Freethought & Rationalism Archive

kyurious · 09-29-2007, 12:29 PM

You nailed it. There was breakfast and a tomorrow. Congratulations. Your next challenge:

Pick a culture and predict their future for, say, 3000 years. Predict how they will enter and occupy a land, be kicked out of that land into all nations of the earth, then be regathered from those nations a couple of thousand years later to occupy the same land they were kicked out of. Add some details on how that people will be persecuted in the nations where they were dispersed and that they would find no rest there. Mention that although once many in number, they will be reduced to few in number in those nations. Add some details on how the surrounding Arab countries will hate their guts and want to drive them into the sea once they are regathered into their original land. Identify those Arab countries by name based on the tribes that once inhabited them. Mention that others will try to divide up their land. Mention that this people will annoy all nations of the earth and that wars will be the result.

Identify yourself as God, and invite anyone else who thinks they can predict the future in like detail to come forward and give it a try. Mention that as the prophecy is being fulfilled, it is a sign so that people may believe that you are indeed God and know the future from the beginning.

Toto · 09-29-2007, 12:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kyurious

You nailed it. There was breakfast and a tomorrow. Congratulations. Your next challenge:

Pick a culture and predict their future for, say, 3000 years. Predict how they will enter and occupy a land, be kicked out of that land into all nations of the earth, then be regathered from those nations a couple of thousand years later to occupy the same land they were kicked out of. Add some details on how that people will be persecuted in the nations where they were dispersed and that they would find no rest there. Mention that although once many in number, they will be reduced to few in number in those nations. Add some details on how the surrounding Arab countries will hate their guts and want to drive them into the sea once they are regathered into their original land. Identify those Arab countries by name based on the tribes that once inhabited them. Mention that others will try to divide up their land. Mention that this people will annoy all nations of the earth and that wars will be the result.

Identify yourself as God, and invite anyone else who thinks they can predict the future in like detail to come forward and give it a try. Mention that as the prophecy is being fulfilled, it is a sign so that people may believe that you are indeed God and know the future from the beginning.

But that's not what happened.

It was more like shooting an arrow at the side of a barn and then painting the target around the spot where you happened to hit.

There were many details in the history of the Jews that were not foretold in the prophecies, and the prophecies themselves are fairly vague. I think that if you applied to Randi, he would reject this as evidence of the supernatural.

And in addition, you need to factor in that the people who established the modern nation of Isreal (Balfour for the British, at least) were reading the Bible and intentionally trying to make those prophecies come true.

Minimalist · 09-29-2007, 12:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kyurious

Yeah, you may be right. It could have been oral communication generated before they were in the land between Moses and the people, passed on and written down later when they were in the land.

Or it could simply be the creation myth that was dreamed up once they decided they needed one.

apatura_iris · 09-29-2007, 12:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kyurious

Here's one example: In Deuteronomy 28 it says "They will lend to you and you will not lend to them."

That doesn't make much sense until you get to the middle ages and the Jews became money-lenders. Things always went pretty good when they first established themselves in a new area, but sooner or later the persecution would start and one of the persecutions was that the Jews could no longer lend money, but were forced to take on loans at high interest rates --- hence the fulifllment of the prophecy.

The prophecy that they would eat their own children came to pass when Jerusalem was besieged by the Romans in AD 70. Roman soldiers found mothers eating their own children when the city was finally broken into.

The prophecy that their children would be taken from them was fulfilled during the pogroms in various places.

There are dozens more. The history of the Jews was written in advance.

All your assertions assume that Jews were the only group, historically, to ever lend money, resort to cannibalism due to starvation, or have their children taken away from them. This is not true. It's happened to other groups as well.

J-D · 09-29-2007, 09:38 PM

You're saying that a prophecy addressed to the children of Israel saying 'You will not lend' was fulfilled by events when the children of Israel did lend. Strange idea of fulfilment you've got there.

J-D · 09-29-2007, 09:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kyurious

You nailed it. There was breakfast and a tomorrow. Congratulations. Your next challenge:

Pick a culture and predict their future for, say, 3000 years. Predict how they will enter and occupy a land, be kicked out of that land into all nations of the earth, then be regathered from those nations a couple of thousand years later to occupy the same land they were kicked out of. Add some details on how that people will be persecuted in the nations where they were dispersed and that they would find no rest there. Mention that although once many in number, they will be reduced to few in number in those nations. Add some details on how the surrounding Arab countries will hate their guts and want to drive them into the sea once they are regathered into their original land. Identify those Arab countries by name based on the tribes that once inhabited them. Mention that others will try to divide up their land. Mention that this people will annoy all nations of the earth and that wars will be the result.

Identify yourself as God, and invite anyone else who thinks they can predict the future in like detail to come forward and give it a try. Mention that as the prophecy is being fulfilled, it is a sign so that people may believe that you are indeed God and know the future from the beginning.

Details are precisely what is missing from the prophecies you are talking about: names, dates, locations, statistics. What the prophecies have instead are generalities: wars, oppression, persecution, hostility, changes of fortune. Such general predictions are easy and worthless. I am not impressed.

Gooch's dad · 09-29-2007, 09:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by J-D

You're saying that a prophecy addressed to the children of Israel saying 'You will not lend' was fulfilled by events when the children of Israel did lend. Strange idea of fulfilment you've got there.

Bingo! I just found this thread, and realized how utterly stupid that "prediction" was, for the exactly reason that J-D gives. I'm stunned that it took 15 posts for someone to point this out.

kyurious, when did people lend to the Jews, but the Jews didn't lend to them? Please tell me when this was a policy of any nation where the Jews lived. It certainly didn't happen in the Middle Ages. Quite the opposite.

kyurious · 09-30-2007, 12:38 PM

Forcing loans on the Jews was often just a "throw-it-back-in-your-face" reaction from people who were annoyed at the Jews for money lending and any other reason that seemed right at the time.

“An example of the kind of mediation the Jewish prefect was required to perform between the king and the Jews is the forced loan Ulaszlo II imposed upon the Jews of Pressburg in 1491.” Excerpt from “The Jews of Hungary” by Raphael Patai, page 91

“The loans which the kings of England were wont to extract from the Jews were really of the character of forced loans, though the method has never been used in England in modern times so extensively as on the continent.” Excerpt from Encyclopedia Britannica

“the Governor of Mantua has imposed a forced loan on the rich Jews to the amount of a million of liras.” from “The Occident and American Jewish Advocate, Vol. VI, No. 4 Tamuz 5608, July 1848

“Greed was not the only or even the most important why governments coveted the wealth of their citizens. . . But if it had the ability to persuade a few citizens to put up more when it was in need (what in medieval times was euphemistically called a forced loan), then it had little incentive to repay old loans. Since creditors, as a result, had no punitive power over the government, they had no reason to trust the government to repay. This then made it all the more certain that the government would renege on any debt contracted in good faith and resort periodically to expropriation, disguised as forced loans or defaults. The easy targets (after the usual suspects like the Jews had been shaken down) were of course the rich, especially financiers.” Excerpt from “Saving Capitalism from the Capitalists” by Luigi Zingales, Raghuram Rajan, 2004, page 135

‘I have seen various references that nobles would "choose" certain Jews to act as money lenders. They would lend money at exhorbitant rates to the Jews who were not allowed to refuse the loan. The Jews would than lend the money at a higher rate to the nobles who needed money. Often the noble who borrowed money would refuse to repay while the Jew still had to pay the noble who had lent the money” . Excerpt from Mail-Jewish Volume 48, No. 71

“Not that Venice was a liberal polity. The city was proverbially severe in punishing sedition and treason; in emergencies, it imposed special taxes or forced loans on Jews; and citizens were discouraged from contact with the Jewish population.” Excerpt from “The Cambridge Companion to Shakespearean Comedy”, Alexander Leggatt, 2002 page 204

“In 1326 the yellow badge was decreed in Avignon. On the 6th of March, 1328, a cruel persecution began in Navarre, of which 6000 were the victims. In 1330 a story about the holy water was the cause of a real tragedy in Gustrow; twenty-nine names of martyred persons are enumerated in the Mecklenburg memorials of departed souls. Similar excesses happened in Uberlingen, in 1933, with a forced loan of a thousand pounds of Pfennigs.” Excerpt from “The Sufferings of the Jews during the Middle Ages”, Leopold Zunz, 1907, pgs 60-61

“Often the churches or the priests threatened to extort huge sums of money from the Jews. They “prettied up” the extortion in various ways. The Jewish community paid a bribe over and above the sum of the loan, which loan they never received. They often obligated themselves to pay a high interest rate on a loan, which was actually a bribe for a fictitious loan. Perhaps, the Khelmer Jew's loan was also a bribe to avoid a fateful sentence. Whether the loan was real or fictitious, the important point is that this is evidence that the situation of the Jewish community in Khelm was not as good as in previous times.” Excerpt from “The History of the Jews in Chelm” (Poland) by Dr. Philip Frydman

The Jews were frequently having their properties and wealth confiscated by the governments in which they lived. This was widespread throughout the centuries. What do you do when everything has been taken from you and you have to start over again? You take out a loan. In effect, it is a "forced loan."

"They will lend to you and you will not lend to them" should be a red flag just because money lending did become such a big part of Jewish culture and commerce. It's quite the opposite of shooting an arrow and painting bullseye circles around where it lands. It's like shooting an arrow before 200 BC (conservatively) and have it hit a bullseye in the Middle Ages.

But if you don't want to see something, you won't see it.

In my agnostic days, I was offended at God because He, if He existed, did not make Himself real to me. Why didn't He give me a sign if He wanted me to believe in Him? Eventually He did become a personal God, but in the interim He began capturing my attention through prophecy, particularly the history of the Jews. Are we willing to wade through all the offense that we can take and our prejudices and seek Him --- assuming that He might exist?

chieftain · 09-30-2007, 01:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kyurious

Forcing loans on the Jews was often just a "throw-it-back-in-your-face" reaction from people who were annoyed at the Jews for money lending and any other reason that seemed right at the time.

What?? So now a forced loan is evidence of the Bible's accuracy in saying "you will not lend"?

Gooch's dad · 09-30-2007, 01:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chieftain

Quote:

Originally Posted by kyurious

Forcing loans on the Jews was often just a "throw-it-back-in-your-face" reaction from people who were annoyed at the Jews for money lending and any other reason that seemed right at the time.

What?? So now a forced loan is evidence of the Bible's accuracy in saying "you will not lend"?

Bizarre, isn't it, chieftain?

kyurious and kyuriouser, that's what that "logic" is! :banghead:

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09-29-2007, 12:29 PM	#11
kyurious Junior Member Join Date: Sep 2007 Location: hawaii Posts: 7	You nailed it. There was breakfast and a tomorrow. Congratulations. Your next challenge: Pick a culture and predict their future for, say, 3000 years. Predict how they will enter and occupy a land, be kicked out of that land into all nations of the earth, then be regathered from those nations a couple of thousand years later to occupy the same land they were kicked out of. Add some details on how that people will be persecuted in the nations where they were dispersed and that they would find no rest there. Mention that although once many in number, they will be reduced to few in number in those nations. Add some details on how the surrounding Arab countries will hate their guts and want to drive them into the sea once they are regathered into their original land. Identify those Arab countries by name based on the tribes that once inhabited them. Mention that others will try to divide up their land. Mention that this people will annoy all nations of the earth and that wars will be the result. Identify yourself as God, and invite anyone else who thinks they can predict the future in like detail to come forward and give it a try. Mention that as the prophecy is being fulfilled, it is a sign so that people may believe that you are indeed God and know the future from the beginning.

09-29-2007, 09:38 PM	#15
J-D Moderator - General Religious Discussions Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: New South Wales Posts: 27,330	You're saying that a prophecy addressed to the children of Israel saying 'You will not lend' was fulfilled by events when the children of Israel did lend. Strange idea of fulfilment you've got there.

09-30-2007, 12:38 PM	#18
kyurious Junior Member Join Date: Sep 2007 Location: hawaii Posts: 7	Forcing loans on the Jews was often just a "throw-it-back-in-your-face" reaction from people who were annoyed at the Jews for money lending and any other reason that seemed right at the time. “An example of the kind of mediation the Jewish prefect was required to perform between the king and the Jews is the forced loan Ulaszlo II imposed upon the Jews of Pressburg in 1491.” Excerpt from “The Jews of Hungary” by Raphael Patai, page 91 “The loans which the kings of England were wont to extract from the Jews were really of the character of forced loans, though the method has never been used in England in modern times so extensively as on the continent.” Excerpt from Encyclopedia Britannica “the Governor of Mantua has imposed a forced loan on the rich Jews to the amount of a million of liras.” from “The Occident and American Jewish Advocate, Vol. VI, No. 4 Tamuz 5608, July 1848 “Greed was not the only or even the most important why governments coveted the wealth of their citizens. . . But if it had the ability to persuade a few citizens to put up more when it was in need (what in medieval times was euphemistically called a forced loan), then it had little incentive to repay old loans. Since creditors, as a result, had no punitive power over the government, they had no reason to trust the government to repay. This then made it all the more certain that the government would renege on any debt contracted in good faith and resort periodically to expropriation, disguised as forced loans or defaults. The easy targets (after the usual suspects like the Jews had been shaken down) were of course the rich, especially financiers.” Excerpt from “Saving Capitalism from the Capitalists” by Luigi Zingales, Raghuram Rajan, 2004, page 135 ‘I have seen various references that nobles would "choose" certain Jews to act as money lenders. They would lend money at exhorbitant rates to the Jews who were not allowed to refuse the loan. The Jews would than lend the money at a higher rate to the nobles who needed money. Often the noble who borrowed money would refuse to repay while the Jew still had to pay the noble who had lent the money” . Excerpt from Mail-Jewish Volume 48, No. 71 “Not that Venice was a liberal polity. The city was proverbially severe in punishing sedition and treason; in emergencies, it imposed special taxes or forced loans on Jews; and citizens were discouraged from contact with the Jewish population.” Excerpt from “The Cambridge Companion to Shakespearean Comedy”, Alexander Leggatt, 2002 page 204 “In 1326 the yellow badge was decreed in Avignon. On the 6th of March, 1328, a cruel persecution began in Navarre, of which 6000 were the victims. In 1330 a story about the holy water was the cause of a real tragedy in Gustrow; twenty-nine names of martyred persons are enumerated in the Mecklenburg memorials of departed souls. Similar excesses happened in Uberlingen, in 1933, with a forced loan of a thousand pounds of Pfennigs.” Excerpt from “The Sufferings of the Jews during the Middle Ages”, Leopold Zunz, 1907, pgs 60-61 “Often the churches or the priests threatened to extort huge sums of money from the Jews. They “prettied up” the extortion in various ways. The Jewish community paid a bribe over and above the sum of the loan, which loan they never received. They often obligated themselves to pay a high interest rate on a loan, which was actually a bribe for a fictitious loan. Perhaps, the Khelmer Jew's loan was also a bribe to avoid a fateful sentence. Whether the loan was real or fictitious, the important point is that this is evidence that the situation of the Jewish community in Khelm was not as good as in previous times.” Excerpt from “The History of the Jews in Chelm” (Poland) by Dr. Philip Frydman The Jews were frequently having their properties and wealth confiscated by the governments in which they lived. This was widespread throughout the centuries. What do you do when everything has been taken from you and you have to start over again? You take out a loan. In effect, it is a "forced loan." "They will lend to you and you will not lend to them" should be a red flag just because money lending did become such a big part of Jewish culture and commerce. It's quite the opposite of shooting an arrow and painting bullseye circles around where it lands. It's like shooting an arrow before 200 BC (conservatively) and have it hit a bullseye in the Middle Ages. But if you don't want to see something, you won't see it. In my agnostic days, I was offended at God because He, if He existed, did not make Himself real to me. Why didn't He give me a sign if He wanted me to believe in Him? Eventually He did become a personal God, but in the interim He began capturing my attention through prophecy, particularly the history of the Jews. Are we willing to wade through all the offense that we can take and our prejudices and seek Him --- assuming that He might exist?

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