Who wrote the bible? - Page 11 - PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum

kerry · #**151** 03-14-2013, 09:44 PM

Here's what you wrote:

The subjective nature of the Spirit is in the internally (and technically externally) recognizable changes to my person and character through the work of God through Christ. I see a change in me, my wife saw a change in me, my friends saw a change in me.

So my subjective witness is not of the Bible, but of the Person of the Bible.

Your other two tests was its historical accuracy and internal coherence. Neither of those things are necessarily connected with divine inspiration since any human author could produce an historically accurate and internally coherent text. So the crucial measure is the Witness of the Spirit since this must be the supernatural source of the belief that the text is authored by God. Since you say it doesn't do that, the argument doesn't hold water.

What I wrote was: "and he conceded quite a few posts back that his Witness of the Spirit provided no reason to think that was true." That is not a misrepresentation of your argument AT ALL.

kerry · #**152** 03-14-2013, 09:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tbomachines

Pompeii eruption

Good one.

davidmash · #**153** 03-14-2013, 10:00 PM

Dinosaur die off, meteor strikes, volcanic eruptions.

martureo · #**154** 03-14-2013, 10:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kerry

First off the written record was not created until decades later.

Hmmm..... that sounds like an IRRELEVENT comment...

Quote:

That in and of itself is enough to decide the evidence doesn't carry much weight.

Are you kidding? Are you REALLY trying to fit MODERN practices into ANCIENT events?

Quote:

Even if it was written down immediately, I wouldn't believe it.

Well, we have the Carmen Christi which is said to have been circulating within a month of the resurrection... but I'm sure you wouldn't trust that either.

Quote:

Even if I saw a resurrection with my own eyes I wouldn't believe it without a huge amount of corroborating evidence just because of the overwhelming evidence to the contrary. I'd want to double and triple check that the person was really dead and then really alive. The fact that the disciples believed that Jesus resurrected is irrelevant. I don't doubt that the disciples believed it. I just don't believe them on the basis and quality of their evidence. We have no idea how gullible they were and how likely they were to believe in miraculous things. I have relatives who think God drops gold dust on them in religious services. I don't doubt the sincerity of their belief. I don't think that what they believe is true. None of them have taken the gold dust to a jeweler had it assayed. If Richard Dawkins told me that he had witnessed a resurrection I wouldn't believe him without a hell of a lot of personal critical investigation.

I read that book many years ago. It's not convincing.

So what about the Pharisees? They knew the body was missing.

martureo · #**155** 03-14-2013, 10:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tbomachines

Pompeii eruption

Find me several sources, unbiased and then tell me when it was written down.

And then tell me where those sources came from.

And how many copies we have.

martureo · #**156** 03-14-2013, 10:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kerry

Here's what you wrote:

The subjective nature of the Spirit is in the internally (and technically externally) recognizable changes to my person and character through the work of God through Christ. I see a change in me, my wife saw a change in me, my friends saw a change in me.

So my subjective witness is not of the Bible, but of the Person of the Bible.

Your other two tests was its historical accuracy and internal coherence. Neither of those things are necessarily connected with divine inspiration since any human author could produce an historically accurate and internally coherent text. So the crucial measure is the Witness of the Spirit since this must be the supernatural source of the belief that the text is authored by God. Since you say it doesn't do that, the argument doesn't hold water.

What I wrote was: "and he conceded quite a few posts back that his Witness of the Spirit provided no reason to think that was true." That is not a misrepresentation of your argument AT ALL.

Wanna bet?

I'm the propagator of the argument, I was the one putting it out on this forum. And if I say you are misrepresenting my argument.... well, you are.

The onus is then on you to find out how.

martureo · #**157** 03-14-2013, 10:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by davidmash

Dinosaur die off,

Sorry, I need a witness who wrote that down. Otherwise they might have been killed off.

Quote:

meteor strikes,

Nope, the aliens did it.

Quote:

volcanic eruptions.

Nope, never happened.

You haven't given me a single historical event with the same type of evidence you have been asking for the resurrection.

Be careful, your double standard is showing.

davidmash · #**158** 03-14-2013, 10:45 PM

Who cares about eye witness accounts. they are notoriously unreliable. Physical evidence is what counts.

Botnst · #**159** 03-14-2013, 10:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kerry

1. The fact that there is no evidence to the contrary and hearsay evidence in favor does not in any way provide grounds for belief that it happened, when the fact that it doesn't happen has overwhelming evidence.

2. Same with your black swan observation. No need to think you were lying, just not believing until the evidence is more than your word is a reasonable thing to do. Now if you were a zoologist and found a white swan with which to breed the black swan and then took pictures, that may be reasonable grounds for a European to change her mind.

3. If on the other hand, someone convinced me that I'd fry in hell if I didn't believe your black swan story, I might have some motivation to believe in the story but it would in any way provide credible evidence that the story is true. It would just explain why an otherwise rational person would believe your story in the light of overwhelming contrary evidence. Fear and self-interest can do strange things to rational judgment.

1. Absence of evidence is evidence of absence? Then you support the creationists view that missing intermediates in the fossil record are proof taht evolution does not occur.

2. Whether or not you choose to believe the report does not have anything to do with the existence of the black swan.

3. To my knowledge, nobody is forcing you to believe anything.

Botnst · #**160** 03-14-2013, 11:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by martureo

Let me make this clear.

Muhammed had no idea what Christians believed.

Muhammed got his knowledge of what Christians believed from Allah.

Therefore Allah had no idea what Christians believed.

And if Allah is ignorant, it means he's not all-knowing, thus not God.

Thanks for the attempted clarification. AS you can clearly see from this thread, knowing what Christians believe is not without ambiguity. I suspect that there are probably a billion people who call themselves Christians who do not believe as you do -- Roman Catholics. I suspect that the Christians with whom Mr Muhammad were acquainted were at least as different from you as you are from the Roman Catholics.

OR ...

God told him exactly what Christians believed that were contemporaneous with the prophet and the Christians have evolved their belief since.

Now you will argue that documents support your personal belief as the closest expression of what Christianity was. Evidence of competing Christian theories are wrong, etc. Since you have a self-referencing belief system that excludes contrary evidence (not part of your canon) there is clearly no possible argument. Faith leads you to your understanding of the evidence. That which does not speak to your faith is inconsistent with Christian beliefs because -- you know what Christians believe.

I'm guessing that I could invite a Mullah to provide exactly the same class of argument that would be in complete opposition to yours and both of you have faith as the bedrock of your argument.

This is exactly the criticism offered by the Roman philosophers concerning Christians and Jews, that their faith is merely a superstition because it demands acceptance on faith alone.

Many Christians thought Aquinas a heretic because he argued that Christianity should be logically defensible while his contemporaries thought using human logic debased faith.

kerry · #**161** 03-14-2013, 11:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Botnst

1. Absence of evidence is evidence of absence? Then you support the creationists view that missing intermediates in the fossil record are proof taht evolution does not occur.

2. Whether or not you choose to believe the report does not have anything to do with the existence of the black swan.

3. To my knowledge, nobody is forcing you to believe anything.

Not sure what your point is on #1. There's plenty of evidence that dead people stay dead.

I agree my belief has nothing to do with the existence of the black swan. The issue isn't the existence of the swan or not, the issue is the rationality of belief.

I never said anyone was forcing me to do anything. I was suggesting that once people think that their eternal fate rests upon believing certain propositions, rationality is quickly marginalized.

kerry · #**162** 03-14-2013, 11:07 PM

There were Christians in Arabia at the time of Mohammed so I'm not sure why Martureo is arguing that Mohammed got his knowledge of Christianity from Allah. It's totally possible he got it from Christians in his locale.

Botnst · #**163** 03-14-2013, 11:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by davidmash

Who cares about eye witness accounts. they are notoriously unreliable. Physical evidence is what counts.

People view the fossil record as eye witnesses. Physical evidence demonstrates that the fossil record is incomplete and inconsistent. Therefore, evolution is false.

That is the same argument you used but just with different nouns. Do you see the problem -- that fossil evidence alone is insufficient?

In the case of evolution mostly we use multiple lines of evidence and assemble an argument that best explains those multiple lines. It does not prove evolution. It does make evolution the best rational explanation for nature as we see it today.

Now apply that to an hypothesized historical event, say Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo. What do we have to prove what happened? The best evidence is from -- multiple eyewitness accounts. There is also physical evidence.

So what do we have concerning the crucifixion story? Several eyewitness accounts. Ambiguous (at best) physical evidence. And handed-down tradition. What evidence do we have to the contrary?

Botnst · #**164** 03-14-2013, 11:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kerry

1. Not sure what your point is on #1. There's plenty of evidence that dead people stay dead.

I agree my belief has nothing to do with the existence of the black swan. The issue isn't the existence of the swan or not, the issue is the rationality of belief.

3. I never said anyone was forcing me to do anything. I was suggesting that once people think that their eternal fate rests upon believing certain propositions, rationality is quickly marginalized.

1. I know the general rule is that people stay dead. But you know, that's why we call things, "miracles" and not "standard events."

2. So was my report of a black swan rational or irrational?

3. Okay, then nobody is being forced to believe a religion? I'll go with it either way but not both ways.

davidmash · #**165** 03-14-2013, 11:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Botnst

People view the fossil record as eye witnesses. Physical evidence demonstrates that the fossil record is incomplete and inconsistent. Therefore, evolution is false.

That is the same argument you used but just with different nouns. Do you see the problem -- that fossil evidence alone is insufficient?

In the case of evolution mostly we use multiple lines of evidence and assemble an argument that best explains those multiple lines. It does not prove evolution. It does make evolution the best rational explanation for nature as we see it today.

Now apply that to an hypothesized historical event, say Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo. What do we have to prove what happened? The best evidence is from -- multiple eyewitness accounts. There is also physical evidence.

So what do we have concerning the crucifixion story? Several eyewitness accounts. Ambiguous (at best) physical evidence. And handed-down tradition. What evidence do we have to the contrary?

Never ment to imply physical evidence is the end all be all. How ever if all that exists is eye witness accounts, ill pass.