Freethought & Rationalism Archive

lpetrich · 10-22-2002, 09:42 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by blakader:

---2) Bats are birds. (Leviticus 11:19 and Deuteronomy 14:18)

Birds and Bats both fly and both have wings.. I dont see the problem. Ancient Hebrews were not scientists. God got the point across

However, bats look much more like mice than true birds, something that the authors of the Bible could have noted.

Quote:

Originally posted by blakader:

---3)Insects have four legs. (Leviticus 11:23)

... The back legs of Locost were not counted as "legs" ther function is different and were counted diffently.

Except that locusts also walk with those limbs, thus qualifying them as legs. Frogs, rabbits, and kangaroos all hop with their hind legs, but those limbs are still called legs despite that.

Quote:

Originally posted by blakader:

---4 Some birds have four legs. (Leviticus 11:20)

the word used here is 'owph which merely means a creature with wings ..not a bird reference but still insect

I think that whoever had written it was being careless -- which is especially suspicious in a book which descirbes in gory detail how to perform various animal sacrifices.

Quote:

Originally posted by blakader:
---5) Genetics can be altered by looking at sticks. (Genesis 30:37-39)

A process is described but not endorsed. ...

Except that he had allegedly succeeded in making solid-colored livestock beget spotted and streaked livestock by showing them some striped sticks.

Can anyone say Jean-Baptiste Lamarck?

Quote:

Originally posted by blakader:

If we understood more about the context of the ancient Jews all these errors seem really silly to me. How can we judge how these people lived and the laws they lived by, by our standards of today. Things were really diffenent back then.

In effect, the Bible is just plain irrelevant.

[ October 22, 2002: Message edited by: lpetrich ]

Jack the Bodiless · 10-23-2002, 12:45 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Vanderzyden:
Here we see clear references to a spherical earth and an expanding universe, both of which have only been positively demonstrated in the past 600 years.

This is doubly false. Not only is it a documented fact that the ancient Hebrews were flat-Earthers, but other ancient peoples DID know that the Earth was spherical. Eratosthenes even calculated its circumference!

And the Hopi have a creation myth in which the Earth is a pearl secreted by a giant oyster. Pearls are spherical.

It is likely that many peoples, particularly those living on seacoasts, would have figured it out.

So, far from having "supernatural knowledge", exactly the opposite is true: the Hebrews had a poor understanding of the world even for their own time.

Jack the Bodiless · 10-23-2002, 12:55 AM

...And I note that there has still not been an answer to the known falsehood of the Genesis creation story. No explanation of why the Christian contributors to this thread are still pursuing a lost cause.

Butters · 10-23-2002, 04:34 AM

Of course this type of argument will not be needed soon. The wrtiers of the NIV have changed much of the text to eliminate many contradicitions. In another few years they will probably come out with a new version, eliminating even more. If you can't explain it, change it!

K · 10-23-2002, 07:37 AM

Vanderzyden:

Quote:

What is the aim of (inaccurately) ascribing the term "nomads" to all of the ancient Jewish people? Surely it is to discredit the Bible. There is no clearer indication of presuppositional erroneous bias than this, K.

"Nomad" is equivalent to "redneck" in your mind, I'm sure. You, like others here, think you are somehow more "sophisticated" than the writers of the Pentateuch, the Psalms, or the Proverbs. However, the content of your posts is strong evidence to the contrary.

Wow! Where did that come from. I was saying no such thing with the term "nomad". I was simply restating FunkyRes' assertion (if you read the posts, you would see that's where the term "nomad" comes from) but applying it to a different scientific fact. Namely the origin of humanity versus hares chewing their cud.

I have to admit that I find it insulting that you would imply that I am some kind of anti-Semite (as you seem to be doing) simply because I repeated a description offered by someone who used it to defend the writers of the OT. If you don't like the term "nomad", then take that up with FunkyRes.

MrDarwin · 10-23-2002, 07:50 AM

If you're going to be talking about contradictions and errors in the Bible, this is the kind of thing you need to be pointing out:

Quote:

Originally posted by Asha'man:
Ok, how about numbers? Is there any possible way that the bible can mess up simple numbers?

Sure there is! Take a look at the number of people returning from Babylon after the exile. Read Ezra 2. Now look at Nehemiah 7. Notice anything different? If not, read again, you aren�t paying attention!

Not only do the numbers differ between the two accounts, they also don�t add up to the total listed at the bottom. Ezra lists 29,818 people, Nehemiah lists 31,139, but both make the identical claim that �the whole congregation together was forty and two thousand tree hundred and threescore� (42,360)

I think a separate thread should be created for these more specific contradictions, i.e., ones that cannot be interpreted away by appealing to semantics or interpretations of vague wording.

Boro Nut · 10-23-2002, 08:30 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Jeremy Pallant:
"Could be?" There's still no snake that can kill at a glance.

Oh really? Aren't you forgetting Medusa's hair?

Boro Nut

Jeremy Pallant · 10-23-2002, 09:54 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Boro Nut:


Oh really? Aren't you forgetting Medusa's hair?

Medusa did have snakes for hair, but it was her gaze that could turn people into stone.

Now the cockatrice in folklore was a dragon with the head of a rooster. If it breathed on you, or looked at you, you would drop dead.

One description of it, of unknown origin, states that:

"For they say that when a Cocke groweth old, he layeth a certaine egge without any shell, instead whereof it is covered with a very thicke skinne, which is able to withstand the greatest force of an easie blow or fall. They saye, moreover, that this egge is layd onely in the Summer time, about the beginning of the Dogge-dayes (between early July and early September), being not so long as a Hens Egge, but round and orbiculer:...sometimes of a yellowish muddy color... and afterward sat upon by a Snake or Toad, bringeth forth the Cockatrice, being halfe a foot in length, the hinder part like a snake, the former part like a Cocke, because of a treble comb on his forehead."

Vanderzyden · 10-23-2002, 11:37 AM

Jeremy,

Interesting graphic. Tell me, to what is the canopy anchored in that illustration? What is the large grey plane upon which the disk is resting upon?

Also, what would give the ancient Hebrews the idea that the earth was round at all?

Finally, observe that your diagram does not depict the present active tense of the key verbs in the passage...

Quote:

Isaiah 40:22

It is He who sitsabove the circle of the earth,
And its inhabitants are like grasshoppers,
Who stretches out the heavens like a curtain
And spreads them out like a tent to dwell in.

Again, these notions are consistent with modern observations of an expanding universe.

Vanderzyden

[ October 23, 2002: Message edited by: Vanderzyden ]

Vibr8gKiwi · 10-23-2002, 11:47 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by MrDarwin:
I think a separate thread should be created for these more specific contradictions, i.e., ones that cannot be interpreted away by appealing to semantics or interpretations of vague wording.

I've brought numerical errors up a few times but have been ignored. If someone starts a thread, here's some material to start with:
<a href="http://www.mbdojo.com/~rssl/familycensus.html" target="_blank">Numerical errors in the bible</a>

Again and again we see in the bible where there is the same material twice, errors and discrepancies can be found. Who knows how many errors there are in the material that isn't replicated? How anyone can think this is the work of anything other than ordinary men is beyond me.

[ October 23, 2002: Message edited by: Vibr8gKiwi ]

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10-23-2002, 12:55 AM	#63
Jack the Bodiless Veteran Member Join Date: Feb 2001 Location: UK Posts: 5,815	...And I note that there has still not been an answer to the known falsehood of the Genesis creation story. No explanation of why the Christian contributors to this thread are still pursuing a lost cause.

10-23-2002, 04:34 AM	#64
Butters Regular Member Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Houston Texas Posts: 444	Of course this type of argument will not be needed soon. The wrtiers of the NIV have changed much of the text to eliminate many contradicitions. In another few years they will probably come out with a new version, eliminating even more. If you can't explain it, change it!

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