is the bible real or just some verry old story?

[edsbrick]

TMA-

There is evidance of the tower of babel existed, there have been documents found where kings mention the foundation of babylon on the "tongue tower" which was called babel (which means language). THis is why babylon is called babylon. Whcih means confusion

but who's evidence?

or just another book?

ed

[edsbrick]

perhaps a fable.

all myths are just that  myths because its all summerisation,and thesis.

can we really believe the heavens and earth were created in six days,when science has dated the solar system back before earth existed,maybe another thesis i agree,but substansiated with "facts"

ie carbon dating

speed of light

etc

maybe i dont know what im talkin about but it makes sense in my head.

ed

[GUNWOUNDS]

but who's evidence?

or just another book?

ed

so books are worthless now?

My history book says Hitler existed ... but thats just a book right?  So thats not really proof... maybe he really was a myth too right?

Just becuase a book says something doesnt mean its a myth or story.  what does it have to be on video tape for you?  Even video can be faked... according to your logic there is no such thing as solid proof.

[edsbrick]

IMO

any book about hitler would be deemed factual,because there are people who lived through those terrible times,who can verify the facts. but who is to say that in 2000 years time,someone might discover an old book of j.lennons lyrics and decide that his ideals are the way forward,the new religion.there would be no-one to say how or why ,no proof .and that same person discovers biographies {authored by his apostles/fans/followers} of lennon,saying how great he was.

would you believe in it?

i wouldn't.

and yet im asked to believe that jesus,mohammed,buddah,jehovah,etc is truth,just because you tell me it is.

i dont believe all books are worthless,just those that try to indoctrinate our minds into believing something that cant be proven.

i think......

ed

[Acriku]

so books are worthless now?

My history book says Hitler existed ... but thats just a book right?  So thats not really proof... maybe he really was a myth too right?

Just becuase a book says something doesnt mean its a myth or story.  what does it have to be on video tape for you?  Even video can be faked... according to your logic there is no such thing as solid proof.

That's exactly right, just because it's in a book, movie, or video, does not mean whatsoever that it can validly be concluded to be true.

[thomas]

mordus are you refering to jehovah as an actual person? because you can just say god, they are the same.

[edsbrick]

That's exactly right, just because it's in a book, movie, or video, does not mean whatsoever that it can validly be concluded to be true.

i agree and thats my point

ed

[Gobalopper]

Here are some notes from a course I took last term on the New Testament that might interest some people. We also used this textbook which looks a the bible in historical prospective. Definitely something worth looking at if you are at all interested in Christianity and how it started.[attachment archived by Gobalopper]

[edsbrick]

heavy course

ed

[filecore]

Except for the infamous Jezus 'die for our "sins" part.' ( I guess if one person does something bad, it makes us all EVILLLLLLLL sinners. )

Sorry if this has been addressed in another post but it's very wearing to read through all these arguments, so I may have missed something!

when you say of God, "he sacrificed his son for us", what do you hint at? The way I see it, 'justice' is not a divine concept; it is a human illusion. The very basis of the popular Judeo-Christian code is injustice, the scapegoat system. If you read carefully, the scapegoat sacrifice runs all through the Old Testament, then reaches its height in the New Testament with the notion of the 'martyred redeemed', Christ himself. But how can justice possibly be served by dumping your sins onto another, by creating a simple scapegoat?

Whether it be a lamb having its throat ritually sliced, or a Messiah nailed onto a bloody great cross and 'dying for our sins', a scapegoat is a scapegoat. How many wars and massacres have been carried out in the name of any particular God? There's no such thing as a free lunch. And why do you have to give up a good, satisfied life to please God? You could be a sinner all your life and repent at the end, and be welcomed into Heaven. Or you could be devout all your life, then slip and blaspheme at the end, and be damned for all eternity.

As Jesus said, "After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father, which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done..."

Thy will be done. No Muslim claiming to be a 'slave of God' ever gave a more sweeping consent than that. In that prayer you invite Him to do His worst - making YOU the perfect masochist :)

[filecore]

Wasn't the bible written like 20-50 years after Jesus's death? Couldn't the bible have been written by people who just wanted attention or fame or a religion to call their own?

Hehe... I find it amusing that people like this actually exist. Goodbye, education :)

argh... The bible was not written by one man.lol CLaims like this are blech. The dead sea scrolls date many of the old testament books back to at least 200 to 300 bc. Not only that, but they are obvious copies of older old testament writings.

AFAIK, the Bible (OT) dates back to somewhere between 6000 and 9000BC, for the first book(s).  And remember that a lot of the books (eg Kings, Chronicles) are just telling the same events as in other books, but from a different viewpoint.  So a lot of it is from the same period.  I have done a lot of research into this because I was writing a piece of sci-fi (still am, actually) which involved time travel and the Ark of the Covenant - and it's amazing when you tie down biblical references to historical facts and see how much time the references actually span.  I can't remember all the numbers off-hand but I'll post them up, if anyone's interested.  By the way it's useful to remember that in the bible, it is commonly mentioned that characters (eg Moses and his sons) died quite old - 120 or 130 or sometimes more.

many scientists batton themselves down to the establishment. Many good scientists have become athiests because they see it as the correct way, and do not add any agenda to it.

Actually not, you'd be surprised at the number of scientists who are religious.  A perfect example is my own girlfriend, who is a radiochemist.  It's all to do with radioactivity and nuclear whatsits and I don't even pretend to understand.  But she is a firm believer in religion (despite all my efforts otherwise!;) ) and her mother is even a priest.  Both of them, however, are down-to-earth, rational and extremely likeable people.  So there is no contradiction between science and religion, except in very well-defined areas (such as evolution), and not even necessarily there either.

[filecore]

can we really believe the heavens and earth were created in six days,when science has dated the solar system back before earth existed

Well, for a start you just contradicted yourself.  In the Bible (afaik) doesn't god create the universe/solar system/etc first and THEN create the earth?  Anyway, even if that's wrong, since it's all subjective time at this point, can't we just call each creation period a 'day'?  Don't take it so literally.  If we did that with ANY work, fictional or not, the world would be in trouble - we'd all be looking for elves and whatnot under the tables.  Then again some people do take the Bible literally, translation error notwithstanding (see my post about witches) and you see where that's gotten us.

Playing devil's advocate :)

[filecore]

needless to say the roman religion wasent before the tower of babel. ::)

Which is good to know, because as we all know I'm sure, the Roman religion was just the Greek religion, stolen and with then names changed from Greek to Roman.  It's essentially identical underneath.  Although I think I prefer some of the Roman names ;-) but anyway, that is just one of those things that the Romans did.  The reason that the Roman Empire (pantheistic) became the Holy Roman Empire (monotheistic, Christian) was because they couldn't crush the growing plague of Christianity - remember the whole thing of throwing Christians to the lions?  So since the Christian movement was gaining popularity, and the Romans couldn't stamp it out, they absorbed it and made it their own state religion.  Nice one.  So with so much absorption and borrowing going on (and not just the Romans now, but in gereral), who can say what is really what anymore?  Like this Tower of Babel discussion, every religion is spawned of bits of every other.

The only up side is that they all say the same basic things, common sense things like be nice to people... :) I'm just personally glad that nobody has mentioned extremists though, in this day and age that's a surefire way to kill any intelligent debate.

[Acriku]

Well, for a start you just contradicted yourself.  In the Bible (afaik) doesn't god create the universe/solar system/etc first and THEN create the earth?  Anyway, even if that's wrong, since it's all subjective time at this point, can't we just call each creation period a 'day'?  Don't take it so literally.  If we did that with ANY work, fictional or not, the world would be in trouble - we'd all be looking for elves and whatnot under the tables.  Then again some people do take the Bible literally, translation error notwithstanding (see my post about witches) and you see where that's gotten us.

Playing devil's advocate :)

The difficult part is, however, determining truthfully which is meant to be literal and which is meant to be metaphoric or abstract. But, with the correct context, a reasonable person could get the gist of it.

[filecore]

The difficult part is, however, determining truthfully which is meant to be literal and which is meant to be metaphoric or abstract. But, with the correct context, a reasonable person could get the gist of it.

Hmm.  How about I phrase it like this: does it actually matter?

I mean, if the message is understood (which I think in the majority case it is), then why fight over the details?  In fact, that's quite humorously ironic... fighting over the details of something which tells you not to fight?

:-

[alchemi2]

Base of the tower of babel is belived to be in central Iran it was further destroyed by Alexander the Great. (Discovery channel In search of Pyrimids)

Moses existed as did the exodus of Jews Red sea parting belived to refer to Reed sea, all miracles performed by moses were belived to relate directly to volcanic explosion in med sea (discovery channel Finding Moses)

Geneisis catolouges evolution in the correct order (just a coincidence!)

It is readly accepted that the seven days refer to periods of time not actual 24 hr days. after all whats a day to an immortal being. when you say in my fathers day etc you dont mean one particular day in his life.

Faith doesnt require proof in fact proof negates the need for faith. If God proved his existence then there would be no doubt or temptation.

Just because something is old doesnt prove its right or wrong but for it to last so long and be belived in by so many should imply that it contains something of value/worth.

If everyone lived by the ten commandments the world would be a better place would it not.

[filecore]

Discovery channel In search of Pyrimids) [snip] (discovery channel Finding Moses)

Okay I wouldn't necessarily believe everything you watch on the Discovery Channel though... and be careful, there are many cases where they use qualifying language ("might be", "suspected that", "possibly", "sensible to assume" etc) because often they put this in just in case it's disproven.  A lot of these documentaries are as much speculation as hard fact, and usually more of the former, so just bear that in mind.

If everyone lived by the ten commandments the world would be a better place would it not.

Precisely.  Like I said, does it actually matter?  If we lived according to the ten commandments, for example, would it matter if they were the word of God himself or just common sense by some bugger who decided to write them down?  Who cares?  If it's a good, sensible idea, then does it matter whose it was?

[EWS]

Precisely.  Like I said, does it actually matter?  If we lived according to the ten commandments, for example, would it matter if they were the word of God himself or just common sense by some bugger who decided to write them down?  Who cares?  If it's a good, sensible idea, then does it matter whose it was?

To live by the 10 commandments would be to deny human nature and instinct.  Alot of problems with the bible is that it contradicts itself.

Anway, I don't know if this has been said but Christianity is just derived from Plato's Forms (this would probably have been said by Dusty).  It is all there.

[filecore]

To live by the 10 commandments would be to deny human nature and instinct.

[Acriku]

filecore, it matters if you value it to be key to eternal damnation or eternal peace.

[Leto le Juste]

It is the first time Iread this topic and honestly I have not the force to read all the topics ( :-[) (I'm too tired).

Excuse me if what I will say is already in the topic.

I just want to say that it is not important to know if the Bible is real or if it is just some verry old story. I'm christian and Bible is an help for me. When I open it I can find very different texts which help me for praying and for reflexion. The Bible is the basis of my Belief not because it is real (question of form is not good in religion) but because it is the most beautiful library with a lot of different and nice books as the "Cantiques" (question of substance, that is the matter). So, Bible is an help in order to grow my feith and it is the most important.