Well, after breaking 2000 comments on the previous thread, I think it’s time to move to a new one. Feel free to continue the conversation here.
Also, I want to make a note about future posts. The tone on this blog for the last month or so has been decidedly different than what it used to be. While that’s definitely made things interesting, I’d like to move back to a tone more in line with the way things used to be. So going forward, I want the comments on all new posts to remain civil. We can all make our points, and I expect to see a wide range of opinions. But I don’t want to get into name-calling and bashing when we can’t all agree on particular issues. Let’s try to stay focused on the points and not get side-tracked with personal stuff. Let’s also keep each comment substantive so we don’t rack up so many comments in such a short period of time that it’s hard for everyone to keep track.
If you don’t feel like you can participate within those guidelines, then feel free to continue posting within this thread (and any future “Kathy” threads, if they’re needed), because I won’t be enforcing any guidelines here. But if you want to comment on any other posts, you’ll need to abide by the rules I just laid out. Otherwise, your comment will be subject to deletion, and after a warning, you might find yourself banned from at least that thread, if not the entire blog.
If there are any questions, let me know.
Thanks
Ruth,
“I haven’t been compelled by your reasoning that your legends are true. I have no reason to believe or think that your legends are any less rife with myth than any other legends.
You have not given:
: something which shows that something else exists or is true
: a visible sign of something
: material that is presented to a court of law to help find the truth about something
Thanks for your EDITED definition… MORE dishonesty by you.
“I have said over and over again that the evidence is inconclusive so it’s difficult to draw a conclusion (aka that which is most likely) from a scenario in which the information is so little and also spurious(false, not dependable, not genuine in case you didn’t read the definition of that word)”
Yet, you drew a conclusion about God “most likely” not being real. Where’s your “conclusive” evidence for that Ruth? MORE dishonesty by you.
“Now, I have answered you question for the 20th time probably. You have yet to answer why it is more likely except to say: They preached the gospel, Christians were martyred, so therefore they must have been martyred. This is your evidence? ”
No you haven’t answered my question Ruth.
And you just repeated my ARGUMENT.. that is BASED on the undisputed EVIDENCE of Christians being martyred during that time. You continue to FAIL to grasp the concept of a COUNTER argument to the specific point of mine that you just typed and called my “evidence”.. instead of my ARGUMENT that you cannot counter. No wonder liberals don’t like to debate.. you don’t understand the meaning or value.. it’s all just “mean”.
“Kathy, I’ve never seen anyone so aggressively try to force their beliefs(and that’s all they are) on someone else.”
Ruth, more confusion by you.. I’m not “forcing” anything on you.. the pressure you feel is due to your REFUSAL to be HONEST. Yes, I am trying very hard to get you to be HONEST.. to apply OBJECTIVITY. But the obvious problem is that you don’t WANT to do so.. because that would mean you were wrong.. and it’s all about being “right” with liberals.. that afterlife/ eternity stuff.. meh.. not as important. More proof of how DESTRUCTIVE pride and ego is.
” Especially when you have so little evidence and your points are weak. You have strong belief and that is all.”
Ruth, you don’t know how to process information.. and you don’t know how to do it objectively/ honestly. And you aren’t alone.. this is what makes a liberal a liberal. You don’t “know” how to do it because your pride won’t let you. If you let go of your pride and ego, you’d gain the knowledge of discernment and objectivity. You all are your own worst “enemies”.. you’re your OWN victims. It’s frustrating and depressing to witness.. especially for as long as I have now.
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Gary, your claim of Mormonism having more evidence is truly laughable.
The Bible has 40 authors over 1500 years and from different parts of the world all agreeing on the claims of the Bible.. that God is our Creator. And many if not most gave their lives to testify to the Truth they claim.
You think that 11 men from the SAME time.. and same place (all knowing each other) who didn’t give their lives, claiming to see something that there is NO evidence for it’s authenticity except for ONE man’s word… is “better” evidence for the truth of Mormonism.
You’ve just given an excellent example of a complete lack of objectivity and/ or a real inability to discern information honestly.
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And, of course, Arch.. another liberal who lacks discernment ability and objectivity/ honesty, agrees with you.
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@Gary M,
Wade into this at your own risk. It took me these nearly 5000 comments on 3 different threads to realize that Kathy doesn’t know the difference between evidence and arguments. And if I copy and paste the definition of evidence from the Merriam-Webster online dictionary is that editing? Who knew?
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” And if I copy and paste the definition of evidence from the Merriam-Webster online dictionary is that editing? Who knew?”
Give the link Ruth..
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Yes, Ratamacue0. Definitely time for verse 4.
Incidentally, I still like Proverbs, too. Along with the Psalms. Frankly, I still like to read the Bible.
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http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/evidence
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oh, look what you conveniently EDITED OUT..
“Full Definition of EVIDENCE
1
a : an outward sign : indication
b : something that furnishes proof : testimony; specifically : something legally submitted to a tribunal to ascertain the truth of a matter
2
: one who bears witness; especially : one who voluntarily confesses a crime and testifies for the prosecution against his accomplices
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The claim that Yahweh is the creator of the universe is not the default position, regardless of your inability or unwillingness to accept any alternatives, including the proposition that the answers to stick questions may not be revealed to us by a deity.
Lol.. The largely anonymous authors, several of whom wrote under false names, all agree about one aspect of their often vague and sometimes apparently contradictory writings? Did they live in cultural vacuums and communicate telepathically, such that no one could’ve passed on the stories, alleging their truth?
Oops… Verse 4, verse 4… DOH!
Do you think Kathy will cite this as her first example of my hypocrisy?
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“The Bible has 40 authors over 1500 years and from different parts of the world all agreeing on the claims of the Bible.. that God is our Creator. And many if not most gave their lives to testify to the Truth they claim.”
I agree that all the authors of the Bible claim that Yahweh is God, the Creator. I agree that many devout Hebrews and devout Christians gave their lives in defense of this belief. But the question is: does that prove that Yahweh exists and is the Creator of the Universe?
Islam is almost as old as Christianity. Many Muslim theologians over the last 1,400 years have claimed that Allah is God, the Creator. Many Muslims have died for that belief. Does that prove that Islam is true? Of course not. It only proves that very devout people can believe false beliefs and will die for that false belief.
If one Hebrew/Christian writer 3,500 years ago in Palestine wrote about Yahweh, and then another Hebrew/Christian (Believer) 3,000 years ago in France wrote about Yahweh, without any knowledge of anyone else in the world knowing about Yahweh, and then 2,500 years ago a Believer in Persia, not knowing that anyone else in the world knew about Yahweh, wrote about Yahweh, and this story repeated itself 40 times, with 40 authors, none of them knowing that anyone else had written about or knew about Yahweh…then you would have an argument, Cathy.
But the facts are these: Moses did not write the first five books of the Bible. Someone else did. Some else who leaves a lot of clues that he or they were writing in a much later time period than the time in which he was pretending to write. We have concrete proof that the Patriarchs, the slavery in Egypt, the Exodus, the Wandering in the Sinai, the Conquest of Canaan, the great Kingdoms of David and Solomon—never existed or happened. They are fables, most likely invented by priests during the reign of King Josiah, after the Kingdom of Israel had been taken away by the Assyrians, and then by priests during and after the Babylonian Captivity.
Jesus and his disciples believed that these books had been written by Moses, Joshua, etc. Jesus and his disciples believed that the Exodus and the Passover really happened. So the followers of Jesus wrote their Gospels and Epistles based on “Scripture” that has been proven to be nothing but imaginary fables. It has been clearly shown that two if not three of the Gospels used the first Gospel Mark as a template. Many of the latter epistles, especially II Peter, are blatantly forgeries.
So the idea that 40 authors over 1500 years, writing in different locations, without any knowledge of what the other authors had written is nonsense. Some priest or priests in King Josiah’s court invented a bunch of nationalistic stories to solidify the Hebrew people around the Judean monarchy, and subsequent priests, Gospel writers, and authors of the Epistles simply built upon these fables.
There is nothing miraculous about the Bible. Nothing at all. It is RIDDLED with contradictions and inconsistencies. One only has to read the six Resurrection accounts to see that this book was written by fallible human beings, no different from any other book written by humans. The Bible is no more inerrant than is the Koran.
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Well-said, Gary.
Do you have your own blog? Add some citations to your last two comments, and I think they could be post-worthy. If you want.
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Kathy wrote:
“Yet, you drew a conclusion about God “most likely” not being real. Where’s your “conclusive” evidence for that Ruth? MORE dishonesty by you.”
Kathy, YOU have drawn a conclusion (formed a position, opinion, or judgment) that god is real … yet YOU have not provided any “conclusive evidence” (put an end to doubt or question) about the conclusion you have drawn. Thus, YOU are being dishonest.
Truly, I’m amazed that you write the same things over and over and over again and not recognize that you have not provided ANY evidence of ANYTHING. Yet you continue to blame others for their lack of evidence.
You simply do not have ANY FACTS to back up ANY of your assertions. You reference the bible, but as nearly everyone has submitted thus far, the bible is bogus. Give us some unbiased, impartial evidence and perhaps you’ll actually convince someone of your viewpoints.
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Does anyone here see how what I copied and pasted is significantly different than the full definition. I don’t see it. And I still don’t see where Kathy has given anything close to the definition of evidence.
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Do you think Kathy will cite this as her first example of my hypocrisy?
No, she’s too busy avoiding giving any actual evidence to bother citing examples of your hypocrisy.
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Alleged hypocrisy, thankyouverymuch. 😛
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Well, I’m allegedly dishonest, deliberately ignorant, hypocritical, and unable to process information.
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Give us a list, Kathy, of which of the 40 authors of the Bible gave their lives “to testify to the Truth they claim” – this is how debate works, Kath, you make a claim, then back it up with evidence.
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Ratamacue 0,
If you click on my name, and go to my profile, you will see my blog name and web address (I just updated my profile). Two months ago I was a devout, orthodox Christian blogger. I made the “mistake” one day of going onto the blog of an ex-Christian atheist to “bring him back to Christ”. Instead of re-converting him, I deconverted. I deconverted from orthodox Christianity after four months of intense discussion with many of the people commenting on this blog. I came to see that Christianity is a house of cards, built upon some amazing assumptions, that I had always believed as undisputed fact. For example: I believed that there was clear evidence that the Gospels were written by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. In actuality, there is zero proof for who wrote these books. Tradition, not evidence, attributes them to the above disciples.
It is amazing how Protestants and evangelicals will condemn many of the beliefs of the Roman Catholic Church which are based on tradition, but Protestants in actuality have many beliefs themselves that are based on Tradition alone. The biggest of these is the Canon of the New Testament. The very men who Baptists, evangelicals, and Reformed Protestants condemn for teaching infant baptism and baptismal regeneration are the same men who decided which books were “in” and which were “out” of the New Testament Canon.
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RE: “Arch.. another liberal who lacks discernment ability and objectivity/ honesty” -Then help me to see the light, Kathy – just give me evidence for the following:
“What don’t I have evidence for Ruth?? Please be specific“:
1. The existence of a god named Yahweh
2. The existence of ANY god or gods
3. The existence of Yeshua, his life, death and resurrection
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Ruth, here are the definitions I have of evidence:
(1) Your basis for belief or disbelief; knowledge on which to base belief
(2) An indication that makes something evident
(3) (law) all the means by which any alleged matter of fact whose truth is investigated at judicial trial is established or disproved
Perhaps Kathy is using def #1 because what she presents is HER basis for belief, thus, viola! It is evidence!
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Thanks, Nan. I do apologize if my unintentional edit alters the definition in a significant way. I was certainly not my intention to be deceptive in any way. We’re all grown ups here and I assumed we were all operating under the same impression of what evidence means. I didn’t really think it was necessary to define evidence since it’s already been done several times(no, I’m not saying by me).
Good, grief. Such utter nonsense. Like I said; her argument has become her evidence. Sure, we all agree that Christians have been martyred. More Christians have not been martyred than have been martyred, so I don’t think we can draw a conclusion that particular Christians were martyred because some Christians have been.
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Wow, Gary M, good to see you really know your stuff – these are things I’ve been telling Kathy since Post #1, to the point that she now avoids my comments, rather than trying to refute them, as an actual debater would do.
I DO have to call you on one minor point: “I agree that all the authors of the Bible claim that Yahweh is God, the Creator.” – actually, “Yahweh doesn’t enter the picture until the beginning of Exodus, after the Jews, in the person of Moses, make contact with the Kennites/aka Midianites, a nomadic tribe who worshipped a minor desert god they called YHWH – prior to that, the entity that introduced itself to Abraham called itself “El Shaddai,” another name for Amurru, a god brought to Mesopotamia by the Amurrites who settled in Aleppo, Syria, before branching out and ultimately conquering the Akkadians and finally giving us Hammurabi, the great lawgiver, upon whom the creative Jews modeled their imaginary Moses.
That Abraham hailed from Syria and brought his god with him, can be seen in his nephew, Laban, who stayed behind in Haran, near the Syrian border, and throughout Genesis, is known as “Laban the Syrian” – now if you’re Syrian, in a close-knit culture, doesn’t it kinda follow that your uncle Abe would be too?
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Yes, “Archae”, you caught me. I was trying to avoid going into too much detail.
But you are right. The Hebrew Bible (the Old Testament) very clearly shows that the Patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob) regularly worshiped and prayed to TWO Canaanite gods, one named El (Elohim) and one named Yahweh. Researchers of the ancient Levant cultures have discovered that the Canaanites (of which the Hebrews were but one tribe) had a “council” of gods. Elohim was the chief god. Yahweh was on Elohim’s council, and eventually was adopted as the national god of the Hebrews. That is why in Genesis you will see the Hebrew word translated in English as “God” referred to at times by the name “Elohim” and other times by “Yahweh”.
When you were in Sunday School, did you ever wonder, “Who the hell is Melchezidek?” Your Sunday School teacher and pastor probably tried to convince you that Melchezidek was Jesus, but the truth is that Melchezidek was the high priest in the temple of El in Jerusalem (a city which would not be inhabited by Hebrews for hundreds of years).
Historians believe that the Hebrews were polytheistic (El, Baal, Yahweh, etc.) up until King Josiah’s reign. Monotheism was useful to the Judean monarchy to create unity among the remaining Hebrews who were in mortal terror after watching the ten Northern Tribes of Israel being carted off to Assyria. So Baal was axed without mercy; the worship of El was also eliminated but more quietly.
The majority of the Old Testament can be shown to be a book of fables or books foretelling “future” events, that were actually written long after the “prophesied” event had already occurred many years before!
Let me give an example: If I sit down, and over the next month, I write a book about the events of World War I, BUT I write my book as if I am writing it in 1870 instead of 2014, “prophesying” the events that would happen beginning in 1914, people who read my book and accept what I write as fact, would believe that I had accurately prophesied the events of the First World War, writing almost 45 years before the events actually occurred!
This is what happened with the books of the Old Testament. For instance, Daniel does not prophesy future events. “Daniel” was written by temple priests during the Greek occupation, long after the return of the Jewish people to Palestine from Babylon.
And the OT is not the only place where incredible “prophesies” amazingly become true. Jesus’ prophesy of the destruction of the Temple is most likely another example of this “art” of inventive writing in the ancient world.
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I am not a New Testament scholar, but if you would like to read about the information I have presented above by a very good scholar , I highly recommend Dr. Steven DiMattei’s blog Bible Contradictions:
http://contradictionsinthebible.com/how-do-we-know-that-the-biblical-writers-were-not-writing-history/
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Hey Gary,
Wow, did you just update your profile? Because I checked it before I posted that comment to you, and I think your “About” page spoke as if you were still a believer, and did not include the blog link…?
Speaking of which…I knew I had seen your blog before! So, now subscribed. 🙂
(Sidenote: FeedBurner refers to your blog as “Luther, Baptists, and Evangelicals”. Perhaps that should be updated, too?)
Yeah, we were going through our respective deconversions around the same time. Though in my case I wasn’t trying to reconvert anyone; I had been researching as I was trying to come back to the faith, and some of what I found as I was trying to figure out what I believed on various aspects of doctrine finally made me say, “wait a minute–is this really true?” Then I found out that “deconversion” was a thing, and that people had reasons, and set out to see whether my beliefs withstood scrutiny, as truth should. …They didn’t.
Whose blog was it that you started at? DagoodS? Or Bruce?
50 years…man…best wishes for your deprogramming!
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