser:

Matt. 5 [3] "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. [8] "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. [9] "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. [10] "Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Mark 8 [35] For whoever would save his life will lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel's will save it.

Mark 10 [15] Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it."

Mark 10 [17] And as he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him, and asked him, "Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" [18] And Jesus said to him, "Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. [19] You know the commandments: `Do not kill, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Do not defraud, Honor your father and mother.'"
[20] And he said to him, "Teacher, all these I have observed from my youth." [21] And Jesus looking upon him loved him, and said to him, "You lack one thing; go, sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me."

Mark 10 [29] Jesus said, "Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, [30] who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life.

Mark 16 [15] And he said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the gospel to the whole creation. [16] He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.

Matt 10 [32] So every one who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven; [33] but whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven. [34] "Do not think that I have come to bring peace on earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. [35] For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; [36] and a man's foes will be those of his own household. [37] He who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and he who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; [38] and he who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. [39] He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for my sake will find it. [40] "He who receives you receives me, and he who receives me receives him who sent me.

Matt 18 [5] "Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me; [6] but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened round his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.

And of course this should be helpful:

Matt 19 [23] And Jesus said to his disciples, "Truly, I say to you, it will be hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. [24] Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." [25] When the disciples heard this they were greatly astonished, saying, "Who then can be saved?" [26] But Jesus looked at them and said to them, "With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible." [27] Then Peter said in reply, "Lo, we have left everything and followed you. What then shall we have?" [28] Jesus said to them, "Truly, I say to you, in the new world, when the Son of man shall sit on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. [29] And every one who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name's sake, will receive a hundredfold, and inherit eternal life. [30] But many that are first will be last, and the last first.

I'm sure its all starting to make sense by now. I think Jesus was just a little bit bipolar, and the tests all seem a bit retarded, don't they? And why did you create me as a flawed being in the first place, oh mighty one? How do I know that Jesus was your ONLY son, anyway? Did you just go sterile or something? Probably the wife got fed up with your lazy *ss and divorced you. Lord, the stupidity of this story just never ends.................

spamandham

One trend I've noticed of people who finally break free of the religious mindfuck, is that we have a tendency to apply the same degree of certainty we used to have to our new positions. In many cases though, there really is significant uncertainty (there is always some uncertainty...of which I'm unquestioningly certain ;p ).

For example, we really don't yet have a good solution to abiogenesis. Sure, there are some experiments and some kinda-sorta hashed out ideas, and progress toward a comprehensive theory continues to be made, but it isn't fully formed, and we must not pretend that it is.

I'm not accusing you of this, just something to think about.

Minimalist

Well, Semiopen nailed it but the situation was roughly this.

Persia took Babylon by coup d'main (meaning a sudden attack). When they woke up that morning they found themselves in control of the City of Babylon AND its empire.
The Persians also faced serious problems on their Eastern border and the army needed to deal with those. The seriousness of the fighting is shown by the fact that Cyrus the Great was killed in battle there.

Now, Davies' point is that we have no evidence OTHER THAN the OT that the people who were exiled were recognizable as "Jews" as we now understand the term. A handful of inscriptions and a boatload of cultic figurines indicate that they were at best henotheistic, meaning Yahweh was the local king of the gods much as Zeus ruled over Olympus. They may not have been even that far along the evolutionary scale.
Again, Dever goes over all this in his book.

The Babylonians did not depopulate the area. They removed the upper classes leaving the peasants to work for Babylonian overseers. So, nearly 50 years later the Persians allow a group to "return" but who were they? Remember that life span was much shorter. Any adults who made the outbound trip to Babylon would, if they were not dead already, have been in advanced old age. Even their children would have been pushing 60 which, again, for the times was extreme old age. Would they really have been walking back to Judah or Yehud as the Persians called it? At best it was the grandchildren of the original exiles who would have been born in Babylon and who, from recent finds, were part of Babylonian society. They had never seen Jerusalem. They were strangers.

The idea, and I'm oversimplifying in the interest of brevity - there really is no substitute for reading Davies' book - was that the Persians sent out a group of people with an ideology that said "we are the rightful masters of this land AND the great king Cyrus has restored us to you." Presumably this was to prevent the current residents from saying "who the fuck are you guys?"

Semi is also correct about the derivation of my screen name, although I do not agree completely with Davies' idea that the entire thing was cobbled together as a new creation. I think that Israel Finkelstein makes a good case that some of these legends arose during the 7th century when Judah had a brief and ultimately futile idea of expansion into areas which were being vacated by the Assyrians.

But Davies seems very close. In any case, we have nothing in the form of textual confirmation of any "Jewishness" existing prior to the Persian period.



P.s., sorry for being late but it was a busy day.

renassault

I honestly don't know how you consider this any kind of argument, that there was no collective term Jews..that doesn't mean there were no Jews. Prior to the Exile the term would have been something else, such as Judahite or whatever (as found on the Sennacherib steele, written in 689 BC). As for henotheism, the large majority was always subscribing to the local religions, reaching to only about 7000 faithful left in the time of Elijah (9th c. BC), so that doesn't really argue for anything against the Jewish religion's monotheism existing, especially when seeing how no scholar dates books like Amos, Hosea, etc., after the Exile which are clearly monotheistic.

As Ezra and Nehemiah say, no one was allowed back who couldn't show documents dating their ancestry back to prior to the Exile. Only about 10,000 were deported, true, and about 40,000 came back.

Right..

Toto

Are you speaking of In Search of Ancient Israel (or via: amazon.co.uk)? (also on Google books)

mg01

I am certainly uncertain that I am certainly sure that I KNOW how the universe came to be. I AM certain however it didn't happen as told by a literal reading of Genesis (or the Enuma Elish, or the Vedic hymns, or...)

At the same time, even if some supernatural (as in not currently understood) agent was responsible, there is no reason to assume that one particular band of ancient humans and their traditions should be accepted over another, especially when ultimately derived from personal revelation rather than verifiable claims.

From which it follows, any and all claims of reward/punishment, definitions of good/evil, prescribed behavior, etc... embedded in such traditions and resting on divine authority are also just as contrived. (Not to imply though necessarily always for selfish or immoral reasons.) I'm no more worried over ending up in Gehenna than having to face Angra Mainyu.

Following basic emotions of fear and desire, man's recognition of his own mortality results in a search for meaning. The psychological need for comfort from negative influences on our lives is is undeniable. Often however many fail to see what they are doing. When pre-adolescent dependence on adherence to authority is coupled with indoctrination in a particular tradition, the effects stay with us for a long while.
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Minimalist

Yes, sir... and renassault needs to read it as it would far exceed my poor ability to explain Davies' entire book in a paragraph.

Of course there were people living in the area. They were Canaanites just like all the other towns in the region. The only thing that tells us that they were "Jews" is the OT which, in Davies' view, was written later on for a purely political purpose. The whole idea of the OT is that the "Jews" were special. They weren't.