”
At this point you either have to deny observable science and geometry used to calculate astronomical distances or you have to deny that the bible is to be taken literally.
No response.”
It’s because I don’t have an answer.. and I don’t really care. The evidence is very compelling that the earth is millions of years old.. but then again, I’m not an expert.. I rely on scientists who often DO have a bias while claiming they don’t. But still, in this case, at this time, I do believe it’s the case.. that the literal interpretation of the time frame is not the correct interpretation.
But, at the same time.. I would NEVER claim that God couldn’t create the earth in 6 days and that it’s 6000 years old. Clearly, God can do anything.
This is what I don’t want to do.. waste time on yet another attempt of desperation to disprove the Bible. It’s too time consuming.. all just to find out it’s nothing but reaching. And in order to believe your claim, that means the REST of the Bible, written by many different authors, is in disagreement with this.. does this make sense to you? It doesn’t to me.. it makes much more sense to believe that those few exceptions of the translation are the INCORRECT translations.
Again, it comes down to WEIGHING the evidence. These exceptions (of reaching) do not outweigh the compelling evidence FOR the Truth of the Bible.
Deut. 32: 8-9
When Elyon divided the nations,
when he separated the sons of Adam,
he established the borders of the nations
according to the number of the sons of the gods.
Yahweh’s portion was his people,
Jacob his allotted inheritance.
Are there any other passages in the OT or DSS that support this
claim of multiple gods?
The entire Bible supports the interpretation of the NIV.
You MUST consider the surrounding text, aka CONTEXT.. the entire Bible from beginning to end claims ONE God. You / atheists focus on one lone translation trying to claim that SOME interpretations are correct, and the rest of the entire Bible is wrong.. this is what I mean by weighing evidence.
No, Ms. Kathy, I’m not being ridiculous and I don’t appreciate this snide remark .
What Ruth believes is her business. I believe the archaeological evidence (available body of facts or information indicating whether a belief or proposition is true or not) does not support that meat was offered to idols.
At this point, I have to wonder if you even understand the significance of archaeological evidence.
Carmen, now that you mention it, this definitely is NOT the way to pass a Sat. Eve. So c’ya all!
Kathy, it’s not about whether the NIV is the correct interpretation. It’s the sources, DSS, LXX and MT that do not agree with each other and show a pattern of polytheism to monotheism. I do not disagree that the hebrews become monotheists (eventually) and that the OT is very monotheistic overall. However, when we are looking for clues about origins we start with the oldest portions and look at what was written. Then we look at the later translations and notice some tampering was done to try and smooth things over. Yes, there are some other examples from the old testament, but they’ll have to wait till tomorrow afternoon as I’m heading to bed now. My wife is a Christian so I’ll be going to church with my family in the morning. Have a good night everyone.
“The origin of Yahweh as I’ve presented it is one theory among many. So while some if it is speculation there are still some facts here that cannot be dismissed: Changes occurred in the translations of the verse to “cover up” polytheistic origins. Again, this song of Moses from Deut. along with the song of Miriam from Exodus are considered by scholars to be among the oldest portions of the hebrew bible.”
Sorry Dave but it is NOT a fact that the “changes” were to “cover up” polytheistic origins. This is your assumption, based on speculation.. not fact.
Just because the DSS are the oldest text we have, that doesn’t make them the “original” text.. it just means it’s the oldest we have possession of.
And going by your claim, the Song of Moses would have to be before Genesis and the other books. And that all of those books were a continuing “cover up”.
Your claim means that all the authors of the Bible lied.. they didn’t know what they were talking about. Or.. they were all in on the “cover up”. And that “argument” fails badly.. it’s not a rational claim.. this is just more of the same.. failed attempts to discredit the Bible. The evidence that supports the Truth of the Bible far outweighs these isolated claims.
To further elaborate Ruth, the evidence of pagan sacrifices of meat during Paul’s time helps to validate the truth of what is written.. and which also helps to validate the Bible. It’s supportive evidence. I don’t know how else to explain it.
I’m agreeing to disagree. I don’t see evidence for pagan idol sacrifice and worship as supporting the truth of the Bible or Christianity. That there would have been idol worship, worship of other gods, is well documented. Furthermore we are all well aware that the Jews believe the Bible to be God’s word and that they believed idol worship and sacrifice was a sin. It would not be unusual to see Jewish writers writing about idolatry. Still, this is not evidence of the truth of the Bible, only that the Jewish people believed idolatry to be wrong.
” I fell under your spell
A love no one could deny”
It represents my deconversion, the realization that I gave my deepest love away to a cultural myth. I jumped right into a belief system without ever giving it a second thought. I trusted. I devoted most of my life to this myth. Made a lot of sacrifices. I hate using the word hate, but I’ll say it because it’s fitting. I hate being betrayed, and the thought that others have also fallen under the spell and may someday experience what so many of us have, is something I think about while having discourse with believers. This kind of betrayal is far worse than any betrayal of trust I’ve experienced in my life. As I’ve mentioned before, deconversion is not for the faint of heart.
Welcome back. Hope your camping trip met your expectations. 🙂
It’s because I don’t have an answer.. and I don’t really care. The evidence is very compelling that the earth is millions of years old.. but then again, I’m not an expert.. I rely on scientists who often DO have a bias while claiming they don’t. But still, in this case, at this time, I do believe it’s the case.. that the literal interpretation of the time frame is not the correct interpretation.
I do care. This was something important to me when I was a Christian. I can’t make sense of Genesis with a universe that is so old. God made it, made adam and eve, and then the genealogies start. If the earth is millions of years old (which you admit is very compelling) then something is not right. You can dismiss it and choose to not care. I choose to count this as one of many reasons to doubt the claim of divine authorship.
Sorry Dave but it is NOT a fact that the “changes” were to “cover up” polytheistic origins. This is your assumption, based on speculation.. not fact.
You’re right, I should rephrase. The changes are there, that much is fact. The oldest say “sons of the gods” and the younger say “angels” and “sons of Israel”, this is also fact. What you make of these facts is your choice. I think it makes sense and is very reasonable to conclude that scribes who copied these texts made changes when something did not agree with them.
Just because the DSS are the oldest text we have, that doesn’t make them the “original” text.. it just means it’s the oldest we have possession of.
Yeah, unfortunately we don’t have any originals for anything in the Bible. We have to make do with what we have and trust in the unknown scribes who made copies of copies. Most find it reasonable to conclude that older copies are more accurate than later copies.
And going by your claim, the Song of Moses would have to be before Genesis and the other books. And that all of those books were a continuing “cover up”.
That’s not my claim, I’m just saying what scholars have concluded. It makes sense because songs would have been passed down orally generation to generation.
Your claim means that all the authors of the Bible lied.
I don’t think so. I think things were passed down verbally at first and then written and adapted over time with compilations made and then copying and editing to align the texts with what was currently believed. It does look like Genesis 1 and 2 were written by two different authors. Nowhere is it claimed within the Bible that these were the first things written down. It is the hebrew creation story so it was put at the beginning. So many cultures have a creation story. Do you think all other creation stories should be considered lying? I don’t think so. They are writing down what they believe or what they have heard and what has been accepted by their region as the story of creation.
Just so you know, I read this entire page as I did the last link you gave me. I’m not trying to suppress anything, I am trying to determine what actually happened.
Are there any other passages in the OT or DSS that support this claim of multiple gods?
Deut 32:43, Verse 43 of 4QDeut (DSS):
“Praise, O heavens, his people
Kneel before him, all you gods”
The writer of this verse expects the other gods to kneel before Yahweh. This was changed in the LXX to “you angels of God” and in the MT to “rejoice with his people”. The context of these verses show Yahweh’s victories and vengeance against his enemies.
Exodus 15:11 (song of moses and miriam)
“Who is like you, O Yahweh, among the gods? Who is like you, majestic in holiness, awesome in grandeur, doing marvelous things?”
Exodus 20:2-3 (NIV)
2 “I am the Lord [YHWH] your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
3 “You shall have no other gods before me.”
Rather than saying that they should not worship false gods it just says to keep Yahweh as number one.
2 Kings 3:4-27 – This is a story where the author implies that when the moabites sacrifice to their god, Kemosh, that the sacrifice was accepted and empowered the moabites to rout the israelites.
Psalm 82:1 “God stands in the assembly of El;in the midst of the gods he renders judgment.” (New English Translation)
The OT prophets were constantly calling the Israelites back to Yahweh. They believed in all sorts of baals. Moreover, they worshiped those baals. When Moses came down from the mountain top with his tablets of stone the Israelites were supposedly already worshiping a gold statue. Now, after everything they had supposedly seen – from the plagues to the Exodus – not one, but the whole of the Israelites thought it good to worship a golden calf instead of Yahweh who had just performed all those miraculous signs. It is obvious that they were polytheistic. Those gods weren’t real and neither is Yahweh. Were he real, and had all those miraculous signs occurred the Israelites would have been worshiping him instead of some thing they had just melted down all their own jewelry and made themselves.
Nan, you’re being ridiculous.. did you notice that Ruth DOES see it as evidence?
I don’t think that Nan believes that this is evidence of absolutely nothing. Obviously these artifacts exist. I think that what you, Nan, and myself disagree on is what exactly this is evidence of.
Case in point:
This article is about a large mosaic that has been uncovered in an ancient tomb in Greece. No, it is not a mosaic of any Christian symbol. It’s a mosaic of the Greek God, Hermes. He was the conductor of the souls of the dead to the afterlife. This is evidence. But evidence of what? It is evidence that the Greeks believed that a god named Hermes conducted souls to the afterlife. Nothing more. It is beautiful, I’m sure. And if anyone still believes that Hermes conducts souls to the afterlife they are likely giddy because….evidence. But this, like your artifacts and dining halls, are evidence only of beliefs or rituals – not evidence that any of those gods are real.
So while there may not be a ton of evidence that disproves the Bible(though I think there is and you discount it as liberal), there is also not any archaeological evidence that proves the existence of Yahweh. Only evidence that people believed in Yahweh.
I’m not sure if that makes any sense, but hopefully you get my point. If I wanted evidence that shows what people’s beliefs were there is that in abundance. I think the main point, which you dismiss, is that where one would expect there to be evidence there isn’t any. You’ve asked several times what evidence there would be of, say, the Exodus. Well, I would expect there to be broken pottery. Surely in all those forty years wandering somebody broke a bowl or ten. And with all that nomadic living and the number of deaths that would have been certain to occur one would think bones. It has been suggested that the Jews carried the bones of their dead to the promised land which is why none are found. Millions of Jews supposedly left Egypt. Generations of them died, which would be millions of people, most likely. The Jews that were left carried the bones of millions to the promised land? And there’s no mention of this in the OT at all. It’s just a big supposition that this is what happened. Why? Because one must do all the mental gymnastics imaginable to make the Bible not wrong in any way.
“I’m agreeing to disagree. I don’t see evidence for pagan idol sacrifice and worship as supporting the truth of the Bible or Christianity. That there would have been idol worship, worship of other gods, is well documented. Furthermore we are all well aware that the Jews believe the Bible to be God’s word and that they believed idol worship and sacrifice was a sin. It would not be unusual to see Jewish writers writing about idolatry. Still, this is not evidence of the truth of the Bible, only that the Jewish people believed idolatry to be wrong.”
Ruth, this is just more proof of your lack of objectivity.
Here’s what the site says that I assume you’ve read..
“Meat sacrificed to idols in Corinth
The church that Paul founded at Corinth was one of his most successful. And yet they were in a large city surrounded by immorality and idol worship. One of the problems that plagued the church was how to relate to the pagan idol worshippers who surrounded them. (Many of the church members had become followers of Christ out of such a background.) For example, was it alright for them to share a meal with the pagans? Often, the meat involved in the meal would have been sacrificed to idols first. So did sharing a meal amount to taking part in idol-worship? They wrote to ask Paul, and he replied in his first letter to the Corinthians, chapter 8 verses 1-13.
Archaeologists have discovered dining rooms in the temples of Asclepius and Demeter at Corinth. They have also found an inscription identifying the local meat market. (See 1 Corinthians chapter 10 verses 25-29).
Yet again, archaeology provides a wealth of background confirmation of the historical accuracy of the Bible’s record.”
It’s not simple proof of idol worship and sacrifice of meat.. it’s the fact that it was found in Corinth at the time of Paul.
If the temples were found to NOT have dining rooms, THEN you/ atheists would no doubt claim that was evidence that Paul was either a fictitious person or he was lying. And it WOULD be evidence towards that claim. But when it’s evidence against your claim, you can’t admit it. This is proof of lack of objectivity.
It’s not simple proof of idol worship and sacrifice of meat.. it’s the fact that it was found in Corinth at the time of Paul.
Kathy,
I’m not saying that idol worship wasn’t happening in Corinth at the time of Paul. You are entirely missing my point. It was Corinth in Greece where they worshiped Greek Gods. Of course I would expect there to be evidence that Greeks worshiped Greek Gods. I’m also not disputing that Paul might have something to say about that. No one here is disputing that there were Christians who also had beliefs in Corinth at the time of Paul.
Are these archaeological finds evidence that what the Greeks believed was truth? If not, why not? Why would it be evidence for the truth of the Bible, but not the truth of Greek Gods?
Finding Truth 
Dave,
”
At this point you either have to deny observable science and geometry used to calculate astronomical distances or you have to deny that the bible is to be taken literally.
No response.”
It’s because I don’t have an answer.. and I don’t really care. The evidence is very compelling that the earth is millions of years old.. but then again, I’m not an expert.. I rely on scientists who often DO have a bias while claiming they don’t. But still, in this case, at this time, I do believe it’s the case.. that the literal interpretation of the time frame is not the correct interpretation.
But, at the same time.. I would NEVER claim that God couldn’t create the earth in 6 days and that it’s 6000 years old. Clearly, God can do anything.
This is what I don’t want to do.. waste time on yet another attempt of desperation to disprove the Bible. It’s too time consuming.. all just to find out it’s nothing but reaching. And in order to believe your claim, that means the REST of the Bible, written by many different authors, is in disagreement with this.. does this make sense to you? It doesn’t to me.. it makes much more sense to believe that those few exceptions of the translation are the INCORRECT translations.
Again, it comes down to WEIGHING the evidence. These exceptions (of reaching) do not outweigh the compelling evidence FOR the Truth of the Bible.
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Deut. 32: 8-9
When Elyon divided the nations,
when he separated the sons of Adam,
he established the borders of the nations
according to the number of the sons of the gods.
Yahweh’s portion was his people,
Jacob his allotted inheritance.
Are there any other passages in the OT or DSS that support this
claim of multiple gods?
The entire Bible supports the interpretation of the NIV.
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Welcome, Dave, to the wonderful world of wisdom according to Kathy. . . great way to pass a Saturday evening, eh??
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“Pope me with a fork?” – Nope, first I heard of it.
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You MUST consider the surrounding text, aka CONTEXT.. the entire Bible from beginning to end claims ONE God. You / atheists focus on one lone translation trying to claim that SOME interpretations are correct, and the rest of the entire Bible is wrong.. this is what I mean by weighing evidence.
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“be as brief as possible, if I find it a good argument then I’ll have the interest to learn more.”
In other words, Dave, it’s your responsibility to please her Royal Highnie – now HOP!
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No, Ms. Kathy, I’m not being ridiculous and I don’t appreciate this snide remark .
What Ruth believes is her business. I believe the archaeological evidence (available body of facts or information indicating whether a belief or proposition is true or not) does not support that meat was offered to idols.
At this point, I have to wonder if you even understand the significance of archaeological evidence.
Carmen, now that you mention it, this definitely is NOT the way to pass a Sat. Eve. So c’ya all!
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“Carmen, now that you mention it, this definitely is NOT the way to pass a Sat. Eve. So c’ya all!”
Oh come on Nan — I popped popcorn. 😀
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I was just gonna tell her that I was in it for the entertainment value. . . pass the popcorn!
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Got plenty, my friend.
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Kathy, it’s not about whether the NIV is the correct interpretation. It’s the sources, DSS, LXX and MT that do not agree with each other and show a pattern of polytheism to monotheism. I do not disagree that the hebrews become monotheists (eventually) and that the OT is very monotheistic overall. However, when we are looking for clues about origins we start with the oldest portions and look at what was written. Then we look at the later translations and notice some tampering was done to try and smooth things over. Yes, there are some other examples from the old testament, but they’ll have to wait till tomorrow afternoon as I’m heading to bed now. My wife is a Christian so I’ll be going to church with my family in the morning. Have a good night everyone.
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Dave,
“The origin of Yahweh as I’ve presented it is one theory among many. So while some if it is speculation there are still some facts here that cannot be dismissed: Changes occurred in the translations of the verse to “cover up” polytheistic origins. Again, this song of Moses from Deut. along with the song of Miriam from Exodus are considered by scholars to be among the oldest portions of the hebrew bible.”
Sorry Dave but it is NOT a fact that the “changes” were to “cover up” polytheistic origins. This is your assumption, based on speculation.. not fact.
Just because the DSS are the oldest text we have, that doesn’t make them the “original” text.. it just means it’s the oldest we have possession of.
And going by your claim, the Song of Moses would have to be before Genesis and the other books. And that all of those books were a continuing “cover up”.
Your claim means that all the authors of the Bible lied.. they didn’t know what they were talking about. Or.. they were all in on the “cover up”. And that “argument” fails badly.. it’s not a rational claim.. this is just more of the same.. failed attempts to discredit the Bible. The evidence that supports the Truth of the Bible far outweighs these isolated claims.
Also see:
http://faculty.gordon.edu/hu/bi/ted_hildebrandt/otesources/05-deuteronomy/text/articles/heiser-deut32-bs.htm
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To further elaborate Ruth, the evidence of pagan sacrifices of meat during Paul’s time helps to validate the truth of what is written.. and which also helps to validate the Bible. It’s supportive evidence. I don’t know how else to explain it.
I’m agreeing to disagree. I don’t see evidence for pagan idol sacrifice and worship as supporting the truth of the Bible or Christianity. That there would have been idol worship, worship of other gods, is well documented. Furthermore we are all well aware that the Jews believe the Bible to be God’s word and that they believed idol worship and sacrifice was a sin. It would not be unusual to see Jewish writers writing about idolatry. Still, this is not evidence of the truth of the Bible, only that the Jewish people believed idolatry to be wrong.
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Hello y’all
just dropping by. Hope everyone’s time zone is going swell. Here’s a cover of wrecking ball
All the best
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Ryan. Powerful tune. This version is my favorite.
It represents my deconversion, the realization that I gave my deepest love away to a cultural myth. I jumped right into a belief system without ever giving it a second thought. I trusted. I devoted most of my life to this myth. Made a lot of sacrifices. I hate using the word hate, but I’ll say it because it’s fitting. I hate being betrayed, and the thought that others have also fallen under the spell and may someday experience what so many of us have, is something I think about while having discourse with believers. This kind of betrayal is far worse than any betrayal of trust I’ve experienced in my life. As I’ve mentioned before, deconversion is not for the faint of heart.
Welcome back. Hope your camping trip met your expectations. 🙂
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Snatched from Dead Wild Roses:
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I do care. This was something important to me when I was a Christian. I can’t make sense of Genesis with a universe that is so old. God made it, made adam and eve, and then the genealogies start. If the earth is millions of years old (which you admit is very compelling) then something is not right. You can dismiss it and choose to not care. I choose to count this as one of many reasons to doubt the claim of divine authorship.
You’re right, I should rephrase. The changes are there, that much is fact. The oldest say “sons of the gods” and the younger say “angels” and “sons of Israel”, this is also fact. What you make of these facts is your choice. I think it makes sense and is very reasonable to conclude that scribes who copied these texts made changes when something did not agree with them.
Yeah, unfortunately we don’t have any originals for anything in the Bible. We have to make do with what we have and trust in the unknown scribes who made copies of copies. Most find it reasonable to conclude that older copies are more accurate than later copies.
That’s not my claim, I’m just saying what scholars have concluded. It makes sense because songs would have been passed down orally generation to generation.
I don’t think so. I think things were passed down verbally at first and then written and adapted over time with compilations made and then copying and editing to align the texts with what was currently believed. It does look like Genesis 1 and 2 were written by two different authors. Nowhere is it claimed within the Bible that these were the first things written down. It is the hebrew creation story so it was put at the beginning. So many cultures have a creation story. Do you think all other creation stories should be considered lying? I don’t think so. They are writing down what they believe or what they have heard and what has been accepted by their region as the story of creation.
Just so you know, I read this entire page as I did the last link you gave me. I’m not trying to suppress anything, I am trying to determine what actually happened.
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Deut 32:43, Verse 43 of 4QDeut (DSS):
“Praise, O heavens, his people
Kneel before him, all you gods”
The writer of this verse expects the other gods to kneel before Yahweh. This was changed in the LXX to “you angels of God” and in the MT to “rejoice with his people”. The context of these verses show Yahweh’s victories and vengeance against his enemies.
Exodus 15:11 (song of moses and miriam)
“Who is like you, O Yahweh, among the gods? Who is like you, majestic in holiness, awesome in grandeur, doing marvelous things?”
Exodus 20:2-3 (NIV)
2 “I am the Lord [YHWH] your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
3 “You shall have no other gods before me.”
Rather than saying that they should not worship false gods it just says to keep Yahweh as number one.
2 Kings 3:4-27 – This is a story where the author implies that when the moabites sacrifice to their god, Kemosh, that the sacrifice was accepted and empowered the moabites to rout the israelites.
Psalm 82:1 “God stands in the assembly of El;in the midst of the gods he renders judgment.” (New English Translation)
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“there is NO archaeological evidence that DISPROVES the Bible.”
there is NO archaeological evidence that DISPROVES:
Thor
Odin
Zeus
Ra
Mithra
Marduk
Amurru
and a thousand others – so does that make them true?
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Remember the 14 words (so far) that you don’t understand, Kathy? “Evidence” was one of them.
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Dave,
Just logically thinking through this:
The OT prophets were constantly calling the Israelites back to Yahweh. They believed in all sorts of baals. Moreover, they worshiped those baals. When Moses came down from the mountain top with his tablets of stone the Israelites were supposedly already worshiping a gold statue. Now, after everything they had supposedly seen – from the plagues to the Exodus – not one, but the whole of the Israelites thought it good to worship a golden calf instead of Yahweh who had just performed all those miraculous signs. It is obvious that they were polytheistic. Those gods weren’t real and neither is Yahweh. Were he real, and had all those miraculous signs occurred the Israelites would have been worshiping him instead of some thing they had just melted down all their own jewelry and made themselves.
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Kathy,
Nan, you’re being ridiculous.. did you notice that Ruth DOES see it as evidence?
I don’t think that Nan believes that this is evidence of absolutely nothing. Obviously these artifacts exist. I think that what you, Nan, and myself disagree on is what exactly this is evidence of.
Case in point:
This article is about a large mosaic that has been uncovered in an ancient tomb in Greece. No, it is not a mosaic of any Christian symbol. It’s a mosaic of the Greek God, Hermes. He was the conductor of the souls of the dead to the afterlife. This is evidence. But evidence of what? It is evidence that the Greeks believed that a god named Hermes conducted souls to the afterlife. Nothing more. It is beautiful, I’m sure. And if anyone still believes that Hermes conducts souls to the afterlife they are likely giddy because….evidence. But this, like your artifacts and dining halls, are evidence only of beliefs or rituals – not evidence that any of those gods are real.
So while there may not be a ton of evidence that disproves the Bible(though I think there is and you discount it as liberal), there is also not any archaeological evidence that proves the existence of Yahweh. Only evidence that people believed in Yahweh.
I’m not sure if that makes any sense, but hopefully you get my point. If I wanted evidence that shows what people’s beliefs were there is that in abundance. I think the main point, which you dismiss, is that where one would expect there to be evidence there isn’t any. You’ve asked several times what evidence there would be of, say, the Exodus. Well, I would expect there to be broken pottery. Surely in all those forty years wandering somebody broke a bowl or ten. And with all that nomadic living and the number of deaths that would have been certain to occur one would think bones. It has been suggested that the Jews carried the bones of their dead to the promised land which is why none are found. Millions of Jews supposedly left Egypt. Generations of them died, which would be millions of people, most likely. The Jews that were left carried the bones of millions to the promised land? And there’s no mention of this in the OT at all. It’s just a big supposition that this is what happened. Why? Because one must do all the mental gymnastics imaginable to make the Bible not wrong in any way.
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“I’m agreeing to disagree. I don’t see evidence for pagan idol sacrifice and worship as supporting the truth of the Bible or Christianity. That there would have been idol worship, worship of other gods, is well documented. Furthermore we are all well aware that the Jews believe the Bible to be God’s word and that they believed idol worship and sacrifice was a sin. It would not be unusual to see Jewish writers writing about idolatry. Still, this is not evidence of the truth of the Bible, only that the Jewish people believed idolatry to be wrong.”
Ruth, this is just more proof of your lack of objectivity.
Here’s what the site says that I assume you’ve read..
“Meat sacrificed to idols in Corinth
The church that Paul founded at Corinth was one of his most successful. And yet they were in a large city surrounded by immorality and idol worship. One of the problems that plagued the church was how to relate to the pagan idol worshippers who surrounded them. (Many of the church members had become followers of Christ out of such a background.) For example, was it alright for them to share a meal with the pagans? Often, the meat involved in the meal would have been sacrificed to idols first. So did sharing a meal amount to taking part in idol-worship? They wrote to ask Paul, and he replied in his first letter to the Corinthians, chapter 8 verses 1-13.
Archaeologists have discovered dining rooms in the temples of Asclepius and Demeter at Corinth. They have also found an inscription identifying the local meat market. (See 1 Corinthians chapter 10 verses 25-29).
Yet again, archaeology provides a wealth of background confirmation of the historical accuracy of the Bible’s record.”
It’s not simple proof of idol worship and sacrifice of meat.. it’s the fact that it was found in Corinth at the time of Paul.
If the temples were found to NOT have dining rooms, THEN you/ atheists would no doubt claim that was evidence that Paul was either a fictitious person or he was lying. And it WOULD be evidence towards that claim. But when it’s evidence against your claim, you can’t admit it. This is proof of lack of objectivity.
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It’s not simple proof of idol worship and sacrifice of meat.. it’s the fact that it was found in Corinth at the time of Paul.
Kathy,
I’m not saying that idol worship wasn’t happening in Corinth at the time of Paul. You are entirely missing my point. It was Corinth in Greece where they worshiped Greek Gods. Of course I would expect there to be evidence that Greeks worshiped Greek Gods. I’m also not disputing that Paul might have something to say about that. No one here is disputing that there were Christians who also had beliefs in Corinth at the time of Paul.
Are these archaeological finds evidence that what the Greeks believed was truth? If not, why not? Why would it be evidence for the truth of the Bible, but not the truth of Greek Gods?
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