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#447055 Ezekiel and Egypt's Desolation

Posted by palladium on 09 December 2013 - 06:49 PM in Theology

Thanks Ivastic. :)
 
Also, it's worth mentioning that the prophecy regarding Tyre (Ezek 26) was quite possibly written while the siege was in progress (see http://en.wikipedia....)#Early_history), and after Nebuchadnezzar had already been successful in his siege against Jerusalem...so it's unsurprising that Ezekiel would prophesy the same outcome for Tyre. What is surprising is that Nebuchadnezzar failed to deliver.
 
It would seem from Ezekiel 29:18-21 that Ezekiel acknowledges the (partial?) failure of the Tyre prophecy:
 

Son of man, King Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon made his army labor hard against Tyre. Every head was rubbed bald and every shoulder rubbed bare; yet he and his army received no wages from Tyre for the work he carried out against it. Therefore this is what the sovereign Lord says: Look, I am about to give the land of Egypt to King Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon. He will carry off her wealth, capture her loot, and seize her plunder; it will be his army’s wages. I have given him the land of Egypt as his compensation for attacking Tyre, because they did it for me, declares the sovereign Lord.

 
As for the Tyre prophecy, yes Tyre was later defeated by Alexander the Great, but it was never made "a bare rock" (Ezek 26:14) and was later rebuilt, despite what the prophecy claims. Even if you want to assert that the "old" city wasn't rebuilt, you still have to concede that it was partially rebuilt, and the only reason it has never been fully restored is because it is an ancient landmark and the old ruins are preserved. By the same logic, Jerusalem was never rebuilt because the old city ruins are still there today. Looking at Tyre today (quite a successful city), Ezek 26:17-18 make little sense.




#445592 The view from the top of the Great Pyramid of Giza

Posted by palladium on 02 May 2013 - 04:32 AM in Archaeology, Biblical History & Textual Criticism

Exposure is impressive, must be time lapse; this photo pretty much proves it.


There is writing on top of the bricks in this photo. Left there by other keen climbers perhaps?



#445178 Philosopher submits hoax abstract to theology journal

Posted by palladium on 07 March 2013 - 06:04 PM in Philosophy

You can get any old rubbish published. Especially as a conference abstract.



Science is simply an understanding and knowledge of our physical world. Science and religion are perfectly compatible, the prophets understood science. Dan 1:4 Gods creative process was set in motion in 6 literal 24 hour days. "The evening and the morning were the (#) day. Each day continued for 6000 years where what was created multiplied and evolved until the next day of creation. Adam and Eve were created at the end of the sixth day, in the year 4004 bce so on March 12 it will be the year 6018 (Nissan 1) God is Energy (the El of Elohim-a plural) Energy, the forces in nature, are ubiquitous, omnipotent and eternal. Energy cannot be created or destroyed, it can only change form. God is electromagnetism, gravitation and the nuclear force. Our son (pun intended) is the source of Energy for the universe and is a ball of fire (symbol of holiness The Lord is Gods wife and they are one flesh. Gen. 2:24


I'm sorry, what?

Were these two posts related?



#444881 What evidence can we base our faith on?

Posted by palladium on 21 January 2013 - 03:25 PM in Theology

I am not so sure about this. In the relevant passage 1 Corinthians 15:8, Paul does distinguish his experience from that of the other disciples - it was "as though to one born at the wrong time"

I understood that quote to be about the timing of Paul's conversion.



#444876 What evidence can we base our faith on?

Posted by palladium on 20 January 2013 - 04:59 PM in Theology


I found this interesting. It claims that mass hallucinations (or at least reports of them) are possible, even likely (in the specific circumstances of the gospels). And it gives real, verifiable examples of such.
http://ntwrong.wordp...-hallucination/


How well documented are these historical cases of mass hallucination? Specifically:

(1) How long after the supposed mass hallucination was it recorded?
(2) Is the record of them influenced by political imperatives? Since we know that political imperatives normally trump truth.

Do these problems also apply to the NT narrative of the resurrection?

As I understood it, the point wasn't so much that mass hallucinations occur or not (I suspect there are genuine recorded cases however). The point was that writers in those times would use mass hallucination (well, "visions"), to bolster their claims.
The NT accounts even follow the same formula, of increasing numbers of "witnesses" over time.

The article claims that people of those times considered visions to be as good as reality, and divine truths were often manifest through visions (we have several other visions recorded in the NT). Compare the record of Peter and Cornelius.
Also compare the fact that Paul does not distinguish between his vision and the other post-resurrection appearances. Therefore either they were all visions, or Paul did not consider there to be any distinction between a vision and a real life appearance. Either way, the truth is not as clear as we might think.

As for your questions, we don't know the answers to the first question with respect to the NT accounts, so I'm not sure how it would help. As for the second, I'm not sure about political motivation, but the gospel accounts were highly motivated. They even admit as such "That ye might believe" (John) or "so that you might know for certain the things you heard about" (Luke).

While we're on the subject, the rebuttal used against those who suggest the mass hallucination theory is that "mass hallucinations are extremely rare", but the irony is that resurrections are even rarer. Accounts of resurrections however, are far more common than actual ones.

My view is that the actual truth is unknowable. No one knows for certain. All that remains is what level of credibility/plausibility you can muster up, and I would suggest that what is required for any particular person to believe is actually quite subjective, and varies from person to person.



#444873 What evidence can we base our faith on?

Posted by palladium on 20 January 2013 - 04:54 AM in Theology

I found this interesting. It claims that mass hallucinations (or at least reports of them) are possible, even likely (in the specific circumstances of the gospels). And it gives real, verifiable examples of such.
http://ntwrong.wordp...-hallucination/



#444870 What evidence can we base our faith on?

Posted by palladium on 20 January 2013 - 02:59 AM in Theology

I'm still not convinced by the argument of comparing the gospels with other historical documents.


It's not an argument, it's a rebuttal to an argument.

Sounds like my terminology was incorrect.

The fact is that history is not concerned with absolute truth. It cannot do more than provide some level of plausibility.


This sounds like a point in favour of the gospels.

Potentially, yes. But my intention was to define the "best case" scenario. I often attempt to define the min/max boundaries before proceeding.

I would like more than just plausibility, but I have to concede that what I would like to know is now impossible to find out. I may never find what I seek. Uncertainty seems to be the only truth I have found so far.

Incidentally, did anyone see which way the point went? If you did, please tell Jeppo, because he missed it. :whoosh:/>/>

Actually, I think Jeppo's done a fine job so far. :)/>/>

The fact he is bothering to take part in this discussion at all (what's in it for him really?) speaks highly of him.



#444864 What evidence can we base our faith on?

Posted by palladium on 19 January 2013 - 06:10 PM in Theology

I'm still not convinced by the argument of comparing the gospels with other historical documents.

The fact is that history is not concerned with absolute truth. It cannot do more than provide some level of plausibility. For any one of those writings quoted, I agree that historians would accept that the overall story or the events it portrays are in some way historical, but I doubt very much that any historian would place hand on heart and assert that any of those works is 100% accurate, unless they had tangible corroborating evidence.

If all you wish to claim is that the gospels provide evidence that some event they are based on is merely plausible, then I believe that is demonstrated just fine.

But the gospels cannot give us absolute truth, and cannot provide the level of certainty which is being required of christians. Basing your life on something requires more than just mere plausibility. It requires proof beyond doubt. We are a long way from that.

Anecdotal evidence is the weakest form of evidence and can never be used as proof on its own. Yet what kind of evidence do we have for the resurrection? Anecdotal. We don't even know who the anecdotes come from? No character reference. Nothing.

The bible clearly states that belief in God requires faith. To claim that we have enough evidence to believe in all of its claims is not honest. If that were the case, there would be no need for faith.

Heb 11 defines faith not as "in addition to evidence" but "the evidence". In other words, faith IS the evidence of what is not seen. To me that's just opening up a world of self-deception.

As an aside, yes it also requires faith to get on a plane etc. but then on the other hand many plane-crash victims have died for that faith. Faith is not a replacement for certainty. Faith doesn't become proof.

For interest, have a look at the youtube series entitled "Psychology of faith" - it's a 10-part series. It powerfully demonstrates that humans are hard-wired to easily believe things that are not true. It covers most areas of faith, and gives scientific evidence that people are very easily deceived, and relates the findings to matters of faith.

At the end of the day, I think the only intellectually honest position in all of this is that we cannot be certain. We don't have all the facts. We only have partial evidence. The psychology of faith series will show you why some people are convinced beyond doubt by that evidence, while others are not.

If you haven't figured it out by now, with all of my flip-flopping on this issue, I remain agnostic.

Is there anyone here who would like to take up the challenge of writing a chronological account of exactly what happened on the day of Jesus' resurrection?

Finally, there are failed prophecies in the OT. Also, the scholarly consensus view (based on much exploration) is that there is no evidence that Israel existed prior to living in Canaan. Many (most?) events in the OT cannot be dated with any certainty, and some parts (Genesis) share details with legends from surrounding nations (showing that the stories were not divinely inspired, but were adapted from previous cultures. Read that carefully. I'm not claiming they copied their contempories. I'm agreeing with the consensus view that both they and their contemporaries shared a common source at some point).

Proof of Jesus' resurrection does nothing to fix these problems. It's just another piece of an already impossible puzzle.



#444824 Trinity Talk

Posted by palladium on 16 January 2013 - 05:15 PM in Theology

Anyone who claims that Jesus' nature is simple and obvious throughout the NT is not being truthful nor honest.


I don't believe that's correct.

Jesus is consistently described as a mortal human being before his death and glorification, in language used to describe other mortal men. Even Trinitarian commentators will admit that the pre-resurrection language of Scripture gives no hint that he was anything but a genuine human being, sharing the same nature we all possess. Some will go so far as to say that you simply cannot get a divine Jesus out of the synoptic gospels.

Fair enough. I guess I just struggle with the concept of: God made humans -> God wrote (i.e. produced?) Bible -> majority of humans cannot understand Bible correctly.

On the other hand, the free will argument, combined with the fact that at least some humans have understood it correctly is probably enough to resolve that.

#4: we need to stop reading the New Testament in light of post-apostolic Christological developments and start reading it within its original socio-historical context. This will mean avoiding the temptation to place unreasonable expectations on Scripture.

When we ask 'Why doesn't the Bible refute an idea which emerged in the 2nd/3rd/4th Century?' we overlook the fact that the answer is in the question.

Perhaps, but your answer also works if the Bible was not inspired, or if God did not have complete foreknowledge, or if God chose not to act on that foreknowledge, or ... if the Bible is not the reason for the erroneous beliefs, as you state below...

Incidentally, it is a point of historical fact that the first people to believe Jesus' pre-resurrection nature was somehow divine, did not draw their conclusions from Scripture but from Hellenic philosophy and myth. The earliest Christological heresy was Docetism, which denied that Jesus was physical, corporeal, and literally human. This is the teaching refuted by John.

Fair enough. What you said above (emphasis mine) was probably the key to answering my original concern.

Note that I am NOT saying that the trinity is correct by any definition. I do not accept the trinity - I do not believe that the Bible teaches anything like it.

I have often been concerned by the number of honest, well-intentioned christians who believe in it, but I suppose at the end of the day, we need to leave salvation up to God. As R2D2 mentioned, it is not profitable to try to second-guess God's motives/actions.



#444806 Trinity Talk

Posted by palladium on 15 January 2013 - 11:47 PM in Theology

One thing that still bothers me regarding the nature of Jesus is that the majority of Christians believe in the trinity and they believe that the trinity is what the Bible teaches, and that clearly so. (I am not claiming they are right btw).

The way it bothers me is when you consider the concept of a God who knew in advance that this would be the case, and also inspired the writing of the Bible, and yet didn't see a need to make Jesus' nature more explicit. Anyone who claims that Jesus' nature is simple and obvious throughout the NT is not being truthful nor honest. Anyone who claims that there was no way to make it clearer is also not being honest. The mere existence of statements of faith about the nature of Jesus means that humans can rewrite it in a form that is more explicit.

The possible resolutions to this problem that I can think of are:
1. God did not foresee the problem.
2. God did not inspire the writing of the Bible (whether #1 is true or not).
3. A correct, technical understanding of the nature of God/Jesus beyond the "basics" is not critical for salvation (i.e. on the basis that honest believers would be no less faithful if they were revealed the finer details at the judgement seat or later).
- I need to qualify #3 by mentioning that John (in 1 John) claims that one must at least believe that Jesus came in the flesh. To my knowledge, even trinitarians believe this. This is included in what I refer to as the "basics" above.

Are there any other "solutions" to the above problem that I've missed?

I have to admit my preference is for #3.

The Bible is pretty clear that Jesus came to save sinners and that belief in Jesus followed by baptism is what is essentially required for salvation. It doesn't really go into too much detail on what that belief in Jesus should entail, beyond the simple fact that Jesus died for our sins, and the need for a personal relationship with him.

The idea of a range of potentially difficult-to-interpret doctrines that must be believed in exact detail does not fit with the concept of a loving, merciful God (at least not in my mind).

To put it another way, a God that creates humans with limited understanding (some people are barely capable of reading) cannot then fairly turn around and require an understanding of concepts beyond their grasp.



#444659 What evidence can we base our faith on?

Posted by palladium on 06 January 2013 - 08:47 PM in Theology

You may find Anthony Le Donne's Historical Jesus: What can we know and how can we know it? useful. It's an example of the sort of non-fundamentalist scholarship I find quite useful.

I read this one, and I whole-heartedly recommend it. It's a bit light on actually applying the concepts to the gospels, and like one reviewer said, the title and sub-title should be swapped. It really is a book about "What can we know and how can we know it?", and then applies these theories to select events recorded in the gospels.

It will change the way you look at the gospel records.

What you get in the gospels has come through the memories of the eye-witnesses. This may sound obvious, but most people don't read the gospels that way. I won't spoil this book any more than that.

---

Meanwhile, on the topic of the resurrection of Jesus, I found the arguments presented here interesting and compelling. The weight of the arguments isn't so much that each individual piece of evidence is compelling, but that all of them form a coherent picture. I have so far not read any alternative explanations that can do this.

For example, I also have read Richard Carrier's article on the resurrection.

While he raises some valid points, I do not agree with his level of skepticism.

The conclusion I reached was that while his argument that Joseph's tomb was likely just temporary storage and the body was moved to a permanent grave a couple days later, sounds possible (maybe even plausible), it still doesn't explain the resurrection appearances. Those aren't adequately explained by hallucinations either (multiple people experiencing the same hallucination, and sometimes even at the same time, is unheard of), and all you end up with is a bunch of ad-hoc explanations for each different piece of the puzzle. And several of these ad-hoc explanations are mutually exclusive. There is no coherency.

On the other hand, there is a far simpler explanation that accounts for everything in the gospels, and that is that the gospel writers and their sources were telling the honest truth. And if so, then the most likely explanation for what the eye-witnesses said they saw, is that they really did see it. And the most likely explanation for that, is that it really happened. With this simpler explanation, everything makes sense.

Looking at the actual material evidence we have, there are a lot of gaps, and a lot of things we simply don't know. It's impossible to have 100% certainty about what really happened. The bible doesn't even claim to offer 100% certainty on all of the details of each event recorded. That's why faith is required. Now I know most non-theists will simply switch off at this point, but that's the key. God requires faith. It is intentional.

You could question why God requires faith, but that is a separate discussion.
Consider the alternative - if God left people no choice but to accept that he exists and that Jesus really rose from the dead, do you really think it would achieve his purpose of filling the earth with people who think like him and who voluntarily chose to worship him? Instead, God has left the final decision up to us.

If we choose not to believe in the resurrection of Jesus, then there are plenty of gaps in the historical record so that we can justify our skepticism and cry "not enough evidence" and leave it at that. On the other hand, if we choose to believe, then God can work with us, and will slowly reveal himself to us over time (through his word, combined with life's experiences). The point is, we need to make that first step in coming to God.

At the end of the day, to believe or not believe is a choice. And no matter which option you choose, it requires faith. I find that quite interesting in itself.

This topic is called "What evidence can we base our faith on?" and the mistake I made when starting out is that I tried to remove the faith element altogether. At this point in the thread there has been a lot of evidence presented, but it must also be stressed that faith is still required. Faith is based on evidence, which means that you need both. One does not replace the need for the other. If we had 100% conclusive evidence then we wouldn't need faith. If God wanted blind faith we shouldn't expect any evidence at all. But we do have (very good) evidence. We have exactly what we should expect to have if God wants real faith that is grounded in evidence.

It is really now just a matter of choosing which path you want to take.