CX

I hate to quibble but it seems to me you are creating a false dilemma here. It is not an either or proposition and certainly some of the material in the bible is historical. There's plenty of stuff in the OT that we know happened based on outside sources. The NT is a little less certain, but plenty of the nonsupernatural events are plausible including Jesus being executed by the Romans. Why must absolutely all of it be fictional? That hardly seems a reasonable position.

CX

Hmmm...the parts that aren't contradictory and meet the criteria of naturalistic plausibility? I mean Pilate definitely was procurator of Judea so there's some actual history right there. Paul appears to have been a real guy who travelled around converting Gentiles so that's some more. The Jews revolted in 66 and by 70 the Jerusalem temple was levelled so there's some more history. You ever read the Jefferson Bible? TJ took out all the supernatural stuff in his version. Granted I'm not saying the NT is useful for discovering detailed history about 1st century Palestine, but it isn't a complete fiction and can tell us a lot about the development of Xianity in the early period.

Beach_MU

CX is right in that a text that isn't 100% historically accurate isn't fiction. While you may see the point that it was writing using different standards for history is insignificant it is incredibly important. Suppose that when the history of World War I was written it was the common practice to give dates or describe battles simply because no one did it or wanted it on a cultural level. Would that make those accounts fiction? No, they would be accurate historical accounts for that time period and anyone reading it afterwards should keep that in mind before they throw them out.

Koyaanisqatsi

Quibble all you like!

I didn't necessarily state it must "all" be fictional. My argument was to it's reliability as an historical document and that once you grant it is not an historically accurate document, then what is it?

You're left with two options, IMO; (1) unreliable trash for the dumpsters or (2) mythology (fiction based upon real people and real places).

Koyaanisqatsi

Agreed. But, again, what do you call a work based on real places and real people that is demonstrated to not be historically accurate?

Mythology.

Koyaanisqatsi

You're not off the hook, Mr!

I've clarified what CX is responding to, now back to my other arguments.

No, it is not. Again, you are talking about a literary style and that literary style has a name; it's called mythology; basing fictional stories on real people and real places.

What? Your analogy makes no sense.

Simple question. You have two stories about a person levitating in a book on levitation. The two stories are almost identical-let's say 90% identical-and both base their stories during Reagan's presidency.

Author "A" says that Billy the Magician levitated ten feet off the floor and flew around the White House right at the beginning of Reagan's presidency and author "B" says that Billy did this right at the end of Reagan's presidency.

Setting aside the levitation, which author do you say is right, considering the fact that there exists no independent verification of either the levitation or that this levitation occurred in the White House at all?

Beach_MU

The point of my analog is that during the time in which the bible is written, the exact time of events was not considered important. Now you can criticize the style of the time as not being very accurate historically by today's standards but you can't reasonably expect them to have tried to meet different standards than were being practiced. Perhaps a better example would be, suppose in the future it become the accepted practice to record every possible detail in historical accounts (i.e. the color and length of a person's hair, etc..) Now, someone in the future could then look back at our history books and say they are invalid because one book describes George Washington as having long hair and another as having short hair (a detail that today wouldn't be considered significant). Would it be reasonable to judge our current historical records by those future standards?

To answer your question about leviation, supposing that the authors weren't really interested in the timing of the event or basing their story upon that timing, does it matter? Why should you assume what the author should have thought was important?

Here's another thought for you. Have you ever been to a latin american country? In latin american countries they have a completely different concept of time than we do. If they tell you they'll be somewhere at 11 that could very well mean anytime between 10:30 and 11:30. Now I don't know very much about Latin American history but I would suppose that they don't concern themselves as much with the exact timing or order of events, because to them 10:30 is the same as 11 is the same as 11:30, and so they are more interested in the events themselves and therefore may say that one event occured before another because it doesn't matter to them.

Beach_MU

Well, it has certainly been interesting debating all this, but I'm shortly going to have to go home so I'm not going to be watching this forum as closely over the weekend, but if you'd like to continue discussing, I'd love to, just don't be surprised if there is a long delay before any response is given and don't think that such a delay is an admission of defeat either.

Anyway, it's been a pleasure discussing with you both. Have a great weekend.

Grumpy

emphasis mine

Man, you need to get some new references. It can be "easily seen" that it says "never." Which in apologist-ese means "relatively brief."

No, silly! It is easily seen that the Gospel authors accurately report events. It's just that some events happen twice. Each author wisely omits the episode from the other work, which, though similar, happened at a completely different time. Take your example...

Obviously, they're both right! Billy flew around the White House on two separate occaisions. Author "A" omits the second one, Author "B" omits the first. Come to think of it, I recall Billy levitating around the White House three or four times, but Authors "A" and "B" deftly leave out the other times, which would become tedious reading.

You know, like when Jesus healed a blind man in Luke 18:35-43 while approaching Jericho, and then healed a completely different blind man while leaving Jericho in Mark 10:46-52. Both Luke & Mark deftly omit a very similar (but completely different!) healing of two blind men outside of Jericho in Matthew 20:29-34.

I tell ya, the guy gave more sight than LensCrafters!

Vorkosigan

Did you fail to read the rest of the post? At what point did I agree with NOGO that the accounts are at odds with one another. Taking half of someone's thoughts and drawing conclusions from them doesn't fit with logic thinking, so please in the future how about being open-minded enough to at least read all of someone's idea before replying to it.

I'm sorry. I'll try not to point out the logical consequences of your position from now on.

In response to your question about the timing of the Temple scourging, does it matter?

For those of us who are interested in what actually happened and whether accounts are reliable, the answer is "yes."

Like I said the Bible is not meant to be read as a history book. That's not to say the Bible doesn't have more historical evidence and support than some of our history books which are accepted as fact,

Oh? Like which ones?

but Jesus's ministry lasted for a short three years so if one account, using general terms, says it was early and the other later does that really prove that it didn't happen or that either account is wrong.

Hmm...simple logic suggests that if one account says his activities lasted three years, and the other, one year, then one or both accounts are in error on that point.

Further, it matters in another way. The willingness of authors to move around events, anecdotes and sayings suggests that they had no idea whether this person had ever lived, and the stories they wrote are theological/legendary constructs.

Finally, the many strong differences between the wordy discourses of John and the Synoptics suggests that one set of accounts is probably not true.

So, yes, when the Temple was scourged matters. So what is your principle for sifting truth out of all the contradictions and legendary claims?

Vorkosigan