Is The Bible Written By God?

Great Debates
41

Polycarp:

As I indicated earlier, I feel the bible is too poorly written, too garbled, has too many examples of bad behavior presented as acceptable or even good, and has far too much confusing or irrelevant material to be the work of a perfect god. That’s true even if it is the indirect work (inspired by God). Apparently you disagree, but I don’t know your reasons.

Perhaps more important, you (and millions of others) seem to feel there are strong reasons on the positive side to believe the Bible’s message is essentially true. I don’t see them. It seems to me it is just as unlikely to be true as the scriptures for other religions (Hindu, Islam, Mormon, ancient polytheistic religions, or any number of smaller groups or cults). That is, darned unlikely. I just don’t tend to believe people who say “God told me this”, same for Moses as anybody else.

I’ll assume you agree with me about the other religions, but not Christianity. Why? One obvious difference is that Christianity is the dominant religion in our American culture. While you would probably be ridiculed by many of your friends if you said Mohammed was the Messenger of God, you fit right in believing that Jesus was the messiah. Believing the Bible is very mainstream so the ideas don’t seem to need much defense, but I hope you agree that your culture believing it says nothing about whether it is actually true. The Roman culture was very dominant for a long time, and they worshipped Jupiter and Mars.

The other big factor I see in people believing religion is that it makes them feel good. It is comforting. It is nice to think that you will live on after death and be reunited with loved ones. It’s nice to think those nasty people who mistreated you will get punished in the next life even if they got away with stuff in this one. I assume that the Muslims and Hindus and everybody else take comfort from their religions as well. That doesn’t imply, in even the tiniest sense, that these religions are true. What we wish were true has nothing to do with what is actually true.

Are there any valid reasons for thinking the Bible is somehow different from all the other religious writings out there?

42

Dear Czar:

You will get used to my spacing of lines.

Every writer’s language is in a way an unique one, that’s my observation.

I think your written language – well, even speech of everyone – is also unique to yourself.

Just the same we get to understand each other, that’s the beauty of human communication.

If you want an example of something somewhat similarly presented, try this:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

The same was in the beginning with God.

All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.

In him was life; and the life was the light of men.

And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.

There was a man sent from God, whose name was John.

The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe.

He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light.

That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.

He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not.

He came unto his own, and his own received him not.

But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:

which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.

John 1:1-14

(Every line is ‘paragraphed’; I just added a blank line in between.)
Susma Rio Sep

43

I said, correct me if I am mistaken.

Maybe I am mistaken.

But I was referring to the event of Moses receiving the tablets already inscribed with the ten commandments.

I never said that Moses told any if just one lie.

But if he did tell just one lie, according to the policy of total honesty required of witnesses in such a momentous matter as the divine authorship of the bible;

namely, one known to be dishonest in one instance would unavoidably be suspected of dishonesty in any and all other instances;

then he would be for all purposes always unreliable whenever he should witness again.

I will take some time to find out from the Bible whether Moses had ever told a lie in his long long years in God’s service.

Have you ever read it written in the Bible something like this:

“I say in my sorrow, All men are liars”.

And the Bible cannot be contradicted.

Susma Rio Sep

44

No, but it can be mistranslated.

I’m assuming you’re referring to Psalms 116:11?

The words used are Ani amarti b’chafzi. B’chafzi does not mean “sorrow,” it means “haste.” See Duet 16:3 ki b’chifazon "…because in haste you left Egypt… The Israelites did not leave Egypt in sorrow.

Zev Steinhardt

45

Off topic:

Hey Sus - Can’t speak for Czar, but I - for one - will not. Instead, when I see one of your posts, I read the first line or two. When I scroll down sufficiently to see that you are still posting in that irritating style, I simply scroll down to the next post.

No reason you should be tremendously troubled by my decision not to bother going through the effort to make sense of your “unconventional” style. But, if your desire is to communicate, your chosen style presents a significant impediment. At least for me.

Carry on.

46

I wasn’t going to post this, but I (obviously) changed my mind. I wholeheartedly agree with Dinsdale regarding Susma Rio Sep’s posting style.

I decided to post because Susma asked what was annoying about her style. In the interest of providing informative feedback, for me, it comes down to two things: it does not “flow” (the paragraph breaks up the thoughts too much), and it “sounds” condescending.

After fully reading the first two of those posts I stopped reading the rest. It is just too annoying. As many of us have tried to explain to posters (especially those who refuse to use capital letters), the form is as important to readability and comprehension as the words themselves. If you’re trying to communicate a thought or idea, then why would you want to construct artificial obstacles to inhibit the expression of those thoughts?

Sorry for the continued hijack from this thread. As Dinsdale says… carry on.

47

Dear Susma Rio Sep:

You will get used to my spacing of lines (even if it takes longer to type).

vry wrtr’s lng**g s n * wy n nq n, tht’s my bsrvt**n.

I think your written language – well, even speech of everyone – is also unique to yourself. Het ontbeit is klaar! Parlez vous esperanto? Shomo putz aktion lesper patzer.

Just the same we get to understand each other, that’s the beauty of human communication. (Well that’s why we have standards, isn’t it?)

If you want an example of something somewhat similarly presented, try this:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

The same was in the beginning with God.

All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.

In him was life; and the life was the light of men.

And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.

There was a man sent from God, whose name was John.

The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe.

He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light.

That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.

He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not.

He came unto his own, and his own received him not.

But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:

which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.

John 1:1-14

(Every

word

is

‘paragraphed’;

I

just

added

a

few

blank

lines

in

between.)

I can’t take all the credit for this 'performance art - I was inspired by

Susma

Rio

Sep

48

For the record, I should apologize to Susma for calling him a her in my post. I realized the proper gender while reading the parallel-to-this-thread in Staff Reports.

(and glee… that was REALLY annoying. ~grin~)

49

OK, that does it. Susma, you now see the reason that your posts are annoying and hard to read and hard to respond to? You got it? Please amend. Failure to have consideration for other readers is a sign of jerkdom.

And just to clear up a comment of Polycarp’s, << Are we then to assume that those mere mortals wrote those columns? Of course not. Cecil wrote them >> Abso-bloomin’-lootly. Cecil has quoted me (and other Staff) upon occasion, but those are always noted as quotes or paraphrases. Cecil writes his own stuff, period.

50

Dear Glee:

Very funny.

But certainly, you can see that I don’t write that way.

Love you withal.

Susma Rio Sep

51

Dear Zev:

Thanks for the correction about sorrow that should be haste.

Appreciate that.

I know I can always depend on you for corrections in regard to the Bible.

But that part about all men being liars, it’s in the Bible…?

Tell, me as a favor, did God deliver the ten commandments already inscribed in two tablets as narrated in the Bible?

My recall of Sunday school lessons is not so good now.

An even more importunate request:

Know any instance in the Bible where Moses lied?

Susma Rio Sep

52

Dear Dex:

May I just continue with my way of writing, please…?

It is unfamiliar but not really annoying to the extent of irritating and exasperating to understand – I think.

Please…?

Susma Rio Sep

PS: I am getting paranoid.

53

No.

You’ve been told my an admistrator to cut it out. He had told you that it is a sign of jerkdom. Jerkdom is a reason for being banned. Paranoid? Yes you should be.

54

Getting back to the OP, I’m curious, since I’ve never really studied the Bible. The OP mentions futuristic things which can be found in the Bible such as quarantine. So, is the Biblical quarantine similar to the modern version of quarantine? Did other non-Biblical cultures independently develop quarantine? What other futuristic stuff is in the Bible and how accurate are these claims?

BTW, I don’t necessarily believe that quarantine is necessarily a futuristic practice, since I would gather an evolutionary explanation could be put forth for it.

55

My apologies for the delay in responding. I’d gotten 80% of a response written when we had a nearby lightning strike that caused a power surge losing my response.

If you will permit an analogy, “the law” regarding a controverted topic (e.g., to what extent may the states regulate the performing of abortions) is not to be found in the constitution, in a given statute, or in any single court opinion, but in the intelligent interfoliation of all the above, with particular attention paid to the most recent pronouncements of the Supreme Court on this or related subjects. And if a discussion of the question of what “the law” actually is should come up, the folks around here with an interest in constitutional law will produce different but related analyses – and in the outcome of their discussions of the point, one can finally get a handle on what “the law” is. No single person on the board can state flatly what it is – but together minty green and Bricker and Dewey and the rest of us can come up with a reasonably accurate answer.

It’s in this way that I see the relationship of the Bible to God’s message – the men who wrote the Bible were men of their time, subject to the personal and cultural preconceptions of their time and place, capable of “inspired insight” that speaks directly to the believer’s heart, but for the most part writing based on their own awareness and worldview. So no one Bible author is going to have the absolute word of truth on the subject – but when one reads them intelligently with an eye to what themes are being conveyed, what is stressed as the focus, one can get a handle on the difficult-to-verbalize but quite clear idea of what God expects man to know and do.

I’m sorry; I stand with C.S. Lewis in finding truth in parts of the Tao Te Chung, the Hymn to the Sun, the Qu’ran, and the Sutras – and would probably find it in the Vedanta philosophy, the Granth, the Baha’i writings, and so on if I had read extensively in them. I believe that God got his message across to the extent possible by whatever means were possible, not delimited to one small group of Semites and a few Greeks who adhered to a variant on their beliefs.

For me, as a man brought up in a predominantly Christian culture in the last half of the 20th Century, Christianity is the single mode that speaks most clearly to me, the one that “fits” my personal mindset the best. And IMHO the essence of Christianity speaks the most clearly and fully of God’s will, better than the other But one would need to be a fool not to see truth wherever it lies.

In addition, there is one large factor influencing my choice of beliefs – my conviction that what Jesus did has a real bearing on the metaphysical fate of the world, over and above where one can find divine wisdom.

I trust you don’t know me very well – that one went so far past me that I only felt a gentle breeze from its passing. My belief is founded on a combination of personal mystical experience and a reasonably thorough (and ongoing) study of scholarship that have together convinced me of the validity of my beliefs. I fully admit a “will to believe” and regularly test the tenets of my faith against folks who are critical of them to avoid falling into that pitfall. And absolutely none of the false justifications you suggest in that paragraph has anything to do with what I believe, most especially the “nasty people” line.

I’ll close with a rejoinder to your last point, which was said by one of the wisest and most compassionate women I know:

56

Well, this has been an interesting debate, but I think there’s another angle that we’re overlooking:

The Bible has been translated into completely new languages several times over the milennia. Aramic -> Arabic -> Latin -> English at the very least (and I’m probably missing some). No language ever translates perfectly into another language, and multiple translations would compound this problem even more. Geez, we’ve got at least 6 ENGLISH translations/versions of the Bible that I can think of off the top of my head, and if you’ve ever read two versions of the Bible side-by-side (I have a couple of times), you’ll find that two different english versions can read very differently.

So, let’s assume the strictest view, that the Bible is literally the Word Of God. How much has the Word Of God changed through all of these rewrites/translations? My guess is quite a bit. And if the Bible was Inspired By God, we add another level of translation complexity.

My point: well, I’m not quite sure, but I think it was something about how translation over several thousand years can have a significant impact on the meaning of a text.

57

And I forgot to post it, but I think my sig may be somewhat appropriate in this discussion.

58

Ok, it didn’t post.
:smack: :smack: :smack: :smack:

59

God could not have written the Bible because as far as anyone knows, there is no God.

I can’t prove this, but you can’t prove that there IS one, and until you can isn’t is best to assume the Bible was written the same way every other book is written? (by humans)

60

There is nothing futuristic about quarantines. They were common practice in ancient times in many cultures. It only makes sense not to get too close to sick people. Somes “quarrantining” took a slightly different form (i.e. banishment from a tribe/community/village) but it has pretty much always existed.

There is nothing especially futuristic in the Bible. It is entirely commensurate with its various historical contexts.