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Quote: Originally posted by joker17 on Jun 19, 2010
I give up....It's futile.....
The Bible has much to say about God is not evidence that it is his word. The fact that some Jews living in Palestine two thousand years ago put their thoughts of God in writing does not make an unthinkable God responsible for what they wrote.
A mind once stretched by a new idea never returns to its original dimensions!
Catch-22: A dilemma or difficult circumstance from which there is no escape because of mutually conflicting or dependent conditions.
Corruptissima re publica plurimae leges: When the republic is at its most corrupt the laws are most numerous.
The best way to learn is to never stop being an Experiential Student! -
Zeta Reticuli Star System
United States
Member #30,469
January 17, 2006
11,795 Posts
OfflineSome interesting, although skewed, theologies being proposed here.
God's greatest gift to us is free will? Gee, and all these people have said it was His coming here, taking on a human form as his Son, and making the sacrifice on the cross for us so we'd be saved. Always thought the greatest gift was salvation, you just have to accept it. Are things so poitically correct that Christians are afraid to mention Jesus? Are people closet Unitarians without admitting it?
You believe in something? How wonderful, I believe in something, too!
Remember when joker17 said that all these denominations and faiths can't agree?
If we only go back 2,000 years ago we don't get any of the Old Testament.
Those who run the lotteries love it when players look for consistency in something that's designed not to have any. So many systems, so many theories, so few jackpot winners.
There is one and only one 'proven' system, and that is to book the action. No matter the game, let the players pick their own losers.
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Quote: Originally posted by Coin Toss on Jun 19, 2010
Some interesting, although skewed, theologies being proposed here.
God's greatest gift to us is free will? Gee, and all these people have said it was His coming here, taking on a human form as his Son, and making the sacrifice on the cross for us so we'd be saved. Always thought the greatest gift was salvation, you just have to accept it. Are things so poitically correct that Christians are afraid to mention Jesus? Are people closet Unitarians without admitting it?
You believe in something? How wonderful, I believe in something, too!
Remember when joker17 said that all these denominations and faiths can't agree?
If we only go back 2,000 years ago we don't get any of the Old Testament.
You got it, but you forgot the result of free will, "an opinion", free will and the ability to think makes it possible for our brains to learn and form opinions before we die. Opinions again, are like a$$4o1e$ most everyone has one. And we have the free will to listen to opinions and accept them or not, you know.... live and let live............ but keep the h311 out my business.
A person's life experience determines their opinion formation. Environment is critical, someone without human contact during development will probably not build a church.
Then we have the extreme opposite, the people that believe they know everything and their opinion is godly. These people are the ones that know better than all the stupid ignorant unwashed masses that they have to deal with on a daily basis.
FJB
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Quote: Originally posted by Delta Draw on Jun 19, 2010
Hey Slumbervision, Romans 11:8
I am not responsible for errors people teach as ‘truth’.
If you want to believe in a three-headed god that pulled out a mirror and prayed to himself, then go ahead. What I do not understand is the Son of God taught how to pray a prayer to God many repeat weekly with no thought. Yes, among many, God died in a three-in-one formula. I thought three-in-one was nothing more than household oil. You should read the book you claim to have knowledge of.
I suppose you would say that J.C. when talking about abundance was talking about material things. John 10:10. Too bad everyone would have to wait nearly 2,000 years for microwave popcorn and gameboys.
I have no problem being my father’s son. I know the difference between the two. Popular beliefs are many, but so many “Christians” live as though they are defeated and destroyed (their lord is hung in effigy , sometimes with fake blood). Most are taught sin and guilt and condemnation. Romans 8:1. Most are destroyed for a lack of an accurate knowledge of spiritual things; Hosea 4:6, Romans 10:2.
At any point where the Word of God is corrupted by adding a word, deleting a word or turning the whole thing 180 like you can read about in Genesis with Eve, you got a lie. Lies are not truth.
Marx was right, religion is the opiate of the people. If you really knew the book, you would see that religion stinks to the high heaven to God. His blueprint was a family and He has much to say about wisdom, understanding and knowledge. He has much also to say about what men do in His name to other men and that’s religion. He does not approve.
When the door is closed like the door on the Ark, many will want in with counterfeit credentials. Many will wish the door hits them in the azz. No deals. The trinity BS looks like, smells like and tastes like the real deal but it is not fit for dogfood and is a No-go ticket. Most Christian’s prayer life is as emaciated as the three-headed dead god they worship.
DD
PS you got that guilt-trip BS pretty good Slumbervision. Your serving some potent laudanum highballs!
you're responsible for "teaching errors", if you are the one that is being an accessory to the crime of furthering it.
obviously, you have not taken the time it would have taken for you to actually see first hand just what the entirety of the bible teaches. from the very beginning, God spoke in PLURAL form (let "US" make man in "OUR" image), and yet in places like isaiah, God claimed there was only ONE God. the Trinity is ONE God, manifested in three persons, period.
if i need to, i would be more than happy to clog the blog with cover to cover proof that Jesus was God.
but being the efficient guy i wanna try and be, maybe you can explain away the fact that the reason the jews crucified Christ was because He claimed to be God. and as He was arrested, inteerrogated, flogged and beaten, made to carry His own cross and finally crucified, if He was "just the Son" (as you affirm) He never ONCE denied that accusation that He was God.
since one of the greatest sins would have been for Him to assert "god hood", and thus be spoken off in the same breath as idolatry, He would have squashed that straight up.
the jews stated "that for a good work, we crucuify you not. but thou being a man, and makest thyself God, we crucify you"
every smidgen of possibility of knowing the truths of God - rest on that fact - that Christ claimed to be God, and raised Himself from the dead. Christ even said "and after 3 days, i will raise MYSELF (emphasis added by me) from the dead". only God can raise the dead.
DD, i don't really know exactly what you are into, but whatever it is, it doesn't involve historical biblical truth, that is for certain.
and please don't purposefully misrepresent what i do or say. i am the last guy that operates from the guilt platform, and i ALWAYS espouse moving people toward a vibrant loving relationship with God, and not some works realted boat-anchor religious theology. but i do it, by telling the truth. even when that "truth" isn't popular, because truth ALWAYS wins the long distance race.
what i do, is i tell the straight up truth without hesitation. unfortunately, that sometimes comes off as "confrontational". that's not my deal (per se), although i will deal the cards out on these issues straight up. straight up is the superhighway to any truth, period.
like the prosperity garbage teaching. harsh to say it like that, but it's true. like i said, the ONLY people that benefit from that teaching are the preachers teaching it. that's the straight up true.
if it's not, i welcome you right here to explain to all the others reading this why THEY aren't "healed", or "wealthy".
maybe you can tell them they "don't have enough faith". or, they "haven't tithed quite enough". add sickening infinitum
look, i am all about seeking God for whatever He wants to allow, whatever God decides that adds up to in a mans life parameter wise, but i don't want any part in selling anyone false hope to anyone.
that is nothing more than amway Christianity, where only the "rich de voss's" benefit. NO THANKS
DD, while you are "explaining" the reasons why the prosperity folks aren't being "healed" (as there are some reading this that would like to know why), do yourself a peripheral favor, and ask yourself if Jesus Christ "wasn't God" (according to you), nor did He claim to be, then why would the jews kill him FOR claiming to be God?
here is a tip......NO MAN will stand before God and blame what they believe on another. you cannot blame your held theology on a church or organization. we are ALL autonomous before God singularly, which means we are ultimately responsible for getting it right, and the ONLY way that happens, is thru personal effort.
the above paragraph completely squashes the need for "religions" or "denominations", etc.
"i am .........."meant to"
P.S., that RJoH is a stand up guy. thanks, vision
until further notice, it's france everyday
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Quote: Originally posted by Raven62 on Jun 19, 2010
The Bible has much to say about God is not evidence that it is his word. The fact that some Jews living in Palestine two thousand years ago put their thoughts of God in writing does not make an unthinkable God responsible for what they wrote.
raven, you need to read it for yourself, before you can accurately say that.
not a cursory bits-n-pieces / here-n-there approach, but an honest study of it, and you will see it's continuity over 1,000's of years, written and recorded by 40 DIFFERENT authors, from differing cultures, and differing times in history, and it ALL adds up to the same thing. continuos thought. there isn't a religious text or book of humanism in the worlds history that can match that feat.
or, you can take the challenge that i offered up to joker (who refused to do it, as far as i can tell)......and that was to ask the googlemaster about Jesus Christ, who alone, one man in history, fulfilling over 300 prophecies written in that book you assert "is not evidence that it is his word"........ hundreds of years before He was ever born.
because truthfully, until you refute that, you cannot make the above statement with any conviction/authority.
here is a slice of what i mean, by it not being "just a religious book".........Jesus Christ rode into jerusalem on a donkey, on the EXACT same day that the old testament said He would, some 500(+/-) years previous to His birth. on the EXACT same day.
that's just ONE "prophecy". He fulfilled some 299 more. i did get the attention of the mathematical/odds statisticians with that one.
300. one man. equals validity. equals irrefutability. which should equal acceptance, but often doesn't. why? simply because they refuse to, and not because there isn't enough "evidence"
it's more than just a book. well, to those who really make the effort read it, it is.
i implore you raven. read it yourself, then see if you can honestly make that statement :)
would't like to join the ranks of this thread, who pray about all things, including the consideration as to whether or ot you are wasting your time persuing the lottery, or whether you aren't, and you are actually "meant to", because you actually have a relationship with God?
or would you rather miss out?
"i am .........."meant to"
P.S., that RJoH is a stand up guy. thanks, vision
until further notice, it's france everyday
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Quote: Originally posted by visiondude on Jun 19, 2010
raven, you need to read it for yourself, before you can accurately say that.
not a cursory bits-n-pieces / here-n-there approach, but an honest study of it, and you will see it's continuity over 1,000's of years, written and recorded by 40 DIFFERENT authors, from differing cultures, and differing times in history, and it ALL adds up to the same thing. continuos thought. there isn't a religious text or book of humanism in the worlds history that can match that feat.
or, you can take the challenge that i offered up to joker (who refused to do it, as far as i can tell)......and that was to ask the googlemaster about Jesus Christ, who alone, one man in history, fulfilling over 300 prophecies written in that book you assert "is not evidence that it is his word"........ hundreds of years before He was ever born.
because truthfully, until you refute that, you cannot make the above statement with any conviction/authority.
here is a slice of what i mean, by it not being "just a religious book".........Jesus Christ rode into jerusalem on a donkey, on the EXACT same day that the old testament said He would, some 500(+/-) years previous to His birth. on the EXACT same day.
that's just ONE "prophecy". He fulfilled some 299 more. i did get the attention of the mathematical/odds statisticians with that one.
300. one man. equals validity. equals irrefutability. which should equal acceptance, but often doesn't. why? simply because they refuse to, and not because there isn't enough "evidence"
it's more than just a book. well, to those who really make the effort read it, it is.
i implore you raven. read it yourself, then see if you can honestly make that statement :)
would't like to join the ranks of this thread, who pray about all things, including the consideration as to whether or ot you are wasting your time persuing the lottery, or whether you aren't, and you are actually "meant to", because you actually have a relationship with God?
or would you rather miss out?
or, you can take the challenge that i offered up to joker (who refused to do it, as far as i can tell)......
I really don't need the googlemaster to tell me something I already know. You keep saying it is written, as If that makes it true.
I've read the Bible and watched many many religious shows in the past, during a long period when I did subscribe to what the Bible wrote. Sometimes on shows like PTL, Paul Crouch would have a guest on the show that threw left curve ball questions at some of the important issues, and one of them was about prophecy. It was clear to me after watching, that prophecy didn't always have the target that most religious folks believe. They were meant for other events not connected, yet people twisted them for their own agendas. Furthermore, some of the prophecies were simply self-fulfilled.
But I did go to google master, and found almost everything i just wrote above. It's an article by Farrell Till.
Bible apologists love to use probability arguments, and most readers have undoubtedly encountered them in apologetic literature. Some situation perceived to prove either the existence of God (life developing from nonlife) or the inspiration of the Bible (prophecy fulfillment) is analyzed in terms of likeliness or probability. Most of these arguments, of course, are based on purely arbitrary factors selected to make the theistic or biblical position look good. I have yet to see one that can survive careful scrutiny.
At the debate in Portland, Texas, that Earle Beach referred to in the foregoing article, my opponent applied probability to the prophecy-fulfillment argument. He mentioned several times how truly amazing it was that so many Old Testament prophecies had been fulfilled precisely and exactly in the life of Jesus of Nazareth. His premise was that over 300 such prophecies were made and later fulfilled. At one point when he was under cross-examination, he stated that the probability of any 50 of these prophecies being precisely fulfilled was 11 sextillion 250 quintillion to one. The figure written out would look like this: 11,250,000,000,000,000,000,000. Since the statement was made under cross-examination, I could not respond directly to it without calling for a resumption of time, and at the moment I was pursuing a line of questioning that I wanted to continue. In reviewing the tapes, I was reminded that I forgot to return to this issue to show the absurdity of the statement, so I will do that now. If Mr. Dobbs wishes to respond to my comments, we will gladly publish his statement in the next issue. My prediction is that he won't respond. If he doesn't, I wonder what he would say the odds are that I could make a prophecy like this and have it fulfilled.
The major problem with Mr. Dobbs's argument is that it simply assumes that prophecies were both made and fulfilled, but he has no real evidence to support those assumptions. As I did point out in the debate, when these fulfillment claims are studied within their original contexts, one can easily see that most of them had nothing at all to do with the applications that New Testament writers arbitrarily gave to them. An excellent example would be the one that Earle Beach cited in his article. Jeremiah 31:15 is a statement that in the original context was referring to the Jews who had been scattered abroad during the Diaspora. Jeremiah figuratively referred to this as Rachel weeping for her children, but within the context of the statement, there was a promise in the very next verse that these children would "come back from the land of the enemy." Obviously, then, Jeremiah was in no sense talking about a brutal massacre of Jewish children, so to twist the passage and give it the application that Matthew did can only be seen as an act of desperation on the part of someone, with no real evidence on his side, trying to prove that his man Jesus had fulfilled Jewish prophecies of the coming Messiah. When we add to that the complete lack of reference in contemporary secular histories to Herod's slaughter of the innocents, we have compelling reason to believe that this event that Matthew claimed was a prophecy fulfillment never even happened.
In his article, Earle Beach mentioned that the dangerous-child myth on which this story was obviously based is a common theme in pagan religions that antedated Christianity. Space won't allow a review of all these myths, but the Hindu version is worth looking at, because it is strikingly parallel to Matthew's story. According to Hindu literature, when Krishna, the eighth incarnation of the god Vishnu, was born to the virgin Devaki, he was visited by wise men who had been guided to him by a star. Angels also announced the birth to herdsmen in the nearby countryside. When King Kansa heard about the miraculous birth of this child, he sent men to "kill all the infants in the neighboring places," but a "heavenly voice" whispered to the foster father of Krishna and warned him to take the child and flee across the Jumna river. (In this Hindu legend, we recognize many other parallels to the infancy of Jesus other than the dangerous-child element.) In Bible Myths and Their Parallels in Other Religions, author T. W. Doane cited a work by Thomas Maurice, Indian Antiquities, vol. 1, pp. 112-113, which described an "immense sculpture" in a cave-temple at Elephanta that depicts the Indian children being slaughtered while men and women apparently representing their parents are standing by pleading for the children (p. 167).
A study of pagan mythology would establish similar parallels in the stories of Zoroaster (Persian), Tammuz (Babylonian), Perseus and Adonis (Greek), Horus (Egyptian), Romulus and Remus (Roman), Gautama (the founder of Buddhism), and many others, because various elements of the dangerous-child myth can be found in the stories of all these pagan gods and prophets. All of these myths antedate, usually by many centuries, Matthew's account of the massacre of the children at Bethlehem. Krishna, for example, was a Hindu savior who allegedly lived in the sixth century B. C., so when a study of ancient world literature shows that an unusual event like the slaughter of the innocents seemed to have happened everywhere , reasonable people will realize that it probably happened nowhere or, at best, that it happened only once and was thereafter plagiarized. Since the story occurs many times before Matthew's version of it, we can only conclude that no such event happened in Bethlehem as Matthew--and only Matthew--claimed. Just like that, then, Mr. Dobbs finds one of his fifty amazing prophecy-fulfillments vaporizing right before his eyes.
If space permitted, I could easily establish that many of the other alleged prophecy fulfillments in the life of Jesus have their parallels in ancient mythology. Mr. Dobbs alleged that the miracles of Jesus had been prophesied in Isaiah 53:4-5, his crucifixion in Psalm 22:16, his resurrection in Psalm 16:10, and his ascension in Psalm 68:18. Examination of these passages in context, however, reveal the same problem that Earle Beach and I discussed above relative to Jeremiah 31:15. The statements are notoriously obscure and become prophecies only through the arbitrary claims of the New Testament writers who lifted them out of context and applied them to situations that the original writers were not referring to. So there is no way that anyone can establish that these "prophecies" were originally intended to be prophecies. All we have is the mere unsubstantiated word of the New Testament claimants that they were meant to be prophecies, and that is not a good enough foundation to build a probability argument on.
To that problem must be added the one cited above. Christianity is not the only religion to claim that its savior performed miracles, was crucified, was resurrected from the dead, and ascended into heaven. Hindu writings attributed all of these to Krishna. In fact, the lives of Jesus and Krishna, as related in the respective literatures of their followers, are so strikingly parallel that reasonable people can only conclude that the New Testament gospel writers borrowed many of their ideas from a savior mythology that had evolved long before the first century. In fact, virgin-born, crucified and resurrected saviors were as common as dirt in pagan mythology, and if that does not destroy probability arguments (as they pertain to prophecy fulfillment) in the minds of Mr. Dobbs and all others who see merit in them, then they are obviously determined to believe the folly of the Christian myth no matter how compelling the evidence to the contrary.
Another fallacy in this probability argument is that it completely discounts the possibility of deliberate contrivance. At one point when I was the cross-examiner, I pressed Mr. Dobbs to tell the audience if it would be at all possible for someone to study the Old Testament scriptures, interpret a number of obscure passages as prophecies, and then write a biography of a fictional character to make it appear that all of these "prophecies" had been fulfilled in his life. The tapes will show that Dobbs desperately evaded answering the question, even though I presented it to him three times.
In a letter to fundamentalist writer Chuck Missler, Jim Lippard very effectively addressed this same issue in commenting on a probability argument that Missler applied to prophecy fulfillments:
(Y)ou estimate the probability of a Messiah claimant entering Jerusalem on a donkey based on how many candidate Messiahs have done this, assuming (without evidence) that it is less than one in a hundred. Not only is this probably wrong, the correct question to ask is, "How many prospective Messiahs, knowing of the existence of this prophecy, would bother taking the trouble to fulfill it?" It's not as though entering Jerusalem on a donkey is beyond the capacity of a human being to intentionally fulfill. I'd assess the probability as on the order of one in one (June 8, 1993, p. 2).
My purpose in questioning Dobbs was to show that these alleged prophecy fulfillments never even happened, that the gospel writers simply went through the Old Testament looking for statements that they could construe as prophecies and then wrote the biographies of their Messiah to make it appear that all of the prophecies had been wonderfully fulfilled. Lippard's approach was to show that, even if the acts of "prophecy-fulfillment" actually did happen, they could have been done deliberately in order to give the pretending Messiah occasion to claim that he had indeed fulfilled the Jewish prophecies. Either way of looking at it, there would be nothing exceptional to claim, in this case, about a man riding into Jerusalem on a donkey. How many Jews descended from Abraham through David can we suppose rode into Jerusalem on a donkey at one time or another? Any one of them could have claimed that he had fulfilled this "prophecy."
With this background established, I can now demonstrate the absurdity of Dobbs's probability argument. I have not had an expert on probability factors check the argument to verify that the probability against the fulfillment of "any fifty" of the "more than 300" prophecies about Jesus would be over 11 sextillion to one. For the sake of argument, I will simply assume that the math is correct. If the figures are correct, all that Dobbs has accomplished is to show that the odds against his being able to prove that 50 Old Testament prophecies were fulfilled in the life of Jesus would be 11 sextillion to one.
To show why this is so, let's return to the slaughter of the innocents. The claim was made that this event was prophesied in Jeremiah 31:15, so we will let this "prophecy" be number one on the list of fifty. To begin proving his probability argument Dobbs would have to demonstrate ABSOLUTELY, beyond any question, that Jeremiah intended the statement as a prophecy of Herod's slaughter of the innocents. If there is any doubt at all that Jeremiah so intended the statement, then no fact of prophesy utterance has been established. Since I dispute that this was what Jeremiah meant and since there are hundreds, even thousands of others like me, who also dispute it, this is positive proof that Dobbs has not yet established beyond even reasonable doubt, much less absolute doubt, that Jeremiah's statement meant what it must mean in order to be a prophecy. Let's assume, however, just for the sake of argument that Dobbs could prove that Jeremiah did mean for the statement to be a prediction of the slaughter of children at some time in the prophet's future. After he has done that, Dobbs must then prove ABSOLUTELY that Herod's massacre of the children at Bethlehem can be established as a historical fact. The complete absence of any reference to such an event by any other New Testament writer or any secular historian contemporary to the times makes this an impossible task for Dobbs or anyone else. However, if an event that is allegedly a prophecy fulfillment cannot be factually established, how can any rational person contend that it was a prophecy fulfillment?
Again, for the sake of argument, let's assume that Dobbs could somehow prove that Herod's massacre of the innocents did in fact occur. At that point, all he would have accomplished is to prove that ONE--just one--prophecy was fulfilled in the life of Jesus. Now he would have to take the 49 others and go through the same process, one by one, painstakingly proving in each case that (1) the original statement was indeed intended as a prophecy of something that would happen in the life of the Messiah and that (2) the event prophesied did in fact happen to Jesus. This would necessitate taking the prophecy claims about the virgin birth of Jesus, the miracles he performed, his triumphal entry, his betrayal, his crucifixion, his treatment during the crucifixion, his resurrection, his ascension, and forty-one other alleged prophecy fulfillments and proving what was hypothetically proved about the slaughter of the innocents. No reasonable person can believe that Dobbs or anyone else could possibly do this, because the very moment that the least element of doubt arose in any one of the 49 remaining steps (after proving prophecy fulfillment in the massacre of the innocents), the entire probability argument would collapse like a house of cards.
So if Mr. Dobbs's math is correct in his calculation of probability, the odds against his proving that Jesus fulfilled 50 different prophecies would be over 11 sextillion to one. So much for probability and prophecy fulfillment!
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Slumbervision,
“from the very beginning, God spoke in PLURAL form (let "US" make man in "OUR" image), and yet in places like isaiah, God claimed there was only ONE God. the Trinity is ONE God, manifested in three persons, period.”
The Queen of England speaks as “We the Queen of England”. The great We or great Wee? To use ‘We’ does not prove there are others in the room; it is a statement of supreme authority, just like the Queen exhibits. Not exactly proof your holy trinity holds water in the use of WE. But I’ll tell you what- the trinity is the biggest lie to make the Word of God non-effect. It is an old pagan belief to have three headed triune gods, and now it is expected to be adhered to in Christianity. Get your fix on Sunday.
You are upset about your words being twisted? How little you regard the Word you claim to know. “and please don't purposefully misrepresent what i do or say. “
I don’t believe tithing is required because the tithe was never about money. To say it is required is a fabrication, a lie and BTW if Christ fulfilled all the law, why hold on to the tithe like it is the law? A: leagalism.
“like the prosperity garbage teaching. harsh to say it like that, but it's true. like i said, the ONLY people that benefit from that teaching are the preachers teaching it. that's the straight up true.,….” Here you go. Pure garbage religion says YOU MUST TITHE, like it is a commandment of the true God. You’re all twisted up in the lie and think prosperity is wrong because you see the hypocrisy of religion. Now you have to have some rationalization to explain it and you say bunk to what God says is available. Funny how that works, but it is by design to steal the worship from the true God. You lose.
“…if it's not, i welcome you right here to explain to all the others reading this why THEY aren't "healed", or "wealthy". A: Because they bought into a lie and it does not deliver. The failure is people’s unbelief and there are basically two kinds mentioned in the book. Apsitia and apithia. The first kind is from wrong teaching or the lack of right teaching, while the second is indifference. Just because someone does not know how to set a clock on a VCR does not mean that it does not work. Read the manual.
“maybe you can tell them they "don't have enough faith". or, they "haven't tithed quite enough". add sickening infinitum” A: Wrong teaching and indifference: the doctrine or guidelines for belief most follow are flawed. Many are left confused and bitter toward God as the result of religion.
“then why would the jews kill him FOR claiming to be God?”
How about You provide the chapter and verse where J.C. said he was God and where it says the Jews killed him for saying he was God? Document it with chapter and verse.
Joker, that post is pretty big, mind if I get some popcorn and beer stocked up before I read it?
DD
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Quote: Originally posted by joker17 on Jun 19, 2010
or, you can take the challenge that i offered up to joker (who refused to do it, as far as i can tell)......
I really don't need the googlemaster to tell me something I already know. You keep saying it is written, as If that makes it true.
I've read the Bible and watched many many religious shows in the past, during a long period when I did subscribe to what the Bible wrote. Sometimes on shows like PTL, Paul Crouch would have a guest on the show that threw left curve ball questions at some of the important issues, and one of them was about prophecy. It was clear to me after watching, that prophecy didn't always have the target that most religious folks believe. They were meant for other events not connected, yet people twisted them for their own agendas. Furthermore, some of the prophecies were simply self-fulfilled.
But I did go to google master, and found almost everything i just wrote above. It's an article by Farrell Till.
Bible apologists love to use probability arguments, and most readers have undoubtedly encountered them in apologetic literature. Some situation perceived to prove either the existence of God (life developing from nonlife) or the inspiration of the Bible (prophecy fulfillment) is analyzed in terms of likeliness or probability. Most of these arguments, of course, are based on purely arbitrary factors selected to make the theistic or biblical position look good. I have yet to see one that can survive careful scrutiny.
At the debate in Portland, Texas, that Earle Beach referred to in the foregoing article, my opponent applied probability to the prophecy-fulfillment argument. He mentioned several times how truly amazing it was that so many Old Testament prophecies had been fulfilled precisely and exactly in the life of Jesus of Nazareth. His premise was that over 300 such prophecies were made and later fulfilled. At one point when he was under cross-examination, he stated that the probability of any 50 of these prophecies being precisely fulfilled was 11 sextillion 250 quintillion to one. The figure written out would look like this: 11,250,000,000,000,000,000,000. Since the statement was made under cross-examination, I could not respond directly to it without calling for a resumption of time, and at the moment I was pursuing a line of questioning that I wanted to continue. In reviewing the tapes, I was reminded that I forgot to return to this issue to show the absurdity of the statement, so I will do that now. If Mr. Dobbs wishes to respond to my comments, we will gladly publish his statement in the next issue. My prediction is that he won't respond. If he doesn't, I wonder what he would say the odds are that I could make a prophecy like this and have it fulfilled.
The major problem with Mr. Dobbs's argument is that it simply assumes that prophecies were both made and fulfilled, but he has no real evidence to support those assumptions. As I did point out in the debate, when these fulfillment claims are studied within their original contexts, one can easily see that most of them had nothing at all to do with the applications that New Testament writers arbitrarily gave to them. An excellent example would be the one that Earle Beach cited in his article. Jeremiah 31:15 is a statement that in the original context was referring to the Jews who had been scattered abroad during the Diaspora. Jeremiah figuratively referred to this as Rachel weeping for her children, but within the context of the statement, there was a promise in the very next verse that these children would "come back from the land of the enemy." Obviously, then, Jeremiah was in no sense talking about a brutal massacre of Jewish children, so to twist the passage and give it the application that Matthew did can only be seen as an act of desperation on the part of someone, with no real evidence on his side, trying to prove that his man Jesus had fulfilled Jewish prophecies of the coming Messiah. When we add to that the complete lack of reference in contemporary secular histories to Herod's slaughter of the innocents, we have compelling reason to believe that this event that Matthew claimed was a prophecy fulfillment never even happened.
In his article, Earle Beach mentioned that the dangerous-child myth on which this story was obviously based is a common theme in pagan religions that antedated Christianity. Space won't allow a review of all these myths, but the Hindu version is worth looking at, because it is strikingly parallel to Matthew's story. According to Hindu literature, when Krishna, the eighth incarnation of the god Vishnu, was born to the virgin Devaki, he was visited by wise men who had been guided to him by a star. Angels also announced the birth to herdsmen in the nearby countryside. When King Kansa heard about the miraculous birth of this child, he sent men to "kill all the infants in the neighboring places," but a "heavenly voice" whispered to the foster father of Krishna and warned him to take the child and flee across the Jumna river. (In this Hindu legend, we recognize many other parallels to the infancy of Jesus other than the dangerous-child element.) In Bible Myths and Their Parallels in Other Religions, author T. W. Doane cited a work by Thomas Maurice, Indian Antiquities, vol. 1, pp. 112-113, which described an "immense sculpture" in a cave-temple at Elephanta that depicts the Indian children being slaughtered while men and women apparently representing their parents are standing by pleading for the children (p. 167).
A study of pagan mythology would establish similar parallels in the stories of Zoroaster (Persian), Tammuz (Babylonian), Perseus and Adonis (Greek), Horus (Egyptian), Romulus and Remus (Roman), Gautama (the founder of Buddhism), and many others, because various elements of the dangerous-child myth can be found in the stories of all these pagan gods and prophets. All of these myths antedate, usually by many centuries, Matthew's account of the massacre of the children at Bethlehem. Krishna, for example, was a Hindu savior who allegedly lived in the sixth century B. C., so when a study of ancient world literature shows that an unusual event like the slaughter of the innocents seemed to have happened everywhere , reasonable people will realize that it probably happened nowhere or, at best, that it happened only once and was thereafter plagiarized. Since the story occurs many times before Matthew's version of it, we can only conclude that no such event happened in Bethlehem as Matthew--and only Matthew--claimed. Just like that, then, Mr. Dobbs finds one of his fifty amazing prophecy-fulfillments vaporizing right before his eyes.
If space permitted, I could easily establish that many of the other alleged prophecy fulfillments in the life of Jesus have their parallels in ancient mythology. Mr. Dobbs alleged that the miracles of Jesus had been prophesied in Isaiah 53:4-5, his crucifixion in Psalm 22:16, his resurrection in Psalm 16:10, and his ascension in Psalm 68:18. Examination of these passages in context, however, reveal the same problem that Earle Beach and I discussed above relative to Jeremiah 31:15. The statements are notoriously obscure and become prophecies only through the arbitrary claims of the New Testament writers who lifted them out of context and applied them to situations that the original writers were not referring to. So there is no way that anyone can establish that these "prophecies" were originally intended to be prophecies. All we have is the mere unsubstantiated word of the New Testament claimants that they were meant to be prophecies, and that is not a good enough foundation to build a probability argument on.
To that problem must be added the one cited above. Christianity is not the only religion to claim that its savior performed miracles, was crucified, was resurrected from the dead, and ascended into heaven. Hindu writings attributed all of these to Krishna. In fact, the lives of Jesus and Krishna, as related in the respective literatures of their followers, are so strikingly parallel that reasonable people can only conclude that the New Testament gospel writers borrowed many of their ideas from a savior mythology that had evolved long before the first century. In fact, virgin-born, crucified and resurrected saviors were as common as dirt in pagan mythology, and if that does not destroy probability arguments (as they pertain to prophecy fulfillment) in the minds of Mr. Dobbs and all others who see merit in them, then they are obviously determined to believe the folly of the Christian myth no matter how compelling the evidence to the contrary.
Another fallacy in this probability argument is that it completely discounts the possibility of deliberate contrivance. At one point when I was the cross-examiner, I pressed Mr. Dobbs to tell the audience if it would be at all possible for someone to study the Old Testament scriptures, interpret a number of obscure passages as prophecies, and then write a biography of a fictional character to make it appear that all of these "prophecies" had been fulfilled in his life. The tapes will show that Dobbs desperately evaded answering the question, even though I presented it to him three times.
In a letter to fundamentalist writer Chuck Missler, Jim Lippard very effectively addressed this same issue in commenting on a probability argument that Missler applied to prophecy fulfillments:
(Y)ou estimate the probability of a Messiah claimant entering Jerusalem on a donkey based on how many candidate Messiahs have done this, assuming (without evidence) that it is less than one in a hundred. Not only is this probably wrong, the correct question to ask is, "How many prospective Messiahs, knowing of the existence of this prophecy, would bother taking the trouble to fulfill it?" It's not as though entering Jerusalem on a donkey is beyond the capacity of a human being to intentionally fulfill. I'd assess the probability as on the order of one in one (June 8, 1993, p. 2).
My purpose in questioning Dobbs was to show that these alleged prophecy fulfillments never even happened, that the gospel writers simply went through the Old Testament looking for statements that they could construe as prophecies and then wrote the biographies of their Messiah to make it appear that all of the prophecies had been wonderfully fulfilled. Lippard's approach was to show that, even if the acts of "prophecy-fulfillment" actually did happen, they could have been done deliberately in order to give the pretending Messiah occasion to claim that he had indeed fulfilled the Jewish prophecies. Either way of looking at it, there would be nothing exceptional to claim, in this case, about a man riding into Jerusalem on a donkey. How many Jews descended from Abraham through David can we suppose rode into Jerusalem on a donkey at one time or another? Any one of them could have claimed that he had fulfilled this "prophecy."
With this background established, I can now demonstrate the absurdity of Dobbs's probability argument. I have not had an expert on probability factors check the argument to verify that the probability against the fulfillment of "any fifty" of the "more than 300" prophecies about Jesus would be over 11 sextillion to one. For the sake of argument, I will simply assume that the math is correct. If the figures are correct, all that Dobbs has accomplished is to show that the odds against his being able to prove that 50 Old Testament prophecies were fulfilled in the life of Jesus would be 11 sextillion to one.
To show why this is so, let's return to the slaughter of the innocents. The claim was made that this event was prophesied in Jeremiah 31:15, so we will let this "prophecy" be number one on the list of fifty. To begin proving his probability argument Dobbs would have to demonstrate ABSOLUTELY, beyond any question, that Jeremiah intended the statement as a prophecy of Herod's slaughter of the innocents. If there is any doubt at all that Jeremiah so intended the statement, then no fact of prophesy utterance has been established. Since I dispute that this was what Jeremiah meant and since there are hundreds, even thousands of others like me, who also dispute it, this is positive proof that Dobbs has not yet established beyond even reasonable doubt, much less absolute doubt, that Jeremiah's statement meant what it must mean in order to be a prophecy. Let's assume, however, just for the sake of argument that Dobbs could prove that Jeremiah did mean for the statement to be a prediction of the slaughter of children at some time in the prophet's future. After he has done that, Dobbs must then prove ABSOLUTELY that Herod's massacre of the children at Bethlehem can be established as a historical fact. The complete absence of any reference to such an event by any other New Testament writer or any secular historian contemporary to the times makes this an impossible task for Dobbs or anyone else. However, if an event that is allegedly a prophecy fulfillment cannot be factually established, how can any rational person contend that it was a prophecy fulfillment?
Again, for the sake of argument, let's assume that Dobbs could somehow prove that Herod's massacre of the innocents did in fact occur. At that point, all he would have accomplished is to prove that ONE--just one--prophecy was fulfilled in the life of Jesus. Now he would have to take the 49 others and go through the same process, one by one, painstakingly proving in each case that (1) the original statement was indeed intended as a prophecy of something that would happen in the life of the Messiah and that (2) the event prophesied did in fact happen to Jesus. This would necessitate taking the prophecy claims about the virgin birth of Jesus, the miracles he performed, his triumphal entry, his betrayal, his crucifixion, his treatment during the crucifixion, his resurrection, his ascension, and forty-one other alleged prophecy fulfillments and proving what was hypothetically proved about the slaughter of the innocents. No reasonable person can believe that Dobbs or anyone else could possibly do this, because the very moment that the least element of doubt arose in any one of the 49 remaining steps (after proving prophecy fulfillment in the massacre of the innocents), the entire probability argument would collapse like a house of cards.
So if Mr. Dobbs's math is correct in his calculation of probability, the odds against his proving that Jesus fulfilled 50 different prophecies would be over 11 sextillion to one. So much for probability and prophecy fulfillment!
joker, you did exactly as i stated a man in your position always seems to do. you work hard to disprove the easily provable, while using sidestep tactics, in lieu of actually weighing the evidence YOURSELF. if you actually read the prophecy compilations concerning Christ, that were written in a history book PRIOR to the life of Christ, you cannot deny their validity. the only hope you have, is a side step approach, hoping the opponent (for lack of a better term) you are facing, doesn't have the intellectual tools and biblical knowledge to call you on it. i do. on both accounts. you didn't read them yourself.
do you now deny that the ancients wrote about Christ specifically, in spefcific ways, and specific events that would pinpoint exactly who He was, including the timeframe that He would be born? PRIOR to His birth? are you willing to go on record and claim it "never happened"? if you even breathe you hold that kind of position, you lose all credibility as far as being "nuetral" until a claimed "truth" can be fully established.
of course "other religions" mirror or copycat aspects of what Christ came to do, because besides Christ, there is a force in the universe that works to draw men AWAY from Christ, just as your citations represent. the best deception comes in the nearest form of "likeness". so that fake rolex you buy, shouldn't sway you from singing the praises of a real one. right?
over 300. reduce it down to as many as you can with the excuse of "self fulfilling", or "it's not really interpretatively realted to Christ", but still, in an intellectually honest arena, there would STILL be enough "odds wise" to exclude any other possibility, than Christ was God who came in the flesh, down to a "T".
do i need to go over the ones that are irrefutable? just the ones that stevie wonder would even see that Christ is the one that is being prophesied about? i can do that. but, the truth is, will it make ANY difference with you if i did, or will you make up some other googled excuse, instead of accepting foretold history.
if it wasn't already written down in pre-recorded history, your argument would have a leg to stand on. but it is.
tell you what, i will be glad to do the leg work for you, because obviously you aren't interested in doing it. you say the word, and i will print out just some of the scriptures that were written about Christ, so that you can't deny "they were'nt", or they are "obscure", etc. that way you will confronted dead on with actual history, instead of relying on some sidestepping the issue while negating THE most solidifying component - that of human inability to "make" things happen.
your mr beach criminally forgot (on purpose) that component. but i fully realize it's solid place in the validity game.
i do like this statement by dr beach, as it corroberates (sp) my claim. mr beach stated ......"So if Mr. Dobbs's math is correct in his calculation of probability, the odds against his proving that Jesus fulfilled 50 different prophecies would be over 11 sextillion to one. So much for probability and prophecy fulfillment!
amen brother. whatever those mathematicians can come up with odds wise, i know it adds up to irrefutable irrefutibility.
therein lies the perfect demonstration of the extreme desperation a man has to go to (twisting the odds bent AGAINST dobbs, because the odds aren't "against Him proving it", they are against the person who has to refute it), in order to think they have come away with a valid excuse.
in life, on any subject matter in life, in any arena of life, if you have to lie and twist someones word(s) in order to manufacture a victory, you are NOT operating from a position of strength. you have lost your intellectual integrity.
now voter, now we will see if you are really interested in world history. i can interject the human element, the one O ONE can control, but God can predict. especially the juiciest ones, where the antagonists of Christ were intstrumental in fullifilling those prophecies. are you game?
"i am .........."meant to"
P.S., that RJoH is a stand up guy. thanks, vision
until further notice, it's france everyday
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Quote: Originally posted by Delta Draw on Jun 19, 2010
Slumbervision,
“from the very beginning, God spoke in PLURAL form (let "US" make man in "OUR" image), and yet in places like isaiah, God claimed there was only ONE God. the Trinity is ONE God, manifested in three persons, period.”
The Queen of England speaks as “We the Queen of England”. The great We or great Wee? To use ‘We’ does not prove there are others in the room; it is a statement of supreme authority, just like the Queen exhibits. Not exactly proof your holy trinity holds water in the use of WE. But I’ll tell you what- the trinity is the biggest lie to make the Word of God non-effect. It is an old pagan belief to have three headed triune gods, and now it is expected to be adhered to in Christianity. Get your fix on Sunday.
You are upset about your words being twisted? How little you regard the Word you claim to know. “and please don't purposefully misrepresent what i do or say. “
I don’t believe tithing is required because the tithe was never about money. To say it is required is a fabrication, a lie and BTW if Christ fulfilled all the law, why hold on to the tithe like it is the law? A: leagalism.
“like the prosperity garbage teaching. harsh to say it like that, but it's true. like i said, the ONLY people that benefit from that teaching are the preachers teaching it. that's the straight up true.,….” Here you go. Pure garbage religion says YOU MUST TITHE, like it is a commandment of the true God. You’re all twisted up in the lie and think prosperity is wrong because you see the hypocrisy of religion. Now you have to have some rationalization to explain it and you say bunk to what God says is available. Funny how that works, but it is by design to steal the worship from the true God. You lose.
“…if it's not, i welcome you right here to explain to all the others reading this why THEY aren't "healed", or "wealthy". A: Because they bought into a lie and it does not deliver. The failure is people’s unbelief and there are basically two kinds mentioned in the book. Apsitia and apithia. The first kind is from wrong teaching or the lack of right teaching, while the second is indifference. Just because someone does not know how to set a clock on a VCR does not mean that it does not work. Read the manual.
“maybe you can tell them they "don't have enough faith". or, they "haven't tithed quite enough". add sickening infinitum” A: Wrong teaching and indifference: the doctrine or guidelines for belief most follow are flawed. Many are left confused and bitter toward God as the result of religion.
“then why would the jews kill him FOR claiming to be God?”
How about You provide the chapter and verse where J.C. said he was God and where it says the Jews killed him for saying he was God? Document it with chapter and verse.
Joker, that post is pretty big, mind if I get some popcorn and beer stocked up before I read it?
DD
DD, your disrepectful bent betrays your spoken claims, but your lack of ability to accurately replicate Gods word, says even more about your stance.
i don't mind a back and forth with anyone on the planet, but really, do you possibly hope that anyone will take you seriously when you pepper your statements with arrogance and sarcasm? really? i can appreciate a man in unwavering form, who doesn't budge from a solid position, but disrepectfulness from the gate tells your story all to well. you're a person with a weak position. nothing more - and nothing less.
anyway, be you as it may, just like i said, Jesus Christ claimed to be God, was crucified because He claimed that, and you "forgot" to mention the all important ..........only God can raise Himself from the dead. care to comment on that?
as you asked ....."john 10:33 ......."We are not stoning you for any of these," replied the Jews, "but for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God."
because you "forgot", but i didn't......."john 2:19 "Jesus answered them, "Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days." . (nope. not about a building. something like 3 passages later it states something to the effect of ..."He was referring to His body as the temple"). ONLY God can raise the dead. He possessed the power over his own life and death (that's only an attribute that's attributable to God), just in case you try and cite instances where the disciples raised the dead, etc.
shoot, pretty much all of john chapter one is descriptive of Christ being God, and becoming flesh.
now, you still haven't told the prosperity proponents why they aren't "healed". all you did is some veiled dance around your definition accusation, that whatever they have done - ISN'T enough. come clean DD, and tell them exactly what's so "complicated" or "perplexing" about the prosperity doctrine that creates the air that "you just haven't done your part, faith-wise, works wise". you won't be specific on purpose for one of two reasons.....(a) either you don't know yourself the "methodology", or you pretend you do, so that you can further that dreaded teaching because it sounds so "spiritual", or (b) you are afraid to admit it's true theology components, because even you know deep down it's a biblical lie, yet you refuse to distance yourself from something that actually STEALS faith from people (because it doesn't work)
not everyone is "supposed to" DD. true, some are, when and if God decides, but not "all" like the prosperity lie teaches.
how about a little bit of the odds deal applied to this fallacy, to expose it's lie. take one of the biggest propsperity churches in america, joel osteens church. look at the vastness of that crowd when the cameraman pulls back, and tell the reading audience that most all of those people "lack faith".
only 5 in that crowd get healed of cancer, because the rest just don't have enough "faith"? seriously? 5 out of what, like 12,000 people? that prosperity doctrine must really be unattainable.
the sacrifice, and subsequent grace of God must not be enough - you have to be near perfect before you can qualify. now THAT'S an accurate description of what the prosperity doctrine REALLY attempts to sell - the lie about "self qualification".
there is one thing that boils my blood faster than a hollywood prop man, and that's when someone uses God for personal gain, by selling to others "you can too - if you just have enough faith".
that's a crock.
simple endearing correct life giving theology reads like this.....if God wills it, then it's so"
"i am .........."meant to"
P.S., that RJoH is a stand up guy. thanks, vision
until further notice, it's france everyday
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Slumberquest:
“simple endearing correct life giving theology reads like this.....if God wills it, then it's so" ”
The question is What is God’s Will? I showed you the scripture that says prosperity is the Will of God. If you want to say it is a biblical lie, let me show a lie recorded in the passage you quote to prove Jesus Christ said he was God. In fact he did not say that he was God, he was accused of saying that. By liars. They said he was being blasphemous in doing so and it was the reason for being stoned. He said he was the Son of God (doing his Father’s will, in agreement with that will, and that God was in him=seed).
John 10:33 (King James Version)
33The Jews answered him, saying, For a good work we stone thee not; but for blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God.
John 10:36 (King James Version)
36Say ye of him, whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world, Thou blasphemest; because I said, I am the Son of God? (liar-liar pants on fire)
Sorry it is not the red letter edition. Oh, look here,… it says this in the book too:
1 Timothy 2:5
For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus;Now I wonder why your split personality trinity did not say that they made man in their image???? I am sure you will find some flawed logic to explain that and you will no doubt have the last word in this thread,…. But it will be your word mixed with a little truth to sell the sizzle, not the steak. God did not die. J.C. sits at the right hand of God ( a place of honor: The hand of blessing) are you sure that I should believe God is sitting on His own hand,... talking to himself,.... to you?
Jesus Christ is not God.
To get answers to prayer, you gotta get your God right to begin with, FIRST.
DD
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DOUBLE BUMP:
There is much in the book about thinking. We are exhorted to think correctly about this or that. We are to renew our minds, we are to put on the mind of Christ and think like he did. We are to have whole thoughts on spiritual matters and sober ones about what the book says. When you think otherwise you do not have whole thoughts you have ,…..
INSANITY
DD
READ WHAT YOU SEE BELOW AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS TEXT: THE SIGNATURE
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John 3:12 I have spoken to you about Earthly things , and you do not Believe. How can you Possible believe if I tell you about Heavenly things!!!
1 Corinthians 13:12
Now we see things Imperfectly, like Puzzling reflections in a mirror; but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All That I know now is partial and Incomplete, but Then I will know everything completely just as GOD now knows me completely.
Please Don't argue. The day will come when all will be revealed, Just Pray that you will be in right standing with ALMIGHTY GOD on that day. For on that day, we will not run out of time, but out of all chances, to get things right with THE ALMIGHTY GOD!!!
forget what "they" say about you. What you say about you?...
Now, does it count??
*Jr$ina
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Quote: Originally posted by jrosina on Jun 20, 2010
John 3:12 I have spoken to you about Earthly things , and you do not Believe. How can you Possible believe if I tell you about Heavenly things!!!
1 Corinthians 13:12
Now we see things Imperfectly, like Puzzling reflections in a mirror; but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All That I know now is partial and Incomplete, but Then I will know everything completely just as GOD now knows me completely.
Please Don't argue. The day will come when all will be revealed, Just Pray that you will be in right standing with ALMIGHTY GOD on that day. For on that day, we will not run out of time, but out of all chances, to get things right with THE ALMIGHTY GOD!!!
Quote Them Scriptures, Girl!
**Almost Doesn't Count**
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Quote: Originally posted by visiondude on Jun 20, 2010
joker, you did exactly as i stated a man in your position always seems to do. you work hard to disprove the easily provable, while using sidestep tactics, in lieu of actually weighing the evidence YOURSELF. if you actually read the prophecy compilations concerning Christ, that were written in a history book PRIOR to the life of Christ, you cannot deny their validity. the only hope you have, is a side step approach, hoping the opponent (for lack of a better term) you are facing, doesn't have the intellectual tools and biblical knowledge to call you on it. i do. on both accounts. you didn't read them yourself.
do you now deny that the ancients wrote about Christ specifically, in spefcific ways, and specific events that would pinpoint exactly who He was, including the timeframe that He would be born? PRIOR to His birth? are you willing to go on record and claim it "never happened"? if you even breathe you hold that kind of position, you lose all credibility as far as being "nuetral" until a claimed "truth" can be fully established.
of course "other religions" mirror or copycat aspects of what Christ came to do, because besides Christ, there is a force in the universe that works to draw men AWAY from Christ, just as your citations represent. the best deception comes in the nearest form of "likeness". so that fake rolex you buy, shouldn't sway you from singing the praises of a real one. right?
over 300. reduce it down to as many as you can with the excuse of "self fulfilling", or "it's not really interpretatively realted to Christ", but still, in an intellectually honest arena, there would STILL be enough "odds wise" to exclude any other possibility, than Christ was God who came in the flesh, down to a "T".
do i need to go over the ones that are irrefutable? just the ones that stevie wonder would even see that Christ is the one that is being prophesied about? i can do that. but, the truth is, will it make ANY difference with you if i did, or will you make up some other googled excuse, instead of accepting foretold history.
if it wasn't already written down in pre-recorded history, your argument would have a leg to stand on. but it is.
tell you what, i will be glad to do the leg work for you, because obviously you aren't interested in doing it. you say the word, and i will print out just some of the scriptures that were written about Christ, so that you can't deny "they were'nt", or they are "obscure", etc. that way you will confronted dead on with actual history, instead of relying on some sidestepping the issue while negating THE most solidifying component - that of human inability to "make" things happen.
your mr beach criminally forgot (on purpose) that component. but i fully realize it's solid place in the validity game.
i do like this statement by dr beach, as it corroberates (sp) my claim. mr beach stated ......"So if Mr. Dobbs's math is correct in his calculation of probability, the odds against his proving that Jesus fulfilled 50 different prophecies would be over 11 sextillion to one. So much for probability and prophecy fulfillment!
amen brother. whatever those mathematicians can come up with odds wise, i know it adds up to irrefutable irrefutibility.
therein lies the perfect demonstration of the extreme desperation a man has to go to (twisting the odds bent AGAINST dobbs, because the odds aren't "against Him proving it", they are against the person who has to refute it), in order to think they have come away with a valid excuse.
in life, on any subject matter in life, in any arena of life, if you have to lie and twist someones word(s) in order to manufacture a victory, you are NOT operating from a position of strength. you have lost your intellectual integrity.
now voter, now we will see if you are really interested in world history. i can interject the human element, the one O ONE can control, but God can predict. especially the juiciest ones, where the antagonists of Christ were intstrumental in fullifilling those prophecies. are you game?
of course "other religions" mirror or copycat aspects of what Christ came to do, because besides Christ
If you even paid attention to the video i uploaded a couple of pages ago, you would've noticed that they are talking about events before the time of Christ, not after. The same events that Jesus is famous for was already done centuries before him.
The word "Objectivity" is not in your vocabulary. You, among many others in the past with whom I've debated relgion with, will always be biased. You don't try to look for what the truth is, even if it means it's beyond your cozy little comfort zone. I used to be religious at one time until I woke up. How did I wake up?....Well....I started looking at outside sources for possible alternatives, because the info pertaining to religion I had learned up to that point, was starting to NOT make sense anymore.
But again, like i said before, whatever floats your boat.
As long as you claim that everything in the Bible is true, and treat it as though it was a fact, then I really have nothing else to write to you about.
Your conviction is strong, and no amount of reasoning....well..........I shouldn't use the word "Reasoning", because you do not reason at all, will allow you to look or investigate possible outcomes that may differ from what is locked into your mind.
That's fine....If that's what helps you to better deal with life, then go for it.
But I can't keep repeating myself over and over for pages to come. It makes no sense to keep arguing with someone who uses the very same source, the Bible, that I don't hold to be true, to make his points. Just because you think it's true, doesn't mean it is. You have no evidence to back anything you write about. You also discount everything I mentioned earlier about the countless religions or worse, the many denominations within Christianity that can't agree with each other.
I can easily go on and write the other 99% of why I don't believe, like so many inconsistencies within the stories in the Bible, but I'll spare you. It won't matter anyways. You don't want to find out. As long as you're comfortable where you are now, you'll never explore because you may find out that you were wrong. That doesn't mean once you find out, that you still can't be spiritual. It just means that you finally realized after much investigation, that organized religions can't all be correct at the same time. It's apparently very difficult for certain folks to grasp that. I can't see why. It's a very simple concept.
Why is it, just about everything else in life is vigorously scrutinized, but when it relates to religion, all of a sudden most will completely drop everything and take in every word as if it was true? You wouldn't sign on a loan If you didn't read the fine print...would you?....You wouldn't just send your kids to a specific school, because Joe Shmo told you....would you?...You wouldn't buy a brand new car without first taking the time to first inspect every aspect of the sale?...would you?.....Of course not !.......But all I have to do is tell you that the Joo Joo God lived in a mountain 500 years ago in Africa, and he is the true life giver to the Human being, and you'll accept it without giving a second thought. I don't get it.
Maybe it's just me that's crazy, and the rest of the world is sane.
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Good Rosie! The debate participants need to be reminded there is an end and there is no escape from having the truth revealed! You can argue all you want, deny all you want, rationalize all you want, opine all you want but.................in the end.
FJB