Yeah, all yarn and no form. he he he
Well, you could come too. Bring pictures from your last trip.
That's OK, isn't it, Set?
He will need to stop off for some cream and sugar . . .
neologist wrote:stlstrike3 wrote: . . . .In true religious zealot form, you have cast logic and reason aside. Your questions have absolutely nothing to do with the existence of God. I'd be curious as to your answers. Allow me to give you mine.
If God doesn't exists, then how are the apparent inconsistencies in the bible explained?
Because the bible is a sloppily assembled text that was written by a bunch of superstitious individuals, and launched into the mainstream when Emperor Constantine bought into the whole Christian cult thing.
You originated this thread and dropped it:
http://able2know.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=2647077#2647077
You stated your favorite - I answered it. You went out for coffee and never came back. I have asseverated that the bible itself explains its apparent contradictions and while
I have failed (failed, failed, failed :wink: ) to convince any one as yet, I certainly think the bible does a good job of explaining itself.
BTW, I don't believe there is a plural for the word 'exist'.
I apologize for not being able to reply to you at a speed that is to your liking. This pesky thing called employment gets in the way.
I'm not sure what "asseverated" means.... is that Latin? If you're going to call me out on typoes, perhaps you should pay more attention to your own use of the language.
But back to the point at hand, "the bible does a good job of explaining itself"? You have seriously got to be joking.
Does the bible have consciousness and intellect in order to "explain itself"? And, you asserting, or believing that means absolutely nothing. The Bible contains blatant contradictions that can be ascribed to nothing else but its assembly as a inaccurate and error-ridden account of divergent opinions that were modified countless times before "scholars" shaped the texts to create the illusion of internal consistency.
Again, have you read "Misquoting Jesus"? If you haven't, then please partake of that before spewing more "assertions" (I can only assume that's what you meant to spell) or "beliefs". If you have, then please refute the data that Mr. Ehrman presented in that book in an evidence-based fashion.
stlstrike3: "...illusion of internal consistency..." is not an accurate description of the bible - with or without all the revisions and interpretations. There are too many "errors, omissions and contradictions" on the fact of it for any sane person with any common sense and logic to take it seriously.
The writers of the bible didn't have the foresight of contemporary scientific knowledge or the ability to view the whole world when they wrote it. Hindesight is usually 20/20, but their sight was only about 2/20 or a very small part of it. It proves their "message" was composed only by men without the omnipotence of a deity. It's really sad that so many men of letters devoted their lives to translate those worthless verses that only confused their believers further into the abyss.
I like to think of the Bible as a country. A large country like the US, that represents several different cultures. In one part of the country the people promote "this," in others they promote "that." So people who pride in the bible often think that the bible is dynamic and that it adapts to "this" or "that," but in truth they're just visiting different areas, and ignoring the issues of consistancy.
Stlstrike, if you intend to call Neo out on his use of language, perhaps you could cover your own ignorance by learning your language.
[url=http://www.answers.com/topic/asseverate][b]Answers-dot-com[/b][/url] wrote:as·sev·er·ate tr.v., -at·ed, -at·ing, -ates.
To declare seriously or positively; affirm.
What a putz.
stlstrike3 wrote: . . . I'm not sure what "asseverated" means.... is that Latin? If you're going to call me out on typoes, perhaps you should pay more attention to your own use of the language.
OK! :wink:
stlstrike3 wrote:But back to the point at hand, "the bible does a good job of explaining itself"? You have seriously got to be joking.
Does the bible have consciousness and intellect in order to "explain itself"?
Note: Look up figure of speech known as personification.
stlstrike3 wrote:And, you asserting, or believing that means absolutely nothing. The Bible contains blatant contradictions that can be ascribed to nothing else but its assembly as a inaccurate and error-ridden account of divergent opinions that were modified countless times before "scholars" shaped the texts to create the illusion of internal consistency.
Name one.
stlstrike3 wrote:Again, have you read "Misquoting Jesus"? If you haven't, then please partake of that before spewing more "assertions" (I can only assume that's what you meant to spell) or "beliefs". If you have, then please refute the data that Mr. Ehrman presented in that book in an evidence-based fashion.
Don't intend to read (actually re read) his list of straw men. Why don't you pick one to expose to the torch?
You know, a certain hilarity ensues when some joker starts a thread to the effect that better educated people are less religious, and then lashes out stupidly at someone for using a word of his native language of which he is ignorant. Not exactly an advertisement for his position, is it?
Setanta wrote:Stlstrike, if you intend to call Neo out on his use of language, perhaps you could cover your own ignorance by learning your language.
[url=http://www.answers.com/topic/asseverate][b]Answers-dot-com[/b][/url] wrote:as·sev·er·ate tr.v., -at·ed, -at·ing, -ates.
To declare seriously or positively; affirm.
What a putz.
Fine fine, I was WRONG.
I erroneously thought he meant to use "assert".
I'm not used to people using advanced vocabulary.
"Putz"? That's the kind of 4th-grade level talk I'm used to... talk like that encourages me to keep the bar low.
stlstrike3: I'm not used to people using advanced vocabulary.
Yeah, I also "hate" 1,000 dollar words when they can use easy, .02c ones.
Yeah, strike3, this is your thread, ain't it?
You will find Setanta a worthy touchstone for your asseverations.
cicerone imposter wrote:stlstrike3: I'm not used to people using advanced vocabulary.
Yeah, I also "hate" 1,000 dollar words when they can use easy, .02c ones.
Yeah, but CI, you're at least a funguy.
Thank ya, neo. Preciate that!
Sorry I missed a chance to call you on my trip to So. Cal. earlier this month. Carole had my itinerary planned to the second.
stlstrike3 wrote:I'm not used to people using advanced vocabulary.
One might assert (or asseverate) that the word has become an archaic usage, but it would hardly qualify as "advanced vocabulary." That you did not know the word is evidence that a science education does not automatically qualify one to assert (or asseverate) that one is well-educated. At any event, it makes you look like an inept user of the internet, in that you could easily have looked it up before you lashed out at Neo.
Quote:"Putz"? That's the kind of 4th-grade level talk I'm used to... talk like that encourages me to keep the bar low.
Given that you started the topic without reliable evidence of your thesis, and immediately proceeded to beg a series of questions on that basis, and that those questions were as stupidly broad generalizations as that religion attacks science--the bar wasn't set very high to begin with.
(taken from Misquoting Jesus)
"Whereas (John) Mill knew of or examined some one hundred Greek manuscripts to uncover his thirty thousand variations, today we know of far, far more. At last count, more than fifty-seven hundred Greek manuscripts have been discovered and catalogued. That's fifty-seven times as many as Mill knew about in 1707. These fifty-seven hundred include everything from the smallest fragments of manuscripts -- the size of a credit card -- to very large and magnificent productions, preserved in their entirety. Some of them contain only one book of the New Testament; others contain a small collection (for example, the four Gospels or the letters of Paul); a very few contain the entire New Testament. There are, in addition, many manuscripts of the various early versions (= translations) of the New Testament.
...
In addition to these Greek manuscripts, we know of about ten thousand manuscripts of the Latin Vulgate, not to mention the manuscripts of other versions, such as the Syriac, Coptic, Armenian, Old Georgian, Church Slavonic, and the like (recall that Mill had access to only a few of the ancient versions, and these he knew only through their Latin translations). In addition, we have the writing of church fathers such as Clement of Alexandria, Origen, and Athanasius among the Greeks and Tertullian, Jerome, and Augustine among the Latins -- all of them quoting the texts of the New Testament in places, making it possible to reconstruct what their manuscripts (now lost, for the most part) must have looked like.
With this abundance of evidence, what can we say about the total number of variants known today? Scholars differ significantly in their estimates -- some say there are 200,000 variants known, some say 300,000, some say 400,000 or more! We do not know for sure because, despite impressive developments in computer technology, no one has yet been able to count them all. Perhaps, as I indicated earlier, it is best simply to leave the matter in comparative terms. There are more variations among our manuscripts than there are words in the New Testament."
All the more remarkable that, among the major modern translations, there is so much agreement.
neologist wrote:To find out why my faith is not credulity, you would have to walk in my shoes. Well, not really as I am a poor example. All I can do is suggest that the shoes I am pointing to might provide you the answer. It's kind of like telling you that ice cream tastes good . . .
neo,
Earlier you stated that your belief in God was not the result of "some moment of emotion". However, you now seem to be claiming just that-- that your conviction is based on how you felt about some experience. Do you consider your subjective interpretation to be more reliable than logic, or are you simply unable to articulate in logical form why you believe as you do?
neologist wrote:All the more remarkable that, among the major modern translations, there is so much agreement.
from Misquoting Jesus:
Problems with Copying Early Christian Texts
Because the early Christian texts were not being copied by professional scribes, at least in the first two or three centuries of the church, but simply by educated members of the Christian congregations who could do the job and were willing to do so, we can expect that in the earliest copies, especially, mistakes were commonly made in transcription. Indeed, we have solid evidence that this was the case, as it was a matter of occasional complaint by Christians reading those texts and trying to uncover the original words of their authors. The third-century church father Origen, for example, once registred the following complaint about the copies of the Gospels at his disposal:
The differences among the manuscripts have become great, either through the negligence of some copyists or through the perverse audacity of others; they either neglect to check over what they have transcribed, or, in the process of checking, they make additions are deletions as they please.
Oriegen was not the only one to notice the problem. His pagan oppponent Celsus had, as well, some seventy years earlier. In his attack on Christianity and its literature, Celsus had maligned the Christian copyists for their transgressive copying practices:
Some believers, as though from a drinking bout, go so far as to oppose themselves and alter the original text of the gospel three or four or several times over, and they change its character to enable them to deny difficulties in the fact of criticism.
Need I go on?
