Jesus: A Factual Debate

Great Debates
41

Opus: nearly all the things you have listed are miracles and such and must be yaken on faith. But there is still some background, even then. There is ample archeo. evidence for a great flood, about the right time, that wiped out most of the tigris-Euphrates valley, ie, a flood that drowned the whole “known” world. No, Europe, Australia, America, and India were not drowned, but no one really expects “Miss Universe” to represent alien species, either. “The most lovely woman in the KNOWN universe.”

And, sure, there seems to be problems with some of the numbers of the populations in the early OT, but either they were exagerating (as every other period history does) or those numbers were meant to be taken in a numerological sense, not a literal sense. These were very mystical people, why does it surprize us that a lot of verses have mystical meanings? And as far as the conquests, again, either they were exaggerated(as everyone did) or they have mystical meanings, ie conquering=absorbing.
And there is definate evidence that the Israelites DID attack Jericho, just not at its heyday. And they never said they did attack when Jericho was the greatest city around, in fact it is pretty clear that the only thing keeping the Israelites out is a set of walls. The current guess is that the music and marching was to keep the defenders from noticing the sappers digging under the walls, and so at a pre-arranged signal, the walls did “come tumbling down”. and as far as there not being a Jericho for the Isrealites to destroy, they rebuilt it themselves in the time of Ahab, which was destroyed again in the 7th century AD. There still exists a Jericho, to this day. (population about 2-3000).

Again, you are using extremely biased sites, so much so that I have a problem beleiving anything they say. The bit about there being no Jericho for Isreal to attack, as it was destroyed 1000 years earlier, completely ignored the fact the the site of Jericho is the oldest continually habitated city site in the world (maybe-if not, then a close runner up), and after being destroyed in about 2400BC, it was rebuilt (and destroyed, and rebuilt, and…) Again, Isaac Asimov, an unbiased writer- found no historical inaccuacies in the attacks upon Jericho or Ai, and if there was solid evidence there was no Ai to destroy, he would have said so*.
Oh, I am sure it was destroyed then, and the Ai that Joshua destroyed was a smaller, less important town, but he still did it.

He did posit doubts as the the “miracle”, and on many other occasions, but rarely the actual HISTORY.

42

Danielinthewolvesden wrote:

Will you please stop this crap about how all my sources are biased and cannot be trusted? Why is Biblical Archaeology Review biased? Why is Kathleen Kenyon biased? Did you even read the e-mail I reposted? William Dever, a conservative Bible scholar agrees that nobody in the archaeological community espouses a conquest model anymore. If anything, he is biased in the opposite direction!

I don’t know when Asimov wrote his history of the Bible, but it is very possible that it was before all of these new archaeological discoveries. Or maybe he just did a really bad job, even if he was unbiased. I have posted lots of sources, from all over the ideological spectrum, many of them professional archaeologists who have examined evidence first hand, who disagree with Asimov. Please get away from this one book that you’re so impressed with and look at the consensus in the archaeological community.

What I don’t understand is why you think the Bible is the word of God when it is so inaccurate. The Bible clearly describes a global, not a local flood. I agree that a massive local flood happened (sometime around 5600 B.C.E., I believe), but that’s not what the Bible says! Why would God allow all of this exaggeration and hyperbole into his holy book? What makes the Bible any different from the Moabite stone, which glorifies Moabite history and attributes everyday events to their local God?

43

Opus: nearly every site you have linked to is from “infidel” an extremely biased, anti-religion site. Note I said “site”, not 'cite". Biblical Archealogy review mostly validates the HISTORY in the Bible, not invalidates. I no longer have my stack of back issues, unfortunately.

And again, just saying the Bible is inaccurate does not make it so. If a man loses his home & family to a disaster, and says “My whole world was destroyed”, we really don’t think he was talking about the entire planet Earth. The Bible use a lot of poetic language- when Solomon says his loves “breasts are like two young roes that are twins”, we really don’t think her breasts look like baby deer, do we? The problem arises when the Fundies want to take every word as literal, and that is wrong. Much is poetic, mystical, or even right for the writers at the time, but wrong now (ie the “great fish” from Jonah, was likely a whale, and we KNOW whales are not fishes, as Linneaus said so. But if you define a “fish”, as “an animal that lives in the sea”, then a whale is a 'fish".) Note, nowhere does it say the Flood was “global”, just that it “covered the earth” (note, small case “e”, instead of large case “E”, which the Bible also uses, when they are talking about the entire planet).

And even if God did guide the Bible, how could he explain philsophical & scientific concepts that WE have problems understanding, to pre-scientific goatherds? Clearly, in order to make his message understood, he would have to explain things in a way that would make sense to these peoples. He could not say “Well, I created the beginnings of life from pre-mitochondrial protoplasm, and then guided the evolution thru to modern man”, He had to say “I created Man”

44

I don’t understand your logic here. If the facts (the cites) don’t support you, does that somehow not count when the facts are used by someone (the sites) who strongly disagrees with you? Rather than telling us that sites that disagree with you are “biased” and pointing to Isaac Asimov as the one true arbiter of truth in Biblical archaeology, why not deal with the cites that disagree with you?
I mean, the infidels have made a case, and they have made it by referring to unbiased sources. Is there any acceptable way for them to make their case, in your opinion, or would you invalidate everything they have to say, no matter how heavily documented, on the grounds that by trying to argue against the Bible they are “anti-religion”?

Has it occurred to you, Daniel, that you are a very biased, pro-Christianity author? How would it feel if we simply dismissed everything you said just because you are a Christian?

-Ben

45

Danielinthewolvesden wrote:

Okay, let’s try this again. That line from Song of Solomon uses the word “like.” This implies a simile. That’s pretty obvious. Now, let’s look at Noah’s flood, using your first analogy.

If a man were to say “The whole world was destroyed,” rather than my, then I think it would be fair to say that he was inaccurate. Or, to extend this analogy further, let’s say that a fire devastated a whole town. Based on that last line, we needn’t conclude that the entire town was actually destroyed by fire. It could very well be that much damage was caused by the fire, but it would be silly to conclude on the basis of one line that every house was physically destroyed by the fire. This appears to be your take on the Noachian flood.

But, let’s look at what the Bible actually says. It doesn’t just say “the whole world was flooded.” It says the waters “rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered… Every living thing that moved on the earth perished–birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind… Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died…”

God himself even says “I will wipe mankind, whom I have created, from the face of the earth–men and animals, and creatures that move along the ground…I am surely going to destroy both them [humans] and the earth…I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish.”

Now, this is way more specific and detailed than just saying “the whole earth was flooded.” In fact, the entire story of Noah makes no sense with a local flood. Why the ark? Why two of every animal? Why the covenant after the flood? So, once again, this establishes my point: that the Bible is inaccurate and exaggerated. Sure, a local flood happened. But the Bible describes a global flood. It also describes 8 people manning a ship for over a year and caring for thousands of animals.

I also did some research on Asimov’s book. It was written in two parts, in 1968 and 1969, I believe. Asimov wrote 30 books between 1967-1970, an average of 1.6 months per book. So, in contrast to all of my numerous cites (I don’t care how biased Internet Infidels is, they didn’t do the research; they’re just quoting other, unbiased research), you are relying entirely on a 30 year-old book that took all of a few weeks to write. I notice that a couple years later, Asimov wrote two guides to Shakespeare. Considering how versatile this guy was, do you really think that he did any original research on what he was writing, or do you think that he just pasted together other people’s research that he thought looked good? To call him unbiased is absurd; you have to look at who he quoted and see what their biases were. Asimov, in his haste, may have simply taken most of his citations from Biblical conservatives and fundamentalists, without knowing it. I’m not saying this is necessarily the case, but I have to cast some sort of doubt on a man who wrote over 500 books in a 34 year career.

46

Well, I like Asimov as he is writing about the History of the Bible, all of it, ie a complete, non-biased, non-religous source. Asimov was a Atheist Secular humanist cynic of jewish heritage. To say he accepted Christian fundamentalist sources: “is to Laugh”. Altho not the most madern source, he wroted the book without axes to grind, and I can find nearly no other similar sources with the same objectiveity. Either they are trying to show the Bible as the inerrant word of god, or as superstious claptrap. I won’t use either if I can help it (I did use one such source, but clearly labeled it as biased).

For instance your site re archeological evidence for Bibical conquests. Note there is a “darwin fish” in the headliner. A good indication we are not going to get a pro-Bible or unbiased source. And we don’t. For instance it mentions twice that certain cities were destroyed in 2300BC, a thousand years before Joshua, and thus Joshua could not have destroyed them. Now, that is a complete LIE. Oh, sure, the cities WERE destroyed in 2300BC±, but they were rebuilt. In the case of Jericho there is evidence of human habitation for 10,000+ years. Now, in the early, pre-carbon 14 days of Archeology, they discovered the ruins of a great walled city at Jericho, that was destroyed by an earthquake. Well, Biblical Scholars said, “See, there are the ruins of Jericho, destroyed by an earthquake sent by G-d, just like the Bible said.” But, later evidence showed that the dating was wrong, ie it was that city that was destroyed 2300±BC.
But the town was rebuilt. And destroyed, and rebuilt and destroyed, etc. Now, we can’t point for certain which of these was the Biblical destruction, but there is one at roughly the right time. By then, Jericho was a minor walled town, not a great city as it had been. Incidentally, the Jews repopulated it later, and it was a Jewish city for a thousand years+. As for the city of AI, there the evidence shows that if that site was the city that was referred to in the Bible (this is uncertain, as the Bible may well be referring to another site, nearby), then the Bible is engaging in exaggeration, as the City was never really rebuilt. There were only bands of nomads, ect, camping in the ruins. However, Joshua likely did clean them out, so it is not a complete lie, just not the massive victory pictured. But, in any case, saying that Joshua could not have destroyed Jericho, as there was no Jericho for him to destroy, as the great city of Jericho was destroyed a thousand years prior, is simply a lie.

Of course, the Bible does enhance it’s Peoples victories, ALL histories do that, and especially histories in ancient times. But, unlike other histories, the Bible does not ignore the Losses; as they are all listed, to show that when the people “backslid” or “sinned”, sure enuf, there was a loss. Revival= Victory. Of course, those who believe have better moral, which was 50% of ancient warfare, so there is a truth there.

Now, I am not going to go thru these completely biased & unfair sites, one by one & refute them, after all, there are many more for you to dig up. All I will say it that they are clearly & admittedly biased, and thus that is all the refutation I need. especially when you have been unable to refute my cite, except by calling him a “science fiction writer”.

47

Okay, I think I’m going to end this debate with Danielinthewolvesden right now. There’s really no point in continuing, as he doesn’t seem to understand what I’m saying. The fact that research appears on a page with a Darwin fish on it (which is an advertisement, btw, not part of the page) doesn’t make the research any less legitimate. Remember, like I said, the Internet Infidels are not the ones funding or publishing this stuff. They are simply reporting what others have done. All of this research has appeared in publications like Biblical Archaeology Review and similarly prestigious journals. Several of the people involved, like Devers and Callaway, are conservative Christians, and yet are still willing to admit instances in which the Bible is in error. How are they biased? If these exact same excepts were to appear on another webpage, would you stop screaming bias and accept them as legitimate?

I’m glad people like Ben are at least able to recognize this.

You seem to be unwilling to even read what I posted. Here’s one of the quotes:

Or how about this:

So your claim that cities were destroyed and rebuilt is absurd. Kenyon specifically found that the walls were destroyed before Joshua, and not rebuilt; the Bible story was invented to explain the ruins of an ancient city.

You can scream “bias” all you want, but any objective reader can see that what you’re really doing is nothing more than ad hominem attacks.

48

Good heavens . . . you’re referring to capitalization rules from English translations to prove a point regarding something written originally in Hebrew? :rolleyes:

Chaim, or someone else who speaks Hebrew: In the sections Daniel is referring to here, is it the same word or not? Is there capitalization in the Hebrew of the time?

49

Nor, for that matter, are you going to acknowledge that Opus has completely demolished your arguments about the Flood. Come on, Daniel, you can be mature about this. All you have to do is say Opus, you were right, if the Bible says every high mountain under all the heavens was covered, then clearly I was wrong to say that the Bible supports the idea of a local flood.

-Ben

50

I never said that the Bible supports the idea of a local flood. It clearly gives the IDEA of a global flood. But, when you consider the normal exaggeration, and the very extreme local bias (the Bible gives the impression that the Kingdom of David was a great world Empire, also, when it was only of local significance), you can see that a local flood is likely what is being reported. Anyway, that is the way NON-“fundies” read it.

And Opus, if Jericho was never rebuilt, then why is there a town there right now as we speak? And why was Jericho a moderately important Jewish city, “rebuilt” by King Ahab? Even the Oxford History of the biblical area agrees there was more than one Jericho, altho they do say there is no evidence outside of the Bible, that any of the later destructions were caused by Joshua*, altho they do agree it was occupied by the Jews, later. So that’s the Oxford History series also, besides Asimov. And the very GOAL of “infidel” is to dispel Religous “superstition”.

pl: re the large & small case- as we are arguing the Christian interpretation of the KJV, the actaul hebrew is not critical, but I would not mind hearing the answer, myself.
*contraiwise, they say there is no evidence that they were NOT, either, ie, none of the later “destructions” can be tied to Joshua for certain.

51

The bible was oral for much longer than 50 - 100 yrs.

Jesus has been cruxified…purple dishwasher monkey

52

If I read it correctly, the OP makes six statements regarding the individual Jesus of Nazareth, alleged to be a historical figure of the First Century, around whom a great deal of lore has gathered. It does not assert any strictly theological propositions (although points 5 and 6 come pretty darn close), but recounts the supposed eyewitness testimony in fairly general terms.

Nowhere in it do we have Noah going vooba, vooba when a voice from an echo chamber calls his name. (Sorry, I had to do the Cosby quote.) The question had to do with Jesus, not with Old Testament stories. Absolute indisputable proof that the Biblical Flood was a cyclone that hit Ur in 2666 BC would not affect the questions Nilvedman posed. So let’s not play the game “if you’re Christian, you must be a fundamentalist” or “if you believe one piece of the Bible is true, you must believe all of it.” It’s a fool’s game to start with, and nobody fits nicely into categories unless they want to. Even FriendofGod is not a strict literalist, as he’ll freely admit.

Jimmy? “The Bible” was never “oral” – though any reasonable historical-linguistic study will indicate that large portions of it were the probable result of oral tradition over a several-hundred-year span. But the book itself, ipso facto, was not – “oral books” are the product of a technological age. You want to argue against the historicity of Genesis, or even Matthew, on the basis of an oral tradition, I’ll listen, but don’t make off-the-wall assertions that sound like you skimmed a Newsweek article on the Bible once and decided to regurgitate what you remembered without thinking it through. This is the Straight Dope – if a question has an answer, we’ll keep working until we find it.

53

And who, exactly, is playing that game? It seems to me that Daniel made some assertions about the Bible, and Opus demonstrated that the assertions that he made were wrong, at which point Daniel changed his assertions. I don’t think anyone ever said that if you believe one part of the Bible, you have to believe the whole thing.

-Ben

54

[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Opus1 *

Now, let’s start a new debate! This one is over your ridiculous claim that archaeology has shown the Bible to be accurate over, and over again. Archaeology and other branches of science have shown some of the Bible to be accurate. They have shown much of the Bible, however, to be quite inaccurate. Some of the discrepancies between the Bible’s claims and scientific discoveries include:

[QUOTE]

Nope, it was Opus that started the new “debate”, when I disproved his assertion that; 1.Luke was wrong about the dates of JCs birth> thus JC never existed. Altho Opus did manage to show there was doubt as to the details of who was “governor” at the time of JC’s birth.

My “assertion” was the the History of the Bible has been largely backed up by Archeological evedence. This does not mean the Miracles, etc, just the actual history, and I mean “largely” not entirly and without exception. Altho most of the 'exceptions" are a matter of degree, ie Joshua wiping out a small tribe living in the ruins of a once great city, and claiming a “great” victory. However, I agree this would make another thread entirely, as it was just a throw away line, and not ment to start a “debate where somebody shows that one expert says one verse is not backed up by evidence thus the entire Bible is so much mumbo-jumbo”. I don’t buy that arguement when closed-mind fundies use it to attack Evolution, and I don’t buy it here either.

OH, and just for the record, the Oxford History of the area, altho it does say actual written evidence is sparse>non-
existant, says there is no reason to doubt the actual historical reality of JC as a person. Again, an unbiased source, altho Oxford is well known for its extreme cynicism.