Is the Bible Fact or Fiction?
Saturday December 4, 2004
In honor of the new Discovery Channel program on Rameses II, the Pharaoh mentioned in the Bible, here's a little bit of the History of Archaeology, on how there are interesting, and answerable, questions about the "truth" of the bible and other ancient texts.
Comments
Kris your bandwagon-esque diatribe is amusing as it is incorrect. You say that a planet-wide deluge (flood) has been disproving? Ummmm… why did you say such an asinine thing?
I assume your not familiar with anthropological anecdotal stories of global floods throughout diaspora. What are all of those ancient tribal groups and cultures in league with one another? What about enigmatic water erosion damage to the Sphinx in the DESERT? What about Dr. Ballard’s Black Sea research?
Moses’ account of the global flood even parallels the Epic of Gilgamesh which arguably was a pre-flood document despite it appearing to be post-flood due to its content. No Moses didn’t plagiarize it as it was not available to Egyptians at the time.
There is so much geological evidence of global flooding it staggers the mind why you would parrot such a specious statement. If you want to be in the in-crowd thats one thing. But if you want to be a REAL scientists you must challenge the status quo even if you become a pariah for doing so.
Spooky, you are just another delusional literalist. ALL of real scientific inquiry has utterly FAILED to provide the slightest evidence for a global flood. There never was such a thing – ever. If you believe that kind of tripe because that was what you were taught as a credulous child in church, you have been misinformed. They lied.
Oh , this gets very old after a while.
There are too many presuppositions in the
evolutionary circular thought process.
Other religious groups may read their texts
to see what they say, but we check the
veracity of the holy scriptures. We want
to make sure that our faith is right.
And by the way Lee, when was the last time
you read the bible?
Instead, you stand up and close your eyes to proclaim
your ignorance and try to pass it off as wisdom.
Just be sure that we are 100% wrong before you tell us that.
Before the name calling gets ugly, there has been evidence found of a great flood… In what we call the Old World. The known world at the time of those writings.
There has not been geological confirmation of a flood of massive proportions found anywhere that I’ve read about in the New World e.g. The Americas.
True, our Rockies are not so high, and most of the Andes are unexplored, while the North lies frozen and unreadable.
Blanket statements serve no purpose. Just let it remain a mystery.
After all, if you are a believer, you don’t need proof, and if you are not, no proof can persuade you.
Yes, I have read my bible and can see it for what is is – a prettily worded fiction. And to Oh, Really, yes, you are 100% wrong.
Spooky – pray tell where did all the global water go,and by what physical process?
Good question Bob.. anyone care to answer?
Great flood you say….lets see now noah and his family built a huge ship what 3 times larger then the largest aircraft carrier. What would that take a couple weeks? (LOL) then he travelled the world (the world was flat then remember) and gathered up and herded thousands of species of ALL animals, insects, etc. brought them all together and with food for all put them on his boat. Paddeled out, a big flood came and all were saved. What kind of trick would a god be performing to ask something like this to be done. This was one of the many nonsense stories catholics drilled into children growing up. There parents believed it……why? because their parents told them the same silly story and so on. Just like the santa clause story that children believe. By the time most educated children reach the age of 10, santa clause now becomes a hoax. Just like the bible. But with religious people out of fear/guilt they continue to believe. Thats sad! The bible is just a family tradition handed down, never to question. Once you learn all about jesus there is nothing else to learn. Thats sad, when you stop learning. I was raised a catholic and like MOST catholics today have put those silly catholic stories and falacies to bed. Come on educated people give your heads a shake.
God decided to send a worldwide flood. Why? to wipe out humanity and all living creatures. Thats a loving god now isn’t it? But! Noah was smarter then god. He built a boat loaded everyone on board including every animal from the four corners of the world. The big flood came, everyone was saved and lived happily ever after. Now let me tell you the story about the 3 little pigs.
Im surprised one of you very well informed god pests, haven’t said what you always say when a bible story is disproven, that its meant to be symbolic.Load of crap! You all seem to pick and choose whats real and whats not. Funny that because you always say that the Bible is an historical text! You can’t pick and choose. But you all continue to do so. Why? Anyway, the bible is a good story, just like Jurassic park is, but also its a work of intelligent fiction, blending scientific, and historical fact with total hokum!!!
How the HELL do people believe in this stuff, i don’t understand it. Religious people always tell to stop being close minded and open my eyes to the obvious truth. I think they should heed their own advice for a change.
The bible was written at the first council of Nicaea in 325, almost 200 year after JC died. Like any good book it was loosely based on fact, anything that made his mortal was chucked. Luckily everybody then had such good memories.
I can’t believe that in the 21st century people continue to believe in silliness like talking snake, talking donkey, people resurrected from the dead, and so on. A loving mighty god who created Satan, let’s Satan seduces Adam while doing nothing to stop him, and then decided to punish mankind for the mistake of one person. Why the hell should I be punish for Adam. God then decided that he must save mankind again, so to rectify, he send his son (who happens to be himself too) to die on the cross. Couldn’t find a better way. In order to be saved, humanity must obey everything in an inconsistent book with many mistakes and contradictions while engaging on collective incestuous sexual relation (since we all come from Adam and Eve).
Atheist needs to read Lee Strobel’s book “I don’t have enough Faith to be an Atheist”. Lee was a former Atheist. But ofcourse he has to have an open mind, as so other non-believers, in order to try and undestand what is being said. I can list miracle after miracle that my God has put before me, evidence before my eyes, that can only be explained through devine intervention. I will pray for all of you. Prayer is the only hope any of you have. I had a friend ask me once what will happen if I live as a Christian all my life, and when I die, I find out “that’s it” and I was wrong. My answer: I’d rather live as a believer and find out I was wrong, than live as an Atheist and find out the Christians were right. What will I have lost if I am wrong? Nothing. What will I have lost if Christians are right? Everything. Read the book “90 Minutes in Heaven”
Today no honest, educated person can maintain that the universe came into being a few thousand years ago as many christians believe, and assumed its current form in 6 day, and the absurdity that day and night existing before the sun was created (genesis) . Adam lived to be over 900 years old (LOL) , his two sons procreating with whom to start the generations?
Yes there might have been great floods in the past but 700 year old Noah (LOL) circling the globe to every corner gathering and transporting millions of species of animals (bringing their each particular food) with them. Then after the flood returning all these animals to each exact location where they were found. Come on people. Religion is a faith based on old ancient copies of copies of copies of scripts written by a bunch of old farty men that we know nothing personally about them but believe everything they say.
If a 13 year old girl today named Mary walked down any street in america and said she was impregnated by a ghost, we would call the guys with the white coats. If there was a man christians call Jesus (there was no letter J in Hebrew times back in the day) was probably nothing more then a comparable David Copperfield today. David Copperfield can saw people in half. AKA Jesus could bring people back to life. WOW!
NANCY: We don’t need to read anyones book. You need to use your own God given abilities and use your knowledge to subtract fact from fiction. Its obvious you adopted your faith from your parents who probably adopted it from their parents and so on, not based on any facts but back in the time based on fear that churches instilled in people that if you believe in Jesus (not his real name, no letter J in the Hebrew alphabet at that time) Heaven awaits you, if you don’t Hell awaits you. The old fear routine.
I came to believe in Christ my self, from events that had happened in my life. All of you should read the bible and I will be praying so that hopefully you will understand it. No matter what you say God still loves you all.
I know it’s not politically correct to say,but I find it impossible not to feel superior when I read the thoughts of reasonably sophisticated people who regurgitate the same stock phrases time after time as a defense of or evidence of their faith in an omniscient god/creator and all the attendant mumbo-jumbo that supposedly gives those beliefs some credence.
As an atheist,I am aware that my side of the argument-that there is no god,is not a provable statement-one cannot prove a negative.So, I give all the believers out there the easy and provable task.Show one iota of proof.Produce your god.I won’t accept some gobbeldey-gook stock phrases or some self deluding testimonial.Produce him/she/it/they or any tangible proof of any supernatural anything and I will stop feeling superior.Until then I will see all believers as at best deluded by fear or as is more likely, simply delusional.
shay — letter 10 — sorry, the bible, that is the new testament — was not ‘written at the council of nicaeea it was ‘edited’ there
some books OK, some books not eg the ‘Gospel of Thomas’and several doz. more…judged as ‘heretical’…. too bad for us…some are quite interesting …try various univ. libraries………
come on people… anyone with an IQ over 80 can differentiate fact from BULLSHIT which is what the bible is.. it was written by savages!! not god… it is stupid stories that people believed in when we didnt know any better.. but is is 2009!!! we know the earth isnt flat.. we know adam and eve didnt exist and we for sure know noah didnt put all 10 billion species on a boat.. i mean this is ridiculous and any one who thinks this acually happened should go to the doctor and ask for a pill for anti-retardedness.. all religion does is create hatred and war and makes people predjudice/ethnocentric.. 911 etc etc.. people who say jesus this jesus that are only saying it cuz they were BRAINWASHED by their parents .. do any parents let their children choose their religion and beliefs .. ?? NO!!!!!!! before they were born their beliefs were already chosen for them… and if their parents were to have changed their beliefs before they were born and were now for example muslim this same person would now be saying praise allah instead of jesus!!!! RELIGION=BRAINWASHING ..plain and simple..
Vince wrote: “I came to believe in Christ my self, from events that had happened in my life. All of you should read the bible and I will be praying so that hopefully you will understand it. No matter what you say God still loves you all.”
Well, where is the proof that God, if he exists, loves you or for that matter, even cares about you or even notices you exist? I’m fairly certain that if he does in fact exist, he would not waste time noticing insignificant specks such as ourselves. Furthermore, you Bible-thumpers practically scream in our faces that He exists, He did this, He did that and he has a special list of 10 things you Shall Not Do or straight to Club Hell you go, dont forget the suntan lotion. Show me ONE SOLID IRREFUTABLE SHRED OF PROOF that he exists, loves us very much, keeps a close eye on things. Oh wait….there isnt. In fact, your God is a very angry, hostile, intractable God, isnt he? And every single time I confront one of you people with LOGIC, something you all don’t deal with too well…I get the same tired beat-to-death Cop-Out of All Time: The Lord Works In Mysterious Ways. That makes me want to break your Seventh Commandment right there. The arrogance of your Church that has the temerity to tell me Im damned and going to Hell (Hi Lucy Im home!!) simply because I don’t believe in Him. Put it this way: If He is as wonderful as you say he is, and He in his infinite love and wisdom cares for us all…..do you think he would give a rat’s ass whether we believed in Him or not? Oh yeah one more thing before I go: Regarding Thou Shalt Not Kill (Murder)….don’t you think He is more guilty of that than anyone in History combined?