I may live to regret this, but I’ve decided to extend this never-ending conversation once again.
Kathy, this time, it would be a nice change of pace if you would actually address what William has repeatedly been saying to you:
I have. Not saying i’m perfect at it or that I’m right, but the “evidences” you listed arent real evidences. And since you refuse to look at things that are counter to your current beliefs, how can you honestly speak to me about evidences?
here’s all I’ve seen you provide:
1) martyrs, even though every religion and many non-religions have them.
2) our very existence – which no one knows how that started, but even if you must land on god(s), you must go back to that book of claims to get to jesus.
3) there were miracles, but as it turns out, those dont happen today, and end up being more claims by the same men who claim they speak for god.
4) the fulfilled prophecies we’ve discussed weren’t really prophecies at all, or had to be viewed so figuratively that it’s difficult to show anything precise about them other than location (maybe) in order to claim they’re actually fulfilled.
5) 40 authors taking 1500 years to write the bible. But there’s nothing miraculous about men writing books, editing books, and being inspired to write a book or letter after reading an older book.
About that last point, if the Bible had been written by 1500 people scattered across the globe, who didn’t know one another, and they did it in 40 days, then you’d really have something incredible. But 40-ish people, all familiar with the Jewish god, and writing over a long period of time with the previous writings as reference, is not that impressive.
Finding Truth 
Laura,
another possibility is that they’re simply mistaken. whether it’s overly gullible, predisposed to certain beliefs based on upbringing or something else, or under-educated, or whatever… I’m sure we can all think of instances where we’ve been wrong, but we weren’t insane or lying – just honestly mistaken…
I would think that most of us have had situations where a loved one swore something was one way, so we stood by them, believing them to be true, only to find out that were wrong or even lying themselves. People are mistaken all the time, which is why i don’t understand the issue with this.
“What would you consider as evidence or proof that something–anything, not just religion-related things–is true?” Laura
I dont have a specific example I guess, but I have something to offer.
Shooting from the hip here, I’d say that “proof” is indisputable fact with indisputable evidence, where “evidence” is merely a thing or things that imply something, but do not necessarily mean indisputable or complete.
What evidence is required? I believe this depends on what’s being claimed or discussed, and who’s pushing it. If i heard that someone got in a car wreck, I dont think I’d require photographs or video tape before I believed it. Car wrecks happen all the time and are not supernatural.
If someone told me that they saw a deer in the woods with 5 tines on one antler but one nub on the the other, I would believe that too, even though it’s nothing I’ve ever seen. If the guy telling me this story was known for making stuff up, I’d be skeptical, but if i knew him to be good guy, then I’d buy it because it’s not out of the realm of possibility. I’ve seen deer, and i can imagine ways for there to be an injury or a birth defect…
If someone told me that they saw bigfoot, i’d be skeptical. I’ve never seen one, and there’s been so much in circulation surrounding them and talk about hoaxes, that it would take quite a lot to convince me, if not a first hand personal experience of my own.
I think it boils down to the source and the likelihood or uniqueness of the event.
So when a virgin has a baby, it should take more that “someone said so” for it to be believable, because that doesn’t happen. 1 exception in all of mankind, and we’re supposed to believe that as easily as being told about it?
I don’t know the authors. and I have seen a lot of the stuff claimed. I wouldn’t believe this stuff if it came from any other source.
what do you think? Do you think grand claims should have grand evidence or are you more like others here, who think it requires grand evidence unless it’s in the bible, then only only requires the bible to claim it?
LikeLike
Has anyone asked Kathy to name one eyewitness who says that he or she saw the resurrected Jesus?
The Gospels were written anonymously. We don’t know who wrote them, where they wrote them, or even when they were written. The Apostle Paul states in Acts 26 that all he saw was a bright light…in a “vision”. There are no non-Christian accounts of Jesus resurrection, only his life and his crucifixion. Josephus, an enemy of the Jews, mentions Jesus, but never says a word about a resurrection, or dead people walking through Jerusalem when Jesus “gave up the ghost” as stated in Matthew.
There is no evidence for the Resurrection. Kathy declines to give any evidence because there is none for her to give.
LikeLike
and you know, sometimes the absence of evidence is evidence that something is [not] true.
Kathy, there’s spiders in your hair. Oh, what’s that? no there isnt? so because you dont see any evidence of spiders in your hair, you’re really okay in thinking there arent any?
LikeLike
Has anyone asked Kathy to name one eyewitness who says that he or she saw the resurrected Jesus?
The Gospels were written anonymously. We don’t know who wrote them, where they wrote them, or even when they were written.
Her contention seems to be that the Gospels were not written anonymously. She seems to believe that the writers are the names the books are attributed to.
LikeLike
William, did you mean “isn’t true”?
LikeLike
Kathy, there’s spiders in your hair. Oh, what’s that? no there isnt? so because you dont see any evidence of spiders in your hair, you’re really okay in thinking there arent any?
Well that’s just great! Now I feel things crawling in my hair and it wasn’t even my hair you were talking about. *shivers*
LikeLike
ah, yes nate, i did.
LikeLike
…so there is evidence that spider are on ruth.
LikeLike
Hi Laura,
“What would you consider as evidence or proof that something–anything, not just religion-related things–is true?”
For me evidence can be summed up in in one word:
interaction.
For examples of earthly interactions, I also interact with my dog, she sitting by me now,
This interaction does not necessarily have to be measurable,
my dog wants to jump on my lap. we have a connection. she shows affection in her own way, by just spending time with me. and over time we have learned things about her, since she was a puppy. She collects sticks and leaves, and loves meeting new people. Her favourite things in the world is her yellow ball, it is her bestest thing.
She has a different personality to our last dog. But in both cases we value who they were and are in our lives. What they shared of themselves with us.
Since some of the most valuable interactions I have shared with others, have included conversations and connections with family and friends.
My life is what it is because of the interactions I am so fortunate and blessed to have.
Fortunate, because they give my life meaning and value. Blessed because if God has given this life to me, then I am certainly blessed.
Communication can also go beyond words. There are many forms of language,
body language, letters, verbal, sign language… ect.
But providing there is an exchange of communication, and that communication is an interactive relationship, then I consider this to be a form of evidence.
I am open to interaction.
And this also includes me being open to not just earhtly interaction, but also Divine Interaction.
I am not comparing the two, I understand that divine interaction is completely different. But I believe divine interaction also involves interaction,
This interaction could be completely different to that of a human interaction that I am familiar with.
Even so, the interaction, even if different, would need to be expressed in a definite way for me to not misunderstand it. For me evidence involves interaction. But vague interaction confuses me.
For example, if my brother was texting me mixed messages, that contradicted one another, that to me would be confusing. Either I was misunderstanding the texts, or my brother was not effectively and clearly expressing what he wants to tell me.
Furthermore, if my brother used vague, non specific language to convey his texts, unless they were explained to me, I could read into them and completely misunderstand what he was asking or informing me about.
So interaction to me also needs to involve a clear communication, I think its important,
so things are not confused and misunderstood. Otherwise I might think my brother was asking me to buy him some socks, when he really was inviting me over to play a board game.
Its the same reason I’m not a great fan of vague poetry or pop songs,
No matter how pretty the images are expressed, or how strong the emotions they trigger through this imagery. take bands like Cold play for example, its rarely specific, and can be open to countless different interpretations.
Have you looked up the lyrics to “Clocks” or “yellow” what the Heck is Chris Martin singing about?! Although admittedly in another way I love these songs because I love the imagery and poetics painted, Although my point is I probably should not seek life guidance from these songs, they are vague and the intent of the song is not well defined. I could assume anything.
These art forms are so open-ended that anyone can attach their own impressions on them, which is probably partly why they are so successful and popular,
since they become “my” song to thousands if not millions of people, to mean so many different and contradictory things to different people.
So because I don’t want to fall into such a trap of guessing and possibly misunderstanding…
interaction to me should involve clear explanations (like Jesus did when he shared with His disciples what He actually meant in those parables).
I don’t think this is testing God, I hope it isn’t. I think its more not wanting to misunderstand God if He chooses to interact with me.
Does that make sense?
And mind you, a lack of interaction or exposure does not necessarily mean that something or someone does not exist.
For example, I may have a long lost brother somewhere, and because I have not interacted or connected with him yet, I just don’t have the evidence that he is out there, even though he is currently living in Brisbane…
But I am open to the possibility.
So again, for me evidence involves interaction. And after all, didn’t Jesus say, seek and you will find? He did I think 🙂
If God is all knowing and intentional, as I believe. Then God knows where to find me.
LikeLike
I think you’re absolutely right, Ryan. But do you believe you have a long lost brother just because it’s possible?
LikeLike
I still intend to be seeking though, but I need any correspondence to be more well defined than a Coldplay song 🙂
Otherwise I might misunderstand it. Where does faith come into all of this?
that’s another interesting question 🙂
All the best
LikeLike
Gary,
Josephus was born in 37, and could not have been witness to Yahusha’s resurrection.
LikeLike
right, laurie. So even if he had mentioned the resurrection, it would have only been hearsay, and not a first hand, eyewitness account – which is why i never understood it when christians would cite josephus as some sort of evidence, even when i was a christian.
LikeLike
I see what your saying Nate,
to be honest, for me personally, it also involves the fear of denying God
I can deny I have a long lost brother, but this brother also didn’t write me a huge letter and teachings that states that its from him, compiled over centuries as revelation.
The analogy breaks down, because my “long lost brother” is not eternal, all knowing, and the the only consequences of denying him would be the shame that I never had an opportunity to connect, and for him that he never got to be reunited with the family.
LikeLike
“I can deny I have a long lost brother, but this brother also didn’t write me a huge letter and teachings that states that its from him, compiled over centuries as revelation.” – kathy
and neither did god. even if you believe the bible, it was written by men.
So, isn’t it essentially claims of men, that god wanted them to write his word? Claims that god is eternal, all powerful, etc… which i guess brings us back to evidence.
But i totally get the fear. I actually appreciate your honesty in this. Certain motivators are greater than others.
LikeLike
OK, Laurie – it’s raining, and I can no longer work in my yard, so I finally have time to review your material on camels.
“The Domestication of the Camel: Biological, Archaeological and Inscriptional Evidence from Mesopotamia, Egypt, Israel and Arabia, and Literary Evidence from the Hebrew Bible” – a 68-page downloadable PDF? REALLY? Girl, how much time do you think I HAVE?!
The author of your article begins with:
Or about 950 BCE, at the time of the writing of the Yahwist (J) Source, in the Southern Kingdom of Judea, as (it has been pointed out) I have mentioned so frequently. Whose side are you on, MINE?
The author adds: “Most commentators point out the fact that these verses look as if they have been enriched by later additions.”
He goes on to give data regarding bones of wild camels that were butchered and eaten in situ, and continues: “All these data suggest that the dromedary, at least in south-east Arabia, did not appear in its domesticated form before the end of the 2nd millennium.” – 1000 BCE. He finishes the paragraph with: “More specific evidence of when and where the dromedary was domesticated is largely unknown.”
He notes: “Curiously, the earliest known inscriptional references to camels in Egypt are
not from Egypt but from Mesopotamia. On the famous Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III (9th century BCE), two Bactrian camels are depicted on relief No 9 as the “tribute of the land of Musri” (Egypt). – emphasis, mine.
He DOES mention possible domestication of the camel in the 3rd millennium: “Some Early Bronze Age finds of clay camels attached to miniature clay carts in the same area suggest that the two-humped camel was already employed in Southern Turkmenistan by the early 3rd millennium BCE (Peters / von den Driesch, 1997, 658–660; Kohl, 1984, 186)“, but Turkmenistan, located on the Caspian Sea, separated by the Zagros Mountains from Iran and Afghanistan to the south, is a far cry from Egypt, and the fact that they are shown pulling carts, implies the Egyptians never got the news, as the Egyptians had no wheeled transportation until the Hittites introduced them to the chariot in 1500 BCE, well past Honest Abe’s time. He continues, “With the beginning of the first millennium, the use of the domesticated Bactrian camel in trade and war is well attested, which does not need any further explanation“, which brings us back to my original, first millennium, assertion.
I was amazed to learn, however, that our English word, “camel,” dates all the way back to ancient Akkadian, the group who overcame the Sumarians, the original inhabitants of Mesopotamia, – the word was “gammalu,” and has not evolved that much!
The author admits, “The earliest known Mesopotamian lexical evidence of the camel is provided by an animal list from Fara of the Early Dynastic Period (ca. 2600–2500 BCE),
where the Sumerian term “am. si . har .an” (Sumarian, for camel – me) occurs again . In this list, “am. si har .an” is found in the proximity of terms for wild animals, such as the elephant, the water buffalo, the bear and the wolf.” Though he presents a few pieces of evidence, the clay camels mentioned above and a love poem that speaks of drinking camel’s milk, he acknowledges that, “At the end of the 2nd millennium, however, the Bactrian camel was again regarded as a curious animal, although the royal administration had enough know-how to breed Bactrian camels. Ashur-bel-kela (1074–1054 BCE) presented herds of Bactrian camels and other curiosities to the people of Assyria. They are listed between leopards, bears, wild boars, wild asses, deer and wolves on the one side, and apes and crocodiles on the other side.” Did they fall out of use? He doesn’t say.
Further, at another point, he admits that, “The explicit mention of (Gen 32) ‘thirty milking camels and their colts’ implies that these camels were seen as a particular milk-source“, and so, the Sumarian love poem regarding the sharing by the lovers, of camel’s milk, may not have been evidence of any domestication, other than as a milk source.
The above related primarily to the Bactrian (two-humped) camel. Of the Dromedary (single-humped), he says: “For the domestication of the dromedary, the zooarchaeological evidence
points to the beginning of the first millennium, and the inscriptional evidence to the 13th century at the latest.”
Additionally: “…the faunal remains point to the appearance of the domesticated dromedary in south-east Arabia towards the beginning of the first millennium.” – and – “From the beginning of the first millennium onwards the usual form of the domesticated camel was seen as the Dromedary. This is the reason why the Bactrian camel in texts from the 9th century BCE and later was sometimes described as an ‘anše.a.ab.ba with two humps’ or in similar terms.”
He continues, in what we can only hope is the wrap-up, although we seem to still have 26 pages to to go:
He then launches into wild speculation that Abram “might (shades of Kathy!) have brought them with him. He points to Gen 24 and 31 as other indications of Abe’s camel usage, as though using the Bible to prove the Bible, proves anything.
Joseph’s brothers, we see (Gen 43), the product, if we can believe the Abraham story, of three generations of camel jockeys, used donkeys when they went to Egypt to buy grain, to wit:
He then makes an incredible, flying leap:
While the clay statue of a camel drawing a cart may indeed indicate that at least in some area of Turkmenistan, someone may have used a camel as a transportation system, he has certainly given no evidence that I’ve seen, that it spread over the Zagros Mountains gradually or otherwise, during the 3rd millennium, or even the 2nd.
Although he argues that the patriarchs used camels because the Bible says they did, he admits, “In the daily life of the patriarchs, however, the camel played a minor role. The later Hebrews never adopted it and regarded it as unclean (Lev 11:4).” Yes, well, Leviticus didn’t have the same ghost-writer that Genesis did, that could account for a lot.
He further admits, “It is also important to make a distinction between domestication and
widespread use of the camel. There is no evidence for a wide-spread adoption of the camel into Near Eastern economies until the beginning of the first millennium BCE.”
Then he does a soft-shoe: “One explanation is that the process of domestication
lasted a long time and that dromedaries were brought under some human control well before 1000 BCE but were not used for widespread trade and transport until later. Another explanation offered is that dromedary domestication occurred independently at various locations and times.”
I earlier quoted Albright’s “Any mention of camels in the period of Abraham is a blatant anachronism, the product of later priestly tampering with the earlier texts in order to bring them more in line with altered social conditions” – your author partially dismisses this assertion by quoting another historian, “C. H. Gordon had an anecdotal way of explaining Albright’s opinion on the camel. He claimed that Albright ‘abominated camels and adored donkeys. This had a subconscious effect on his pronouncements and publications concerning the patriarchal age. He got rid of the camels by turning their very mention in the patriarchal narratives into anachronisms.’” – a rather cheap shot, in my estimation.
While he claims, “Bactrian camels, however, must have been available in Mesopotamia more
than 1000 years earlier” (than 1000 BCE), he admits in the same paragraph, “But also the Bactrian camel is not often mentioned in Mesopotamian literature…While the elephant (not to speak of the omnipresence of the donkey, the horse and the ox) seems to have been present in all kinds of literature, the camel is rarely mentioned. Those people who used the camel as a means of transport probably avoided to enter the cities and preferred to park them outside.(” I found that more than a bit lame, in terms of an explanation.
He concludes:
I have no more time today to check out the second source you offered, but as promised, I will. I also have no time to offer my own evidence, as this review has totally consumed my morning, and contrary to popular opinion, I DO have a life.
I trust I have completed this review Laurie, with a minimum of jackassery. Are you sure you wouldn’t like me to review War and Peace? After all, I DO have a long weekend coming up —
LikeLike
Ryan,
No matter how pretty the images are expressed, or how strong the emotions they trigger through this imagery. take bands like Cold play for example, its rarely specific, and can be open to countless different interpretations.
…I still intend to be seeking though, but I need any correspondence to be more well defined than a Coldplay song
to be honest, for me personally, it also involves the fear of denying God
I can deny I have a long lost brother, but this brother also didn’t write me a huge letter and teachings that states that its from him, compiled over centuries as revelation.
I appreciate the honesty inherent in these comments. I do have a question, though. It seems to me that, since a whole lot of people disagree about it, the Bible is rarely specific and can be open to countless interpretations. If you need any correspondence to be more well defined than a Coldplay song what kind of correspondence have you gotten from God that fits that description? Is the fear of denying that it might be possible that a God who would punish you for not believing what is driving your belief? These statements from you seem conflicted.
I hope none of that came across as snarky. It isn’t meant that way at all.
LikeLike
And with the brother analogy, I don’t think its even really denying I *could* have a long lost brother,
its more just saying, “I don’t know” considering the evidence and interactions I have currently been exposed to. I could still be open to having such a long lost brother, and if I do I’d love to very much meet him, since it would so valuable to me and hopefully to him that he would get the opportunity to interact with his family and connect, and we could learn more about one another and live life together.
That being said, until I received such interaction I could seek it, but it probably wouldn’t be healthy and possibly deceptive to pretend I definitely had a long lost brother, when I have not received such an interactions.
But for me, God is not like this long lost brother analogy. For one thing.
He is The Creator of The Universe. The beginning and the End.
I continue to believe in God, because I also want to continue to be open to God.
LikeLike
Ruth,
the statements probably seem conflicted because I am conflicted 🙂
LikeLike
the statements probably seem conflicted because I am conflicted
Welcome to the club. 😉
LikeLike
Going back to the long lost brother analogy though,
If I went around telling people that I had a long lost brother, they would probably eventually begin to ask me how I knew this. How had I interacted with him? through letters? through phone? through other people telling me he was alive and well?
I could still be open to the possibility of me having a long lost brother. But I would still have to be honest about the interactions I have had with him,
LikeLike
Hi William,
Although you quoted me as Kathy, I assume your addressing that to me 🙂
I think that’s where trust comes into it (faith). And people have their own evidence and reasons for believing that the Bible is Inspired, or that God has interacted with them in a specific way.
The Bible was compiled by men, there are people who believe those writers were inspired by God. And that God has personally interacted with them also in various ways.
LikeLike
Thanks Portal. For addressing my comments and for not getting angry or too offended by my unintentionally calling you kathy.
LikeLike
I can’t say if other people have or have not had Divine interactions, since there is no way I can step inside their past experiences. That’s between them and God.
All I can do is try to be honest with my own experiences, assess the available evidence honestly, and seek truth, and be open to interaction in this life 🙂
LikeLike
All Interaction 🙂
LikeLike