From the GQ thread [Who was the first real person in the Bible?](Who was the first real person in the Bible? ), and other random questions I have seen about the search for Noah’s Ark, the references to Pharoah, etc.
My Christian friend teaches Sunday school to young adults and gets very excited about literary and archaeological discoveries that correlate with Biblical history. She pays only for basic cable, so I record programs that detail searches and discoveries of Biblical artifactsfor her, such as The Naked Archaeologist on the History Channel and similar programs. I just sent her a link to the article in Archaeology magazine that notes an artifact that references the reign of Nebuchadnezzar from the Book of Jeremiah. She loves this stuff, and recently explained that she presents finds like this to her Sunday school class as evidence of Biblical inerrancy.
My knowledge of the Bible is limited to parable and allegory, and I am unfamiliar with historical events other than the biggies like the Flood, the Exodus, etc. My question is do programs, articles, and discoveries that correspond with Biblical references reinforce a Christian’s faith in the divine? And if so, why?
Jealousy of science. Religion has been trying to imitate science for a long time now; science’s success and evidence based nature makes religion look bad. So, on a fairly regular basis the religious try to find proof of their beliefs; since their beliefs are wrong, this requires them to be either very selective about their “evidence” ( as Czarcasm points out ), or distort it. Or they aren’t selective, actually do a good job, and give up on the idea when they discover yet again that the real world doesn’t fit their beliefs.
No way. I don’t want to argue with her- we are co-workers. I had assumed that she was utilizing the information as a means of making her Sunday school topics relevant and interesting to the often skeptical young adult. I had no idea that she was presenting the information as proof of the divine. I’m cynical, so to me this seems a lazy way to reinforce faith. If I weren’t cynical, would I see her method of proof as optimistic or hopeful?
But I am curious about her throught process; she holds a Master’s in Education, and is quite sharp and well-read. Faith has been explained to death in this forum, and I am not interested in another long-winded explanation of faith, unless someone finds it necessary to state a POV- but to extrapolate *divine evidence * from some moldy old artifacts seems like a big leap, and a weak argument. Historical events, timelines, political office, etc are nearly always mentioned in fictional texts as a means of either fleshing out a story or supporting a theme, and no one has any problem discerning whether or not the events depicted in say… Shogun, are bogus or bonified.
Ah- I totally missed that. Trying to fit scientific evidence puzzle-piece style into Biblical text. When I was a kid, my friend Amy was positively aglow when we found a nice crustacean fossil cache on the mountain above my house. She bounced all the way down the mountain clutching a t-shirt full of fossilized shells chattering about proof of the flood and Noah’s Ark. Took them to Sunday School for show-and-tell. We were in 3rd grade (age 8?) and she was so excited I didn’t have the heart to disagree, and of course plate tectonics was a concept I wouldn’t pick up for a few more years.
But that was a kid, and my friend is in her 40’s, and intelligent and well-read. Do you suppose she is guilty of taking advantage of the naïveté of her youth group?
Now I feel a bit silly. I had assumed that her interest in science and history was a method of teaching the difference between verifiable historical fact and faith. Not sure how to handle this now; I cannot ethically continue to feed her documents and videos if she is using them to muddle impressionable minds.
Maybe a Christian can give me some insight or advice?
Well, I suppose it would depend on the Christian. I find such information very interesting, but it’s not part of my faith. It’s clues to a way of life, how people lived and thought, and therefore neat. It gives a background to history and so on.
Why don’t you ask her about it - honestly? Don’t patronize her, don’t argue with her. Say that you’re truly interested in understanding, which is the truth. Say you don’t mean to question her faith, but you’d like to understand why she thinks these things are proof of the existence of God.
I wouldn’t have a clue as to how to introduce logic into a discussion with her. I am usually flummoxed by logical arguments made by the faithful on this board; apparently the ability to possess religious faith and skill in logical argument is beyond my comprehension. Truly I can follow discussions of logic and prove errors in arguments in any condition save for the religious debates I’ve seen here.
That is what I assumed she was using the information for, but I’ve seen some of her lesson plans, and the words proof, evidence, correlation and fact are used heavily throughout, and our last conversation after I handed her a print-out of this article from Archaeology magazine was “Gosh, thanks, you don’t know how much this helps my students to reinforce their faith.” Then, after I had responded to the GQ thread I mentioned in the OP, I realized that she and others must (might?) be shoring up their faith with archaeological and historical evidence.
I can’t, Sam, she is a co-worker, and has a fragile ego. Cries easily, and holds grudges against people she disagrees with. I’m really not suffering from an ethical dilemma here; truly it is none of my business if she chooses to teach from such a perspective, but part of me feels that contributing to her fallacies is wrong. After considering the GQ thread requesting Biblical evidence, I felt a pang of guilt.It is no trouble doing favors for her, and I like being nice to my co-workers- but I could easily lie to her and explain that I, too, have downgraded to basic cable and can no longer feed her the A&E, History Channel, and NatGeo programs that highlight Biblical finds. What I want to determine here is: Is cutting off her access to such programming necessary? (Who am I to make that call?)
There’s a difference between proving Biblical events as historical facts and proving them as religious facts. Suppose archeologists found clear proof that Abraham was a genuine historical person. Would that prove that Genesis was true? No, it would just prove that Genesis has based on real history. Nobody disputes that Mohammad was a genuine historical person but that doesn’t prove that Islam is true.
Here’s my thought: I would try to err on the side of more information rather than less. I’m not sure that it’s helpful to withhold information because someone uses it in a way I don’t like. You don’t have a big moral obligation to give her recordings of your shows or anything, but I don’t think you have an obligation to cut her off at all. If the information in the shows is accurate, then even if she uses it to come to conclusions unwarranted by the evidence provided, you’re still helping to provide more information and knowledge to the students, and they might find that helpful. I’m sure many of them will figure the difference noted by Little Nemo out on their own.
Personally I don’t find archaelogical evidence to be spiritually compelling. It’s neat, but it’s not the same thing as faith. The important factor in faith is the spiritual witness of the divine.
You are right, dangermom, and that is good advice. There is no excuse for withholding factual knowledge- and conjecture, speculation, bias, and similar kin are a fact of the human condition, and my meager attempt to intervene would be petty. I usually have no trouble making decisions and rarely consult anyone other than loved ones for input, but I’m glad I posted this mini-dilemma earlier today. Thank you.
One thing you might ask her is if she thinks the HBO series “Rome” is literally true because Julius Caesar actually lived. Troy existed - does this make the Iliad and the Greek Gods correct? Jeremiah probably lived, in fact some think he was one of the actual writers of the Bible. Maybe you can find her an archeology book that is unthreatening that gives the latest view of Biblical archeology - which is that the Exodus never happened. However you might blow her mind.
Honestly, Beaucarnea if she believes in the inerrancy of the Bible then it doesn’t matter what facts you do or do not feed her. That’s a matter of faith, and faith does not have a factual basis. The kids she teaches aren’t going to be swayed by crappy “info”-tainment, and if they are it’s too late for them.
The only thing I’d offer is this. Please tell me you’re not assigning a motive and specific strategy to her because Der Trihs suggested it. Your reluctance isn’t because Der Trihs says she, as a religious person, has dishonest inclinations, right? You know that’s pretty much automatic from him, regardless of circumstance, right?
I’m not saying your friend had good or bad motives, only that Der Trihs suggesting a religious person is deluded, dishonest and deliberate in disregarding another’s right to truth (a lot of d’s there, eh?), is like Fred Phelps explaining why everything bad occurs because of permissiveness toward homosexuality. It’s knee-jerk.