Why do you do this......nobody likes you when you start a forum war like this.....o well.....I'm gonna brace myself in for a fifteen page on Reincarnation, which will lead to the belief in God, which will bring up the simple mindedness idea that Christianity is superior to all other religions, then on and on it'll go......I'll just stay out of this one.....

Squirrel Master wrote: Why do you do this......nobody likes you when you start a forum war like this.....o well.....I'm gonna brace myself in for a fifteen page on Reincarnation, which will lead to the belief in God, which will bring up the simple mindedness idea that Christianity is superior to all other religions, then on and on it'll go......I'll just stay out of this one.....

no, go ahead, i wanna see you get guested.

keithx wrote: when i'm in the shower i am usually 10% awake and fall back asleep standing up... and i think about not getting shampoo in my eyes... your showers must be pretty awesome... i need to talk to my parents about this...

yeah...thats what im like too, however if i do get enough sleep, (on rare occasions) I usually start to think about stuff, you know...like "The True Meaning of Life" and all that stuff. 

So far this is what ive got figured out:

Everything happens for a reason.  I say this because as an example (real life examlpe) i was supposed to spend the weekend at my friends cabin but my aunt died after a 34 year stuggle with diabetes.  I didnt go with my friend.  On the way through the pass, a car from oncomming traffic hit my friend car.  The passenger side where i would have been sitting was completly smashed in and i could have died.

So, i think everything happens for a reason...i dont know anything more than that though.

To address the initial question about reincarnation and population growth...  One thing to bear in mind is that *most* religions that follow doctrines of reincarnation also espouse that humans aren't the only creatures with souls.  When you take into consideration the number of animals that are killed worldwide each day for food, or the number of animals whose habitats are destroyed to make new suburbs, or even the plants in the rainforests that are being killed for any number of reasons...  Well, then it isn't that hard to accept the possible connection.

Does it have to take a pretty big jump of faith to believe that there is such a connection?  Yeah, but no more so than to believe most things that are founded on faith.  It's actually quite a bit more logical than most of the things I've heard, and that says a lot.  My major in college (and grad school) was religious studies. ;)

One more pretty important point I forgot to mention.  Not all religions that teach reincarnation deny the existence of God.  In fact, there are quite a few big ones that claim God does exist, and of those, a good number that understand God as a personal being rather than an impersonal one.  Certain Hindu religions (there's no such thing as "Hinduism") fall into this category.  The Hare Krishnas are a perfect example.

Sorry I keep posting separate entries, but...

As soon as I mentioned the Hare Krishnas, I realized that a lot of the people who are reading this are from more of a Judeo-Christian background, and so perhaps I should have used a different example.

There is a precedent among Jews to believe in reincarnation of the soul as well.  It is not common, and isn't really upheld at all today, but there is a historical precedent for it.  It was within Judaism at least as early as Kabbalists (Jewish mystics) from the middle ages, though I have a feeling it has roots as far back as pre-rabbinical Judaism (that is, before Jesus' time).  For those who don't believe me, it's cited in "What is a Jew" by Rabbi Morris N. Kertzer (Macmillan, 1993).

Does this mean that reincarnation is inherently part of the Judeo-Christian history?  Nah, not really.  But it does go to show that a significant enough number of religious scholars were able to accept that reincarnation and monotheism are not inherently exclusive.

As a Buddhist, we do not believe in a god or anything of the sort. However, Buddhism is not actually a religion either.

However, with reincarnation, new souls can be created and old souls can reach nirvanna, that is how the numbers grow. Everything has a Chi, an energy source. Bugs, mammals, reptiles, etc...are all energy holders, not just humans. Therefore, when new energy (i.e., gravity, protons, and all other sources of matter) create a new soul, it moves into the body. There is no heaven or hell, just a dissipance of the energy once the soul has reached nirvanna.

Right about now, many of the Christians reading this are thinking to themselves "well that's just goofy".

Now you know how other people think.

:)

Hehe...  Well, yeah, it is goofy.  But no more so than the belief that God had to come to earth in human flesh to redeem the failures of mankind.

As a sidenote, Christianity isn't the only religion that teaches this, and in *fact*, isn't even historically the first. You know the word "avatar", like the little symbols next to your forum name?  It's a Sanskrit word, the language from ancient India.  An avatar in an incarnation of a god in flesh who has come to earth to fulfill a task.  Vishna, the preserver god, has 10 avatars (Krishna is one of them), and they would come on the scene when the evils of mankind allowed demons to start to take over the world.  Vishnu cults have been around for hundred, and in come cases, thousands of years before Jesus' time.

Hmm, but then, Jesus is also unique in that he is one of several aspects of a single divinty.  Nope, wrong.  This isn't a new concept in the Middle East or Indus Valley regions. 

Ah yes, you say, but none of those other gods suffered death and resurrection to guide the way for humans through the darkness of death into life eternal.  Hmmmmm, wrong again.  Look at the Roman cults of Mithras, look at the Egyptian god Osiris... 

It just keeps going and going...

It's actually kinda humorous, to me at least, that Paul theoretically had access to most of these stories, seeing as how he lived in the Middle East/Mediterranean, he spoke Koine Greek (which was basically the "English" of the day, in that it was spoken all over the place by traders and was the unofficial business language basically), and was a social outcast among most Jews of any standing anyway.  I mean, he was a *converted* Jew to begin with, from Asia Minor.  He was intelligent, though.  So let's put the pieces together...  Smart guy who is basically an outsider, hears a lot of stories because of his travel and language access, disenfranched with his failed attempts at becoming accepted in Jewish society...  His job is to cart to jail these weird religious heretics who are talking about some guy named Jesus...  And suddenly, *HE* of all people on the planet, is magically picked by God to be the "chosen" one.  He sees a vision that no one else sees...  He then starts a new church.  Now, keep in mind that Paul never met Jesus while he was alive...  Also keep in mind, that there already *were* some established churches through the Apostles.  Also keep in mind that a lot of the Apostles called Paul on many of his teachings, saying they were bunk.  But in the end, Paul won out because he was preaching mostly to Gentiles (non-Jews), while the Apostles focused on the Jewish community.  Paul was dealing with a much larger crowd as well as one that wasn't as theologically insular.

Sounds a *little* fishy to me...  But, no more so than the whole reincarnation thing. ;)  If you really want to talk "goofy", there is actually a cult in India that does its religious activity by pretending to be dogs.  Seriously, the people run around on all fours, naked, barking, and eating trash in alleys.  I can't remember what the group is called though, wish I could, then I'd do a search and post a link.  But my friend in grad school wrote his thesis on them.

Just goes to show, no matter how goofy one belief may seem, you can always find something that *seems* goofier. :)

There are those that believe that the matter in which you are reincarnated depends upon your actions in your previous life. If you were good you would be reborn in more properous circumstances, and if you were bad, you would be punished by being reborn into lesser circumstances.

If you continued your good actions through the cycles of reincarnation, you would eventually become the perfect person and enter nirvana.

...  and junky schools all.

:)

adrenalinejunky wrote:   the roman cults of mithras actually started after the the death and resurection. like most of rest of thier religion mithras was taken from other sources, they first discovered it during the reign of nero, though it is believed to date back to the 1400's BC. It actually originated in India. there is also a good deal of biblical and other historical evidence to say that what would one day become the isrealite nation came from that area as well.

I was glossing over details to save the length of the post, but you are correct.  The Mithraic cult *was* an offshoot of earlier mystery cults, predominately the Dionysian/Bacchian ones.  As for the Cult of Mithras specifically beginning during Nero's reign, I would argue against that based on the little I do know.  It wasn't until around Nero's time that the Cult of Mithras became *widespread* and acknowledged by the public.  One of the keys of a mystery cult is that it tends to be around for awhile to build up steam before everyone on the street knows about it, and at that point, it has kinda gone beyond a true mystery cult.

If you look into the egyptian god osiris at all, your going to find loads of biblical similarities, that much is true, but that only fits with a biblical record, though the complete manuscripts of the bible were not yet compiled, should the biblical record be believed, and the bible has been proven very historically acurate, the writing of the bible started far earlier than the egyptian god osiris, and since the hebrew people were held captive by the egyptians for a very long time, and these people had rather strong beliefs in God, its not such a stretch to believe that the egyptians borrowed this from the isrealites.

Well, a big part of the problem here is that there really was no such thing as "the Bible" (from a Christian perspective) until several hundred years after the death of Jesus, thanks to the various ecumenical councils.  Yes, much of the writing of the various books that make up what was eventually called the Bible *were* written before Jesus was on the scene.  As for being written before Osiris?  Hmm, no...  The five books of Moses (Pentateuch) were not actually written down until between 400-200 BCE (before the common era, the 'politically correct' version of BC).  Osirian myth dates back at LEAST 1500 years before that (check out http://alexm.here.ru/mirrors/www.enteract.com/jwalz/Eliade/168.html - http://alexm.here.ru/mirrors/www.enteract.com/jwalz/Eliade/1 68.html  ). 

As for the Egyptians borrowing aspects of theology from their slaves...  Hmm, could have happened.  Not likely, but possible.  The problem is, part of the reason that Jesus caused such a fuss was because he wasn't the kind of messiah that was expected among Jews before his time.  In the Hebrew mind especially, the messiah was one who would come to lead the people out of *social and political* bondage; that is, the very same kind of bondage that the Egyptians (and several other cultures like the Babylonians) held them in.  That's a whole other discussion right there though.  By the time John the Baptist comes around, some people (like him) are starting to look at the Messiah as more of a holy figure, but even then, most of the imagery is based around Hebrew notions of a wrathful and vengeful God...  Not quite the "Love God with all your heart, and love your neighbor as yourself" stuff Jesus focused on.

nobody saw - you are correct, but other people did hear the voice (biblically speaking once again)

Of course, the citation for this is from the Bible itself, from a book that Paul himself wrote.  At best, this can be proved through hearsay, because none of the people who actually *heard* this happen wrote testimonies about that I am aware of.

and paul was born jewish, into the pharisee sect... "... I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees;...." http://www.biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?passage=ACTS+23&language=english&version=NASB&showfn=on&showxref=on - Acts 23 6

I was hoping someone would bring up the Pharisees.  To be honest, one of the BIGGEST flaws in Paul's story is his constant condemnation of the Pharisees.  You see, back in this period of Judaism, there were essentially two types of religious specialists.  The Pharisees, and the Sadducees.  The Pharisees were essentially what are known today as rabbis, and the Sadducees were the priests.  Pharisees were very, very open to theological discussion and debate.  Many of them had ideas that were *much* wackier than someone claiming to be the incarnation of God.  Generally, however, Pharisees were known for teaching that the single most important aspect of God's personality was God's love for mankind.  Sounds a little familiar, doesn't it?  Sadducees, on the other hand, were very strict traditionalists who were constantly at war with the Pharisees over the latter group's desires to reform religious activity.  You could even say that it was the Pharisees who were concerned with the spirit of the law, and the Sadducees who were concerned with the letter of the law.  If anything, the Pharisees would have been an ally of Jesus, or at least willing to engage in open debate with him.  The Sadducees on the other hand...

The problem with a lot of Paul's writing is that it almost, kinda (that's sarcasm) sounds like he's criticising the Sadducees but calling them the wrong group. ;)  If Paul really *was* part of that group, as he claims...  Why the confusion?

If you want citations for the Pharisees/Sadducees thing, I can give you a few...  PM me so I don't make this any longer than it is getting already *ugh*

example? did a keyword search on paul (www.biblegateway.com) and i've found plenty of instances of the Jews calling him out as having flase teaching, but i haven't run into one of the apostles doing that...

Again, biblegateway.com is a Christian site, so of course all of their 'citations' will be from Biblical sources, which are almost entirely Paul's writings.  You've got the Gospels, but besides that...  The New Testament is pretty much Paul's show.  Unfortunately, I don't have a book here to cite; they are all back in Indiana at my mother's house.  I can recall bits from a paper I wrote back in 1995, but that's it.  I do remember that there supposedly was at least one Apostle (I want to say Peter but I am probably wrong on that) who was pretty vocal.  I do remember that the original Jerusalem (non-Pauline) church group was called the Ebionites, and these churches were founded by the Apostles themselves.  Actually, I just did a search and found a few interesting things.  Check out the list at the bottom of http://www.ancientpaths.org/APJTnazandeb.html - http://www.ancientpaths.org/APJTnazandeb.html  to see how Ebionite teachings differed from Pauline teachings.  That first one is HUGE.  Here's another one. http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/E/Ebionite.asp - http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/E/Ebionite.asp   And another. http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/gospelebionites.html - http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/gospelebionites.html   The point is, the church as it developed out of the experiences of the Apostles was a significantly different beast than that which evolved out of Paul's missionary work.  Take into account Paul's missionary tactics (focus on Gentiles, use of language, etc) and it's easy to see why his became the dominant church.

Of course, you can also find Pauline-derived church teachings that claim that the Ebionites were "early Christian sects infected with Judaistic errors" ( http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05242c.htm - http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05242c.htm ).

I'm niether going to say that i cannot see how christianity would be far fetched or goofy, nor that reincarnation is any more so far fetched or goofy.

When it comes down to it, I think that it... whatever IT is that you believe... must be goofy.  Silly word to use, but I'm using it to make a point (not to sound condescending or offensive or anything).  The thing that makes faith great is that its strength lies in accepting something that you can't possibly have any way of knowing to be true, but you accept it as truth regardless.  In other words, faith means nothing, it has no value, if you *know*.  If whatever it is that you "believe" is something that rationality and logic tell you is true anyway, then what's the point in believing it?  This isn't just with Christianity mind you...  This is with any form of belief.

Think of faith as trusting another person with something.  If you *know* that the person won't break your trust (let's say they've been hypotized or whatever), then it really isn't an issue of having faith in them.  However, if you know that it is *possible* that they could fail you, yet you trust them regardless...  That demonstrates a level of respect and care for their autonomy as a conscious being.  It shows that you value their choice in whether or not they will betray you.  Trusting in God, having real faith, is all about saying "Yes, God might let me down.  But that's God's choice to make, and I entrust God with that decision."

Something else I meant to add to the last paragraph...  I don't mean any of my statements to be taken as attacks on belief or faith or anything.  In fact, some of the people I respect most are very intelligent, rational, logical people, and who have no problems reconciling any 'loopholes' with their Christian faith.  I respect them more for it, actually.  They say "Yeah, that might be the case.  Maybe such and such is how it really happened. *shrug* Whatever.  I still believe in my heart what I feel to be true." 

Those are the people with real faith, the ones who hear the truth (whatever that might be) in their hearts, regardless of what a book, or a website, or any silly internet forum posters might claim. :)

Clark Kent wrote: Right about now, many of the Christians reading this are thinking to themselves "well that's just goofy". Now you know how other people think. :)

LOL, that made me think a lil bit.

But I beleive what I beleive because I want to. Is there a god? yep. Do I know anything about him? Not hardly, just that i beleive i need to believe in him to get to him.

That being said, im getting naked with newport, and finding those girls in his sig....

Heck I'm with Gatyr, lol... 

Wimmins, so nice.

Actually, it was first encountered by the roman army in persia during nero's reign, and romans started following it shortly thereafter.

Like I mentioned earlier, my own studies in mystery cults is somewhat lacking, but I would love to see citations of this from more than one academically strong source.  The sources I've seen place proof of its existence at least as early as the first century, with fairly explosive growth through the third and fourth.  Mithras the divinity was transplanted from Persia, through Zoroastrianism (and supposedly earlier from Hindu sects), but the formation the worship took as a mystery cult evolved pretty firmly in the Mediterranean.  Again, this based on what I've read, which is admittedly little...  Definately not my main area of interest when I was in the field.

EDIT: On a whim, I did a few searches for Mithraic cults.  I found a couple of sites that gave dates in the BCs...  One even mentioned commentaries about the cult by Herodotus. *shrug*  So one can't really claim it was unknown to the Mediterranean world until after the time of Jesus.  Not that any of these sources are as valid as the Bible, but that isn't to say they are any less so.  Just a few...  http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=92493 - http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=92493   http://www.vetssweatshop.net/dogma.htm - http://www.vetssweatshop.net/dogma.htm  or http://www.innvista.com/culture/religion/deities/mithra.htm - http://www.innvista.com/culture/religion/deities/mithra.htm   http://www.mnatheists.org/august/solstice.html - http://www.mnatheists.org/august/solstice.html

and yet we have detailed history from thousands of years before that thats proven time and time agian to be remarkably historically acurate. biblically speaking the bible had its start with Adam, although your information on when the pentatuach was writen is a bit off, moses wrote the pentatauch (much of that was compiling earlier things) and he was alive during the exodus from egypt, around 1500 BC. though its really quite obvious that there would have had to be things dating back well before the isrealites were even in egypt, once again given its proven historical accuracies.

Could you share these historical accuracies?  I am not talking geneology records and social commentaries, let's go ahead and talk about the easier issues like fossil records and geological strata dating.  Yes, I've heard so-called creation scientists go on ad nauseum about how carbon dating is flawed, and that there is no substantial evidence that the earth is any more than the 6000 or so years old that the Bible claims it to be.  The problem is, what about the cultures that have been around at least that long, and have records and ruins around to prove it?  I mean, there was already an extremely advanced civilization in the Indus Valley around that time.  Where did they come from?  Why aren't they mentioned in the Bible?  Surely a city like Mohenjo Daro or Harappa, that had *running water systems* would have been big enough news to warrant a mention, especially since the culture was so close...  Literally just on the other side of the desert.

As for Moses, show me one scholar who actually would even think to claim that he wrote the Pentateuch.  That's crazy talk.  It was an oral tradition since the time of Moses, and *might* have been started by Moses (though that is completely impossible to prove), and only written down a few hundred years before Jesus.  Seriously, I've never heard of one legit religious scholar of the past two centuries claim that Moses was the physical author.  It isn't in the least difficult to believe that it could have been carried on through oral tradition.  Hell, in the Middle Ages there were monks who did nothing but memorize the Bible.  The whole thing, Old and New.  That's a lot more than just five books of it.

And again, I'd like more citations about the 'historical accuracies' you mention that the Pentateuch is so in sync with.  Most of the info in the Pentateuch is either A. totally unvarifiable (like claiming it was historical fact that someone talked to a burning bush), or B. geneological information to show which group of people descended from what other tribe, and they crossed River X to hang out in Savannah Y for awhile.

this was a society that had long ago given up following the true will of God, and had turned to legalism. back in the messianic prophesies there was no meantion of social and political bondage, those were imposed on the prophecies by the church leaders of the time. in the times of David and before, it was a much different story.

The problem with the Messianic prophecies of the Hebrew scriptures is that they are, generally, fairly vague.  Pretty much the only cut and dry thing that's mentioned is that the messiah would come from the line of David.  You are right though, to a degree.  There wasn't a firm emphasis on socio-political bondage.  But that's because there wasn't any kind of firm emphasis at all.

well then by the same token, you can't really prove it happened in the first place, if your going to hold up the biblical record as an arguement, you should at least accept the biblical record as a counter for that arguement.

That's exactly my point.  You *can't* prove that it happened in the first place.  It's one person's word against... Well, nothing.  But that doesn't make it true.  I could swear up and down that I just shot 30 bps from my 98custom (getting this back to PB!), but if no one was here to see it, then you can't *disprove* it.  Yeah, it flies in the face of logic, but so does Paul's claim.

you would think they would be on Jesus side, but they weren't, most likely he was pointing out how they were like the people that they were trying to be different from, read the passage i provided earlier, it shows that he knew what the pharisee's belived.

Hmmm, 'most likely'?  I'm not saying that the Pharisees weren't two-faced.  I'm sure a lot of them were, like any group of people.  But even in reading your passage, I don't see how that *shows* that he *knew* what they believed.  I see Paul trying to make a statement, and that statement is kinda fishy when matched up with the theological situation among Jews at the time.  That's all I'm saying.  As for what the Pharisees *believed*...  Well, as I mentioned earlier, one of the problems with that is that there *was* no consistent belief among them, besides the fairly strong undercurrent of accepting that God loves humanity.  Besides that, different ideas were actually pretty strongly encouraged.  Hence the problem with Paul's accounts. 

not neccessary.

so your saying I should trust these ebionites, when they follow a gospel that are knowledge of consists “solely upon the quotations given by Epiphanius”? I’ll pass.

I never said anything about trusting their point of view.  I said that they had one, and it was different than Paul's, and they were developed out of the movements of the Apostles.  If anything, I wouldn't trust them any more or any less than Paul.  The whole point of even mentioning them was to point out that not everyone who was a follower of Jesus was on Paul's side.  As for the quote you made about Epiphanius, if you read the whole paragraph it mentions that he's the only solid writer that presents us with anything substantial about their beliefs.  It doesn't say that the church was based on his writings.

I see no evidence that that church really was develop out of the experiences of the apostles.

If you want me to hunt down hardcopy citations I can, but it might take some time.  Those books are all in Indiana, and I'm in AZ.  A quick Google search did turn up this http://members.tripod.com/~ebionite/mac15.htm - http://members.tripod.com/~ebionite/mac15.htm  if you are interested.  It was the first link I clicked on, a few links down from the top when I searched.  A skimmed it, and the author mentions connections to James and Peter through the Nazarene church.  Looks like the book in question in the link, The Mythmaker: Paul and the Invention of Christianity, Hyam Maccoby. New York: Harper & Row, 1987, might provide a more thorough argument than I can here.

Actually, several of the appostles “praised” (best word I could think of) paul for his work with the gentiles.

Can you show me proof of this, outside of the Bible itself?  More specifically, *outside of the letters Paul wrote*?  If I were writing things, of course I'd want to throw in that my competition was in favor of the way I was doing things...  I'm not claiming this didn't happen, just that (again) it becomes a little fishy when the only 'proof' you have to rely on is what Paul claims.

I guess the whole discussion has kinda gotten out of hand.  Especially since I have to work in the morning, lol...  Anyway, my whole point from the beginning, going back to the issue of reincarnation, is that real faith is about accepting something as true, even if it doesn't quite mesh with all the facts.  I wasn't making a statement about how "Christianity is wrong" or anything.  Just that there might be loopholes in certain issues, and that it isn't silly to accept them as true anyway, if you have faith. 

Which is exactly why someone can accept the "logic" of reincarnation, even though there isn't really any way it can be proven to be right. :)

BenjaminAZ wrote: Like I mentioned earlier, my own studies in mystery cults is somewhat lacking, but I would love to see citations of this from more than one academically strong source. The sources I've seen place proof of its existence at least as early as the first century, with fairly explosive growth through the third and fourth. Mithras the divinity was transplanted from Persia, through Zoroastrianism (and supposedly earlier from Hindu sects), but the formation the worship took as a mystery cult evolved pretty firmly in the Mediterranean. Again, this based on what I've read, which is admittedly little... Definately not my main area of interest when I was in the field. EDIT: On a whim, I did a few searches for Mithraic cults. I found a couple of sites that gave dates in the BCs... One even mentioned commentaries about the cult by Herodotus. *shrug* So one can't really claim it was unknown to the Mediterranean world until after the time of Jesus. Not that any of these sources are as valid as the Bible, but that isn't to say they are any less so. Just a few... http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=92493 - http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=92493 http://www.vetssweatshop.net/dogma.htm - http://www.vetssweatshop.net/dogma.htm or http://www.innvista.com/culture/religion/deities/mithra.htm - http://www.innvista.com/culture/religion/deities/mithra.htm http://www.mnatheists.org/august/solstice.html - http://www.mnatheists.org/august/solstice.html

Could you share these historical accuracies? I am not talking geneology records and social commentaries, let's go ahead and talk about the easier issues like fossil records and geological strata dating.

Just a note on my earlier analysis of Osiris, upon further research it apears that Osiris may have been Nimrod:

http://www.fact-index.com/n/ni/nimrod.html - http://www.fact-index.com/n/ni/nimrod.html

and the stories of the two match up rather well... biblically speaking, Nimrod was the great grandson of Noah, and the founder of the first post diluvian civilization. he was supposed to have been in charge of the building of the tower of babel, which would make sense considering the large number of similar large structures that apeared all over the world after the division of the earth (the bible says the earth was divided in the days of peleg), such as the pyramids, aztec and mayan temples, ziggurats, ect, all of which seemed to have religious significances.

the story of the division of the earth also fits well with the theorized pangea super-continent, and would explain why african cultures had similar structures and beliefs to those of south america.

Could you share these historical accuracies? I am not talking geneology records and social commentaries, let's go ahead and talk about the easier issues like fossil records and geological strata dating.

Yes, I've heard so-called creation scientists go on ad nauseum about how carbon dating is flawed, and that there is no substantial evidence that the earth is any more than the 6000 or so years old that the Bible claims it to be. The problem is, what about the cultures that have been around at least that long, and have records and ruins around to prove it? I mean, there was already an extremely advanced civilization in the Indus Valley around that time. Where did they come from? Why aren't they mentioned in the Bible? Surely a city like Mohenjo Daro or Harappa, that had *running water systems* would have been big enough news to warrant a mention, especially since the culture was so close... Literally just on the other side of the desert.

As for Moses, show me one scholar who actually would even think to claim that he wrote the Pentateuch. That's crazy talk. It was an oral tradition since the time of Moses, and *might* have been started by Moses (though that is completely impossible to prove), and only written down a few hundred years before Jesus. Seriously, I've never heard of one legit religious scholar of the past two centuries claim that Moses was the physical author. It isn't in the least difficult to believe that it could have been carried on through oral tradition. Hell, in the Middle Ages there were monks who did nothing but memorize the Bible. The whole thing, Old and New. That's a lot more than just five books of it.

BenjaminAZ wrote: The problem with the Messianic prophecies of the Hebrew scriptures is that they are, generally, fairly vague. Pretty much the only cut and dry thing that's mentioned is that the messiah would come from the line of David. You are right though, to a degree. There wasn't a firm emphasis on socio-political bondage. But that's because there wasn't any kind of firm emphasis at all.

That's exactly my point. You *can't* prove that it happened in the first place. It's one person's word against... Well, nothing. But that doesn't make it true. I could swear up and down that I just shot 30 bps from my 98custom (getting this back to PB!), but if no one was here to see it, then you can't *disprove* it. Yeah, it flies in the face of logic, but so does Paul's claim.

Hmmm, 'most likely'? I'm not saying that the Pharisees weren't two-faced. I'm sure a lot of them were, like any group of people. But even in reading your passage, I don't see how that *shows* that he *knew* what they believed. I see Paul trying to make a statement, and that statement is kinda fishy when matched up with the theological situation among Jews at the time. That's all I'm saying. As for what the Pharisees *believed*... Well, as I mentioned earlier, one of the problems with that is that there *was* no consistent belief among them, besides the fairly strong undercurrent of accepting that God loves humanity. Besides that, different ideas were actually pretty strongly encouraged. Hence the problem with Paul's accounts.

I never said anything about trusting their point of view. I said that they had one, and it was different than Paul's, and they were developed out of the movements of the Apostles. If anything, I wouldn't trust them any more or any less than Paul. The whole point of even mentioning them was to point out that not everyone who was a follower of Jesus was on Paul's side. As for the quote you made about Epiphanius, if you read the whole paragraph it mentions that he's the only solid writer that presents us with anything substantial about their beliefs. It doesn't say that the church was based on his writings.

If you want me to hunt down hardcopy citations I can, but it might take some time. Those books are all in Indiana, and I'm in AZ. A quick Google search did turn up this http://members.tripod.com/~ebionite/mac15.htm - http://members.tripod.com/~ebionite/mac15.htm if you are interested. It was the first link I clicked on, a few links down from the top when I searched. A skimmed it, and the author mentions connections to James and Peter through the Nazarene church. Looks like the book in question in the link, The Mythmaker: Paul and the Invention of Christianity, Hyam Maccoby. New York: Harper & Row, 1987, might provide a more thorough argument than I can here.

Can you show me proof of this, outside of the Bible itself? More specifically, *outside of the letters Paul wrote*? If I were writing things, of course I'd want to throw in that my competition was in favor of the way I was doing things... I'm not claiming this didn't happen, just that (again) it becomes a little fishy when the only 'proof' you have to rely on is what Paul claims.

I guess the whole discussion has kinda gotten out of hand. Especially since I have to work in the morning, lol... Anyway, my whole point from the beginning, going back to the issue of reincarnation, is that real faith is about accepting something as true, even if it doesn't quite mesh with all the facts. I wasn't making a statement about how "Christianity is wrong" or anything. Just that there might be loopholes in certain issues, and that it isn't silly to accept them as true anyway, if you have faith. Which is exactly why someone can accept the "logic" of reincarnation, even though there isn't really any way it can be proven to be right. :)

Ugh, too much quoting to go through, and so little time.  I've only got a few minutes on here tonight, so unfortunately I'll have to make this short unless I get caught back up on it over the weekend.  Anyway, quick comments...

The historical accuracies you mention seem (from the position I am arguing) mostly coincidental and revisionist.  Yes, the Bible mentions the Tower of Babel, and there were Ziggurats in the Middle East around that time.  Yes, within a 1,000 year or so gap there were *similar* structures in other areas of the world.  Okay?  I don't see the connection except that technology has a habit of spreading across cultures pretty quickly, thanks to trade routes and the like.  I don't see how the fact that there were large temples in other parts of the world does anything to support the idea that the Bible is accurate in other areas.  That is akin to saying "Well, there are spies in the new Robert Ludlum novel, and it is set in Washington D.C.  We all know that spies and D.C. both really exist, *therefore* the plot of the book is a true story."

1400 years actually *isn't* that long of a time for something to be carried by word of mouth.  Firstly, you can't prove that it has not been altered since it was originally conceived, because we don't have a proven original copy, only that which claims to be an original copy.  Secondly, keep in mind that those 1400 years consist of just a lot of single instances of people learning it, and then passing it on.  If it can be done in the small-scale of transmission from one person to another, why is it now suddenly impossible (you did say it would take a miracle) for that event to simply happen over and over? 

However, I do agree, realistically I am sure the content changed.  I'm pretty sure of it.  How do I know this?  Because even the written version changed.  You said that the Bible is the exact same, minus a slight change in the 10 Commandments.  Hmmm, no.  Have you ever read the Tanakh?  That's the Torah, the Nevi'im, and the Ketuvim, the whole of the Hebrew Scripture.  Technically the Torah is only the Pentateuch.  Anyway, go down to the library and pick up a copy of the Jewish scriptures.  NOT the Old Testament, because there is a pretty significant difference.  Not just in certain passages and differences in translation from the Hebrew to the Greek (and Latin and so on), but even in entire books.  An example?  Well, the order for one thing.  In the Tanakh, Ruth is placed closer to the end.  In the OT, it's shortly after the Pentateuch.  Kinda problematic when taken as a cohesive historical (read: time-frame oriented) document.  Same thing with I and II Chronicles, Isaiah, and a bunch of others.  So *besides* problems with translation (which is a whole book unto itself), you can't claim that the OT is the untouched version of the Hebrew scriptures at all.

While we ARE on the subject of translation, let's hit the first passage in your list, the one about the 'virgin' birth.  Strange, the Hebrew doesn't actually say anything about that.  The Hebrew actually says young woman.  

"Assuredly, my Lord will give you a sign of His own accord!  Look, the young woman is with child and about to give birth to a son.  Let her name him Immanuel.  (By the time he learns to reject the bad and choose the good, people will be feeding on curds and honey.)  For before the lad knows to reject the bad and choose the good, the ground whose two kings you dread shall be abandonned.  The Lord will cause to come upon you and your people and your ancestral house such days as never have come since Ephraim turned away from Judah- that selfsame king of Assyria" ("Tanakh: the Holy Scriptures, The New JPS Translation According to the Traditional Hebrew Text" published by the Jewish Publication Society, 1985). 

Strange, that the Hebrew version is pointing to a woman, who was there at the time, and saying "You see this woman here?  She's going to have a son.  Before he even gets old enough to understand all this strife that's going on, God will undo all the crap these kings are putting people through."  It takes a pretty big leap in translation and assumption to get "The savior will be of virgin birth" out of that passage, when you look at it in the original context.

Skimming through your reply, due to time constraints...  Ah, technology.  My point was that if you are going to claim that the Bible is the premiere source of historical accuracy of ancient times, then it's a little odd that the books wouldn't say anything about how fundamentally important those other cities and cultures were to the development of the human race, while the Hebrews were wandering around the desert.  Of course, if you subscribe to the idea that the Bible is a excellent account of a people and culture, then absolutely.  But you made the sweeping comment that the Bible is (and I quote) "remarkably historically acurate".  Well, the problem is that cultural/social histories (from within the context of said society)are inherently flawed, because certain information is sifted out and other information is added.  Proof of this phenomenon?  Look at any grade school history text book from the 1950s.  Do you see much mention of several of the important black figures responsible for coordinating the Underground Railroad?  Nope.  Why?  Because the (white) textbook writers either didn't care, or didn't know.  Regardless, it was a non-issue to them, because that didn't really belong in a "real" history book anyway.  Does that mean it didn't happen?  One of my favorite lines of the movie "Braveheart" sums it up pretty well: "History is written by those who have hanged heros."

Skimming...  You are right, "catholic" means universal.  With a small "c".  With a capital C, it refers to the entity known as the Roman Catholic church, or its offshoots which still claim the "Catholic" title.  It doesn't refer to the other earlier branches of the church.  If it did, then the Eastern Orthodox church(es) would be called the Eastern Catholic church or something like that.  But they aren't.  Especially in the case of Orthodoxy, considering the two Churches rules co-jointly, kind of as two heads of the same body, until the early Middle Ages.

About Paul being in love with the "Jewish church" (poor choice of words, but will do).  That was one of my original points, that a *possible* motive for spearheading the Christian movement was because of his frustration with Jewish leaders at not being allowed into their 'inner circle', so to speak.  He was, and always would have been, considered an outsider to Jerusalem Jews, due to the fact that he was born in Asia Minor and was an official Roman citizen.  (That's even regardless of some sources that I remember reading several years back that stated that *supposedly* only one of Paul's parents was a Jew, anyway.  But I can't cite that, unfortunately.)

As for Acts being written by Luke...  Well, first off, that's not fact.  He's *accepted* as the probably author.  Robin Griffith-Jones, who was the chaplain and taught New Testament at Lincoln College, Oxford, who is also an ordained Anglican priest and accomplished scholar, even mentions this in his book "The Four Witnesses".  Again, going back to my original point, you can't accept the "evidence" of the Bible claiming itself to be accurate as evidence that it is actually accurate.  Though, to be fair, let's assume that Acts *was* written by the same Luke of the Gospels.  Okay, that's 1 of a dozen Apostles accounted for.  What about the rest?  What about the Apostles that actually did stuff besides chronicle events?  Luke, as a physician, was interested in structuring things, that much is evident in his version of the Gospel.  Generally speaking, he's very systematic, and focuses on the who/what/where.  He wasn't the type to go out and try establishing his own church anyway.

Okay, I'm done...  Gonna be late if I don't wrap things up.  Anyway, I do want to say real quick that I totally respect your position.  I also want to say that I do not necessarily agree with all (or *perhaps* even most) of what I've argued.  I'm just playing Devil's Advocate (a fitting term, in this case, lol), because it's so rare that I get to discuss these topics anymore now that I'm out of school *sigh*...  However, I am also a firm believer in the idea that faith that cannot be tested is not real faith, and I honestly admit that you do make some good arguments against many of my points.  I don't agree with most of them, but they are still good points.  I don't agree, because the conclusions I have come to based on the evidence leads me to a place different than where the evidence leads you.  And that's great.

Ultimately, that just reinforces my initial posts from waaaay back at the beginning of the thread, when I was countering the "Well that's dumb and silly, doesn't make sense" comments about reincarnation.  It won't make sense to some people, and will to others.  Just like how your arguments of the evidence will never convince me, and mine will never convince you.  But it's still a heck of a lot of fun to debate, when you are into that sort of thing. 

(Not trying to cop out of the discussion in the least...  I'm definately up for talking about it more, but like I said, I won't be able to contribute again until probably Sunday-ish- I work all day tomorrow again, then I have PB stuff going on Friday night and most of the day Saturday.  But I'm totally up for more if you want.  Anyway, running late, gotta book it... Later)

EDIT: Dang this turned out to be longer than I thought, sorry

Keep it up, guys - I'm enjoying this.

:)

Able to jump on for a sec, I'll try to get back to things tomorrow night or else Sunday afternoon when I've got the time...

About the sorry, I guess it was more in regards to how I kept saying I'd just skim or how I had to go or whatever, and at the length I went to I might as well have just replied point by point, lol...  Anyway, be back tomorrow/Sunday...  Cheers...

I'm majorly frustrated.  Just got done writing half of my dang reply when I accidentally clicked something, then when I freaked out and clicked "back" on my browser, everything I had written was gone.  Grr...   Sorry, I'll start over...

except that there were no trade routes from Africa to south america at that time....

Then how did a human population develop in the New World?  Obviously there was contact between people from both hemispheres.  Of course, the generally obvious answer is the Bering land bridge.  But with the younger Earth model you propose, then it would have been present in roughly the same time period, give or take a few thousand years.  Why?  Because when you are talking about geologicial land and ice masses that are hundreds of thousands of square miles, a few thousand years isn't that long of a time frame.  Of course, there is always the possibility (though I'm personally a little suspect of the 'research' I've seen that claims it) that peoples in both the Mediterranean and in China were engaged in transoceanic travel via watercraft.  I'm not saying there was any kind of large-scale, firmly established trade routes like the Silk Road or anything, but my point is that you can't say with certainty that trade routes *didn't* exist, especially with a younger Earth model.  Okay, I think that was most of what I said before my reply was lost...

ever played that game where one person whispers something in someones ear? and then they whisper that in another's, and so on, and by the end of the line of people you have something entirely different then what you started with? its the same idea... 1400 years is a very long time for that to happen, minor differences compound and pretty soon you have tons of differences, and its imposible to tell what is the correct story, because there is no written record.

Yep, but there is a glaring fault with your analogy.  In that game, the principle is that you hear the message once, and then are expected to pass it along immediately.  The oral tradition differs in two really HUGE ways: A. you have half of your lifetime to listen, learn, memorize, learn, and understand the message; and B. you have the other half of your lifetime to practice retelling it over, and over, and over, and over while in a group of other people who are also doing the same, so you can help each other out when someone forgets a part.  An example is a nursery rhyme.  Yes, you *can* buy books that have nursery rhymes, but most people learn them by hearing them.  I have never seen "Ring around the rosey" in print, but I can recount it for you without screwing it up like in the game you mentioned.  I learned it through repetition back in my spry, carefree youthful days in kindergarten.  Of course, at the time I had no idea that it was a song about people dying from the plague, but hey...

Actually, it's for this reason that I kind of trust the oral tradition more than the written one.  The written word can change just as much as the oral one, especially in terms of translations.  With oral traditions, because languages (generally) evolve very slowly, the message has time to adapt and still stay within the proper context, even though the words themselves might change.  Because the written word has the "benefit" of being more readily translated, it usually means that important nuances of context are lost.  This isn't *too* bad with closely related languages, but is killer when the languages are from two different families (like Hebrew to Greek).  An independent example of this: Chinese, generally speaking, doesn't have what we would consider "grammar".  Parts of speech are determined primarily through word order and the use of particles.  In other words, the word "SWIM" in Chinese can mean "the act of swimming" (noun/gerund), "I swim (present first person singular verb), "they swam" (past third person plural), "you will swim" (future second person singular or plural), etc...  Noun, verb, past, future, command, question, statement...  So when you see the character for "swim" in a written passage, you really need to know whatelse is going on in the sentence to hope to adequately translate it.

The point being, the transmission of information will ALWAYS have the potential for being changed, if the transmission is coming through a person.  This applies regardless to whether it is spoken or written.  However, oral traditions generally (at least in larger societies) have at least as much of a framework in place to make sure that the transmission is not compromised.

the books of the bible aren't arranged in chronological order, and nobody claims they are. I myself am not an expert on jewish scripture, but i've known, but after a bit of searching, the only real differences i've found are that there are different names for books, different number of books, some are combined/split, but there is no real content change, in the books they share. the only thing you could even try to count as that is the translation difference, which is similar to the differences between king james and niv... ony because differen't people did them and translation isn't an exact art, thus why we have interlinear and english/hebrew concordances to clear up any details.

Then how can you call it a cohesive, historically accurate document if it isn't in chronological order?  Glad to see we agree about how translation is more of an art than a science, and definately not an exact one at that.  As for concordances, the problem I would claim with them is that they are often already biased to a certain point of view, which was established before the concordance was written.  Meaning...  You have mistranslation "B", which is significantly off mark from the original passage "A".  People develop beliefs in the context of the mistaken translation.  When the concordance is written, it (even if subconsciously) will be geared towards getting "A" to sound closer to "B", because if not, then the writer of the concordance will have to face the realization that his worldview is based on a error.  This is something that, in general, the human mind is VERY poorly equipped to deal with.  If this wasn't the case, then (in the case of the 'virgin' passage) why wouldn't my copy of the Tanakh sitting on my desk mention that an alternate translation could read 'virgin'?  In most other cases, this particular book is VERY good about giving alternate renderings of the text, sometimes to the point of having 10-15 footnotes on a page.  (It's times like this when I really regret not taking Hebrew  )

the word for virgin there is the hebrew word alma, in the strongs: girl, young woman, (in certian contexts) virgin:- maid, virgins, virgin, damsels. I tried to find a non-christian translation of the word but was unable to turn up anything.

It's the "in certain contexts" I have issue with.  Because of course in a Christian translation of the word, it will be interpreted as virgin.  Show me a Jewish-oriented definition of the Hebrew word that says that, and I'll budge.  I mean, I'm sure that the ancient Hebrews had a word for virgin that Jewish scholars today would accept as the standard word for virgin?  At root of it, at the root of this whole portion of the discussion, is the problem of *context*.

http://www.biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?passage=ISA+7&language=english&version=NIV&showfn=on&showxref=on - Whole chapter of isaiah 7 looks like a prophecy of a coming savior to me...

Again, from http://www.biblegateway.com - www.biblegateway.com , and from the NIV translation of the Christian Bible...  Show me some rabbinical commentaries of the original Hebrew version of the text that declare it as you read it, and we'll talk...  Until then, it's an interpretation, and an interpretation of a translation to boot.

I do not claim the bible to be an all-inclusive history book, i claim it to be a history of specific events, to which it is limited, and it all that it meantions, it has proven time and time again accurate, that is what i mean when i say remarkably historically accurate. and just because most histories are flawed, doesn't make all of them so...

Okay, something we can finally (mostly) agree on.  I fully agree that the Bible is an excellent history of a people.  In that fashion, it is inherently limited in scope.  Assuming that the authors weren't just 'making things up', then yep, it will be very accurate.  As far as their society was concerned, at least.  Meaning, that if a certain book of the OT talks about some kind of king or culture outside of the Hebrew people, then it will inherently be flawed because it is written from outside the context of what was going on with said king or culture.  It will be an account of the Hebrew people's *observations*, in so far as said culture interacted with them.

But I would disagree with the statement about how not all histories are inherently flawed.  Language itself is a human tool, and humans are not perfect.  We do not have perfect perceptions of the whole of what is around us, and therefore even the *best* history cannot be 100% accurate.  At the very LEAST, some things will be occasionally omitted.  However, it is absolutely true that some histories will be remarkably more flawed than others.

it was actually a term used to describe christians as a groop, when you were saved you entered the catholic(universal) church. and actually, eastern orthodox church wasn't in existence till a good bit later, it split off from the RC church.

I think the problem was that I didn't phrase what I said properly.  In that regard, you are right.  Kinda.  There was no "Roman Catholicism" vs. "Eastern Orthodox" until 1054.  It was the "Catholic" church, but it was meant more as a reference to it being the universal church rather than as an actual title.  However, there *were* two distinct bodies within the church, that effectively were those groups.  There was the center of power in the west (Rome), and the center of power in the east (Constantinople).  It's unfair and biased to say that the EO church 'broke away' from the RC church, because that's not really what happened.  Both factions had major differences in language, practice, doctrine, politics, and organizational structure.  They were both of relatively equal standing and power.  To say that the EO 'broke away' is to imply that it somehow went "renegade" and just left.  To be more accurate, all the pressure from the differences that I mentioned (plus the advancement of Islam on both sides, at Asia Minor and Spain) caused the already thin bond between the two churches to snap.  The Crusades made the problem even worse, when all of a sudden the now RC church decided that its 'poor lost little brother church in the east' now needed to be saved from encroaching Muslims.  The problem was, at that point, you could almost argue that the EO church was nealy as different from the RC church as it was from Islam.

perhaps, though i don't see anything that really shows thats how it happened, just speculation.

I agree, that was my point.  It's total speculation.  I'm not claiming that's what happened, just that it's a possibility.

http://www.biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?passage=2PET+3:15&language=english&version=NIV&showfn=on&showxref=on - 2 Peter 3:15 peter was written by peter.

Yep, and all I see is that Peter claims that Paul was given wisdom, and that even though things are hard to understand, they should believe in Christ.  That's all I'm reading in my King James version.  Let me check the link for the NIV.  Hmm, pretty much the same thing.  What I was asking for was evidence that the Apostles (as a group) supported the direction that Paul was taking the developing church.  It's obvious that Paul became a Christian.  And it's obvious that Christians were persecuted.  I didn't claim that the Apostles were all venomously calling Paul a fraud in public or anything like that.  Just like the saying goes, an enemy of my enemy is my friend.  Of course the Apostles, or at least many of them, are going to at least give lip service to Paul (especially when his version of the church is growing in leaps and bounds).  But it doesn't mean that they support all of what he claims.  Now if Peter had written "Listen to Paul, for in truth can he show you how to find Jesus, the wisdom God has given him will lead you to the truth of salvation", then I'd shut up.  But that's not what Peter says.  He says "Paul has wisdom (but you notice that he doesn't elaborate)" and then he says "Yes, things are confusing, but believe (in Christ) and you will be saved".  Essentially two sentences.  And the second one was something that the Apostles were already saying anyway.

I do see your point, and I see how that passage could be taken as "the Apostles hereby support Paul... Yay Paul!"  But honestly, I don't really see that.  Yes, I know that Peter wouldn't be writing to glorify Paul, because Peter is (and rightfully should be) glorifying God, and that's why he doesn't go on about how much he supports him, but...  Still.  It just doesn't seem like a very solid endorsement to me. 

It reminds me of all these signs I've seen up around my town lately for the upcoming elections.  "Police and Fire Department support Bob Smith!"  Well, okay.  I would assume first off that they would support anyone who wasn't in favor of committing crimes and starting fires.  And I'm sure that the $100 donation to the policeman's ball by Bob Smith didn't hurt either.  But usually those kinds of "support" statements aren't really based on anything besides maybe a "Yeah, sure, he's a good guy" kind of comment that some 2nd lieutenant made because Mr. Smith's campaigner called him at 8am and asked if he thought the candidate would do a good job if elected.  "Yeah, sure, whatever, I'm late for work."

In other words, when people really support something or someone, it tends to be the case that they make a point to get that across to people.  Especially in something as important as the salvation of people's souls.  *shrug*  Again, I see where others could interpret those few lines as doing that, but I just can't read it that way.

sorry? as if my posts have been short... its a debate, these things tend to get long winded, nothing to apologize for. And i'm, certainly up for discusing more, i always learn alot when i get in a good debate, forces me to do a lot of research that i normally slack off on.... And its been a good while since i've been in a debate this good.

Lol, yeah tell me about it.  I used to do this thing all the time years ago, but it's been so long.  My brain muscles definately haven't had a work out in awhile, which is sad.  I've probably gone through half of the books I've got here during the course of all this, lol.  They're all scattered about the room at the moment.  But it's great to do, even if I know I won't win.  Heck, that just makes it more interesting.  Good debating on your part though, you definately know your stuff.   I can't count the times I've encountered people (on all sides of this sort of argument, from both my position and yours) who act like they know their stuff, but really have no clue of what they are talking about.  You ask them to back up their claims, and they just either stare at you, or go into personal attack mode. *sigh*  If I may ask, what denomination are you, and what part of the country?  Not as part of the debate or anything, just curious.   Oh and the important part...  What's your marker?    Duh, guess I could just check your profile too, lol...

Trogdor2 wrote: I'm gonna sum up this hardcore debate with on sentence-thing... Jesus>You.

I have absolutely zero problem in supporting that statement, Trogdor.  He's way greater than any of us here.  And he *might* almost be greater than William Shatner, but that remains to be seen.

  That last part was a joke, before I get people cursing my name, heh.  But yeah, I fully admit that Trogdor is right, though I would imagine that my reasons for believing so aren't quite the same as his.

I go to a Christian HS and it's weird. I believe in God but I do not pray to him. What's he gonna do for me that I can't do for myself?

Some teachers pray to him like he's writing them a check for $10 million at that moment. It's amazing. There is nothing God can do for us that we cannot do for ourselves.

Boomstick- Yeah, you said it.  If it goes on much longer I'm gonna make a point to keep things short and sweet.

Grunt- Just because I like to play Devil's Advocate...  Isn't God, by definition, by virtue of being a superior being, capable of doing things that we can't?  Therefore, why couldn't he do things for us that we are incapable of doing for ourselves?  For instance, curing a certain crippling disease, or even something as silly as clearing up the weather for the afternoon so we can play a good game of PB?  Bear in mind that just because God *can* do something, doesn't mean he will.  Just that he could.  And I don't think any of us here on Earth are capable of manipulating the weather. 

Well, except William Shatner.  (See my last post, lol)

Yep, but there is a glaring fault with your analogy. In that game, the principle is that you hear the message once, and then are expected to pass it along immediately. The oral tradition differs in two really HUGE ways: A. you have half of your lifetime to listen, learn, memorize, learn, and understand the message; and B. you have the other half of your lifetime to practice retelling it over, and over, and over, and over while in a group of other people who are also doing the same, so you can help each other out when someone forgets a part. An example is a nursery rhyme. Yes, you *can* buy books that have nursery rhymes, but most people learn them by hearing them. I have never seen "Ring around the rosey" in print, but I can recount it for you without screwing it up like in the game you mentioned. I learned it through repetition back in my spry, carefree youthful days in kindergarten. Of course, at the time I had no idea that it was a song about people dying from the plague, but hey... Actually, it's for this reason that I kind of trust the oral tradition more than the written one. The written word can change just as much as the oral one, especially in terms of translations. With oral traditions, because languages (generally) evolve very slowly, the message has time to adapt and still stay within the proper context, even though the words themselves might change. Because the written word has the "benefit" of being more readily translated, it usually means that important nuances of context are lost. This isn't *too* bad with closely related languages, but is killer when the languages are from two different families (like Hebrew to Greek). An independent example of this: Chinese, generally speaking, doesn't have what we would consider "grammar". Parts of speech are determined primarily through word order and the use of particles. In other words, the word "SWIM" in Chinese can mean "the act of swimming" (noun/gerund), "I swim (present first person singular verb), "they swam" (past third person plural), "you will swim" (future second person singular or plural), etc... Noun, verb, past, future, command, question, statement... So when you see the character for "swim" in a written passage, you really need to know whatelse is going on in the sentence to hope to adequately translate it. The point being, the transmission of information will ALWAYS have the potential for being changed, if the transmission is coming through a person. This applies regardless to whether it is spoken or written. However, oral traditions generally (at least in larger societies) have at least as much of a framework in place to make sure that the transmission is not compromised.

Then how can you call it a cohesive, historically accurate document if it isn't in chronological order?

Glad to see we agree about how translation is more of an art than a science, and definately not an exact one at that. As for concordances, the problem I would claim with them is that they are often already biased to a certain point of view, which was established before the concordance was written. Meaning... You have mistranslation "B", which is significantly off mark from the original passage "A". People develop beliefs in the context of the mistaken translation. When the concordance is written, it (even if subconsciously) will be geared towards getting "A" to sound closer to "B", because if not, then the writer of the concordance will have to face the realization that his worldview is based on a error. This is something that, in general, the human mind is VERY poorly equipped to deal with. If this wasn't the case, then (in the case of the 'virgin' passage) why wouldn't my copy of the Tanakh sitting on my desk mention that an alternate translation could read 'virgin'? In most other cases, this particular book is VERY good about giving alternate renderings of the text, sometimes to the point of having 10-15 footnotes on a page. (It's times like this when I really regret not taking Hebrew ) It's the "in certain contexts" I have issue with. Because of course in a Christian translation of the word, it will be interpreted as virgin. Show me a Jewish-oriented definition of the Hebrew word that says that, and I'll budge. I mean, I'm sure that the ancient Hebrews had a word for virgin that Jewish scholars today would accept as the standard word for virgin? At root of it, at the root of this whole portion of the discussion, is the problem of *context*.

Again, from http://www.biblegateway.com - www.biblegateway.com , and from the NIV translation of the Christian Bible... Show me some rabbinical commentaries of the original Hebrew version of the text that declare it as you read it, and we'll talk... Until then, it's an interpretation, and an interpretation of a translation to boot.

Okay, something we can finally (mostly) agree on. I fully agree that the Bible is an excellent history of a people. In that fashion, it is inherently limited in scope. Assuming that the authors weren't just 'making things up', then yep, it will be very accurate. As far as their society was concerned, at least. Meaning, that if a certain book of the OT talks about some kind of king or culture outside of the Hebrew people, then it will inherently be flawed because it is written from outside the context of what was going on with said king or culture. It will be an account of the Hebrew people's *observations*, in so far as said culture interacted with them. But I would disagree with the statement about how not all histories are inherently flawed. Language itself is a human tool, and humans are not perfect. We do not have perfect perceptions of the whole of what is around us, and therefore even the *best* history cannot be 100% accurate. At the very LEAST, some things will be occasionally omitted. However, it is absolutely true that some histories will be remarkably more flawed than others.

I think the problem was that I didn't phrase what I said properly. In that regard, you are right. Kinda. There was no "Roman Catholicism" vs. "Eastern Orthodox" until 1054. It was the "Catholic" church, but it was meant more as a reference to it being the universal church rather than as an actual title. However, there *were* two distinct bodies within the church, that effectively were those groups. There was the center of power in the west (Rome), and the center of power in the east (Constantinople). [/quote]

while true, constantiane didn't even convert till the early 310's, roughly 280 years after the death of jesus. and byzantium was renamed constantianople in the 320's. as you recal, what brought this up was weather catholic was used to refer to earlier churches, what i was showing is that the EO church isn't an good example to use for this.

It's unfair and biased to say that the EO church 'broke away' from the RC church, because that's not really what happened. Both factions had major differences in language, practice, doctrine, politics, and organizational structure. They were both of relatively equal standing and power. To say that the EO 'broke away' is to imply that it somehow went "renegade" and just left. To be more accurate, all the pressure from the differences that I mentioned (plus the advancement of Islam on both sides, at Asia Minor and Spain) caused the already thin bond between the two churches to snap. The Crusades made the problem even worse, when all of a sudden the now RC church decided that its 'poor lost little brother church in the east' now needed to be saved from encroaching Muslims. The problem was, at that point, you could almost argue that the EO church was nealy as different from the RC church as it was from Islam.

Yep, and all I see is that Peter claims that Paul was given wisdom, and that even though things are hard to understand, they should believe in Christ. That's all I'm reading in my King James version. Let me check the link for the NIV. Hmm, pretty much the same thing. What I was asking for was evidence that the Apostles (as a group) supported the direction that Paul was taking the developing church. It's obvious that Paul became a Christian. And it's obvious that Christians were persecuted. I didn't claim that the Apostles were all venomously calling Paul a fraud in public or anything like that. Just like the saying goes, an enemy of my enemy is my friend. Of course the Apostles, or at least many of them, are going to at least give lip service to Paul (especially when his version of the church is growing in leaps and bounds). But it doesn't mean that they support all of what he claims. Now if Peter had written "Listen to Paul, for in truth can he show you how to find Jesus, the wisdom God has given him will lead you to the truth of salvation", then I'd shut up. But that's not what Peter says. He says "Paul has wisdom (but you notice that he doesn't elaborate)" and then he says "Yes, things are confusing, but believe (in Christ) and you will be saved". Essentially two sentences. And the second one was something that the Apostles were already saying anyway.

Grunt- Just because I like to play Devil's Advocate... Isn't God, by definition, by virtue of being a superior being, capable of doing things that we can't? Therefore, why couldn't he do things for us that we are incapable of doing for ourselves? For instance, curing a certain crippling disease, or even something as silly as clearing up the weather for the afternoon so we can play a good game of PB? Bear in mind that just because God *can* do something, doesn't mean he will. Just that he could. And I don't think any of us here on Earth are capable of manipulating the weather.

Hey, only got a few mins myself, need to get to bed- work in the morning and all.

Actually, as much as you probably wouldn't expect it...  I kinda *do* accept the Jews for Jesus stuff as a Jewish position.  I mean, I don't know whether or not I consider them reliable in a scholarly sense (I know of them, but have never put forth much effort to research them to any real degree, only seen/heard things here and there)...  But as a social phenomenon coming out of the context of Jewish heritage/culture, I've got to give them credit.  Doesn't mean I think their arguments hold up, because like I said I haven't read them well enough yet.  But I'll count them as, like, a *fuzzy* credible source, at least until I've got more info.

Anyway, bed calls...  Not sure how much I'll be on through the week, but I'll make it back when I can.

EDIT: No doubt on the Devil thing, but I don't think it's just this debate.  Had it happen to me a little while ago while trying to pay for PB stuff for my wife from eBay through PayPal, ugh...

Ahh, finally back.  Sorry it took me so long to get back.  Stupid work.  When I got into the discussion I was on the end of my vacation, and I guess all that freetime got to me, lol... 

Anyway, where were we.  Ugh, I don't even know.  I think this thread has pretty much burned out anyway, only because I know that it will just keep going back and forth, lol.  So I'm willing to call it over, if you are.  I'll even declare you the victor (only because I'm the one throwing in the towel, haha  ).  I know I would never convince you (which isn't my intent, I was just doing it more as an intellectual challenge/Devil's advocate thing like I mentioned anyway), and I don't think you'd convince me (I've heard most of the arguments since well before I got into religious studies).  I think if we kept it up, it would just go in circles until everyone would yell at us to shut up and stop wasting server space, lol...

But yeah, on a serious note, I did check out the CPPA page.  Pretty cool, I applaud your efforts.  Especially the "Paintball Isn't" area.  It's a shame to know that a lot of people think of us that way, that a lot of parents won't let their kids get into it because of those reasons.  I guess with the fairly recent surge in popularity of PB that might change as the word gets out, but... *shrug*  Oh well.

Jesus Christ!!!

Can't you lil niglets find something else to do other than spend all you time in this forum rotting your brains while trying to start big arguements between members to make yourself noticed so you can actually feel important for once in your life.

Just step away from the computer for a minute, go outside, take a walk and think about the trees and the little squirrels for a change, instead of whether or not there is or isn't a god.

I'll tell you right now, there isn't!

I know there isn't, but I'm not gonna waste my time trying to convince any of you freakin' ignorant bigots that there isn't cuz it's just a waste of my time as well as yours.

God is just a "grown-up's Santa Clause".

Just deal with it and move on.

Lawless wrote: Jesus Christ!!! Can't you lil niglets find something else to do other than spend all you time in this forum rotting your brains while trying to start big arguements between members to make yourself noticed so you can actually feel important for once in your life. Just step away from the computer for a minute, go outside, take a walk and think about the trees and the little squirrels for a change, instead of whether or not there is or isn't a god. I'll tell you right now, there isn't! I know there isn't, but I'm not gonna waste my time trying to convince any of you freakin' ignorant bigots that there isn't cuz it's just a waste of my time as well as yours. God is just a "grown-up's Santa Clause". Just deal with it and move on.

Rather an ignorant bigot than an angry anti-intellectual closed-minded victim of my own sarcasm.

If you don't like it, don't read it.  Feel free to rot your brain your own way.

now if we had a god(no comment)...y would he(no comment) do something like this?

^^^^^  Because it's funny?

Ouch... the pic I mean.  As for Lawless's comments... 

I find it most interesting that he thinks it's a waste of time for us to write all of that, and to be so concerned with an issue on an online forum...  Yet he obviously took the time to read through the post, *and* went out of his way to reply to it?  Kinda the pot calling the kettle black, eh?

As for getting outside among the trees and squirrels and all...  Did it twice so far today.  Was going to go out again tonight, but I've got too much going on tomorrow, between work, going to the gym, going to dinner with my wife, and possibly stopping by my kung fu class.  Oh, and taking my dog out for a run at some point to look at more trees and squirrels, if there is time.