Can you elaborate on that statement? What made him a ‘good guy’ in your view?
Oh dearie me:
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You are looking at many different stories written by many different authors at many different times, and trying to come up with the point when there is no evidence that all/any of these authors(none of whom with first hand experience)would agree with each other in the first place as to what that point was.
[/QUOTE]
So: ‘many’ (four) different authors at ‘many’ (four) different times (in roughly a 30-year period), who are copying from each other or from common sources, which certainly has to lessen the ‘many different authors’ angle, since anything they all copied like this had just one original author. But for unstated reasons, we shouldn’t look on this copying as evidence of concurrence!
Yeah, whatever. 
I didn’t say they all copied from the same source, but the two that definite concur more than most, Matthew and Mark, are certainly thought to have cribbed from the same notes. Once again:
Luke 23:34: Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.
Luke 23:43: Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.
Luke 23:46: Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.
With John we get:
John 19:28: I thirst.
John 19:30: It is finished.
And finally with Matthew and Mark we get:
Matthew 27:46 & Mark 15:34 My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?
And??
I think his point is that whoever compiled the original Bible must have hired a terrible copyeditor. Not only do Jesus’ final words on the cross vary significantly, but the geneologies listed by Matthew & Luke don’t match, and the actual resurrection scenes in Matthew, Luke & John are markedly different (varying in time of day, how many followers were there, whether or not an angel was present, etc.) Mark doesn’t even include the resurrection, which you’d think was the whole point of Christianity, isn’t it?
The bible - as written by the Trump Administration.
I don’t think Jesus’ death is the only horrible death that ever was that made death seem less horrible (some other religions have good afterlives, too), and that statement completely ignore how much more horrible it makes death/afterlife for those who end up with eternal torment instead of just ending because they weren’t saved (let’s not pretend the knowledge of what one has to do to end up in heaven is simple and straightforward - there are way too many conflicting sets of belief for that).
But even so, back to the original point, “died for you” and “suffered for you” are what I always see. That we owe Jesus something for that. Even though Jesus is God, and therefore could have had us have all that “death less horrible” stuff without Jesus dying at all, so basically we owe him for pulling our car out of the ditch hard way instead of the easy way, when he’s the one that put us in the ditch (possible for our parents’ crimes) in the first place. God never had to invent hell. Or keep anyone apart from him. Of do anything at all to humans who merely carry “original sin.” Like others have said, that’s a concept that doesn’t sit well to me.
Plus what others said about substitutionary atonement not being the act of a just God. Though there’s the argument one cannot be both just and merciful at the same time. But that’s too philosophical a discussion for my sake. In any event, it hardly seems fair that God gets to decide appropriate punishments to me, and can decide not believing in him or accepting him deserves eternal punishment. It’s a very might-makes-right argument. Or “I brought you into the world and I can take you out of it” which also doesn’t sit well with me.
But how does that relate to his claim that the Gospel authors wouldn’t agree with each other about what the point of the Gospel was?
It’s a great argument against Biblical inerrancy, but since neither one of us is arguing for Biblical inerrancy, that seems to be pretty much irrelevant to our discussion.
I went over the genealogy question with TonySinclair last year, but no, I don’t think the genealogies conflict. (Or more precisely I don’t think Luke was tracing the genealogy of Joseph, but rather of Mary). HEre’s Luke 3 in the Young Literal Translation:
“And Jesus himself was beginning to be about thirty years of age, being, as was supposed, son of Joseph, the [son] of Eli, the [son] of Matthat, the [son] of Levi, the [son] of Melchi, the [son] of Janna, the [son] of Joseph…”
It’s plausible (at least to me and to plenty of Christian writers of much more eminence than me down the ages) that the lineage being traced from Jesus to Heli through Joseph refers to a son in law rather than a biological son relationship. This is plausible because 1) at least once in the Old Testament, son is used to mean son in law, 2) the text says “of Heli”, not explicitly “son of Heli”, and 3) early tradition, quite possibly independent of Luke, states that Mary’s father was named Joachim, and Joachim and Heli are apparently varying shortenings of synonymous names. It’s also possible that “of Heli” modifies “Jesus” not “Joseph”, if we read it as follows: “being (as was supposed son of Joseph) the son of Heli, the son of Matthat…”
Mark does very definitely contain a reference to the Resurrection, whatever view you take of the releveant textual criticism. The disputed portion of Mark talks about what happened after the Resurrection, i.e. the post-resurrection appearances. I tend to accept the long ending, but even the* shortest *version of Mark ends this way though:
“And he saith unto them, Be not affrighted: Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth, which was crucified: he is risen; he is not here: behold the place where they laid him. But go your way, tell his disciples and Peter that he goeth before you into Galilee: there shall ye see him, as he said unto you. And they went out quickly, and fled from the sepulchre; for they trembled and were amazed: neither said they any thing to any man; for they were afraid.”
No, they still conflict.
The problem is, the genealogies both converge in the middle at Zerubbabel and his father, Shealtiel, before diverging again. (Matt. 1:12, Luke 2:27.) But according to Matthew, Shealtiel’s father was Jeconiah, and according to Luke, Shealtiel’s father was Neri.
If they never said anything to any man, how did Mark know about it to write about it?
Probably got hold of the Urim and the Thummim, and wrote his Gospel with their aid. 
I figure that answer’s as serious as the question was intended to be, but if I’m wrong about that, just say so.
The standard apologetic response is that here, too, Luke was using “son” to mean son-in-law. Luke, though he was not a Jew, would have access to the Septuagint and knew that Jeconiah was the male-line ancestor of Shealtiel (as Matthew says, quoting Chronicles), so it’s likely he meant something else here, and that could be plausibly “son in law”.
As I said, I don’t believe this is where the Gospel actually ends, I think Mark should end with verses 9-20.
For those people who don’t credit verses 9-20, I’m not sure what they would say, but I assume the idea is either that the writer of Mark left the gospel unfinished, that the Shorter Ending is correct, or that the original ending has been lost. I don’t think anyone believes that the writer of Mark intended to end with the verse we have, just that’s the last verse for which all the copies of Mark agree.
In any case, Mark isn’t the only Gospel we have, the other ones clearly state that Jesus made post-resurrection appearances to the other apostles, so that alone would be enough to assure a chain of transmission.
Harold Camping was polite. He was a nice guy. When people called his show and tried to get him to talk trash about Obama, he refused; he kept politics out.
He knew his Bible, thoroughly. He was a highly qualified Bible scholar…although his specific insights were so limited that his scholarship was badly blinkered. The example I gave – “The Son” had to mean Satan, because there isn’t anything that Jesus does not know – is typical of his approach.
He wandered down the foolish path toward numerology, and earned him humiliation. He did not seem to learn from his errors. But he was never nasty, and in a world where Oral Roberts and Pat Robertson helped set the Christian agenda, that’s a big step ahead of the average media evangelist.
(I even have some admiration for his numerology. It was wrong…but it was so elegant, it “should have been true.” The same goes for String Theory in modern physics: anything that pretty darn well ought to be true!)
Thanks for the reply, Trinopus. I’ll grant that he sounds like he was a nice guy. I’ve met some very nice, kind, giving people with unusual beliefs so I’ve no doubt he could be another one of that ilk.
But do you think he did more good than harm in his lifetime? His doomsday predictions caused many people to give up their homes and fortunes, and in some cases this deprived the children of these folks of emotional and financial stability. And his pushing of his own strained “should have been true” brand of logic gave other people permission to ignore unpleasant facts and embrace more beautiful speculation instead.
Gosh, I’m hijacking my own zombie thread now.
Grin! To perpetuate the highjack just a bit longer… Camping tried to tell people not to do anything irreversible. He told people not to sell their homes, not to give away their wealth, most certainly not to commit suicide.
Certainly, his “May 22 is the end of the world” riff did some harm. Not least, it harmed mainstream Christianity, in the way all extremes of faith do. We were fortunate that he’d been wrong twice before, so there was that additional level of built-in skepticism.
Meanwhile, I think he did some good with his radio ministry, and with his call-in show in particular. Even while he took the view of absolute Biblical literalism – and Sola Scriptura to a huge degree – he actually maintained a quiet sort of moderation in his interpretations.
He preached annihilationism, as one example: there is no hell, only the passing shame of judgement, and then the absolute destruction of the wicked. Too many others wax rhapsodic about the sufferings of the damned in hell, taking a kind of Dantean glee in it. Camping was more of the “We must beg for mercy before the perfect wisdom of the Lord” kind of guy.
He also preached the doctrine of the elect. There is nothing we can do to be saved. God will choose (had already chosen at the moment of creation) who would receive the gift of salvation.
This led him to say that Christ did not die for the sins of all mankind, but only for the sins of those who would be saved. That undercuts the majesty of the sacrifice, but it is pretty much what the Bible actually says.
On the contrary:
“My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous: And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.” (1 John 2:1-2)
“Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out. And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me. This he said, signifying what death he should die.” (John 12:31-33)
“The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.” (2 Peter 3:9)
Nope - ONLY the believers - so not ‘everyone’ -
Mark 16:16
Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.
John 3:36
Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.
Romans 10:9-14
because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. For the Scripture says, “Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.” For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
John 3:18-19
Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil.
Acts 2:38
And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
John 3:15-16
that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
Quotemining the Bible-A fine religious tradition for over a thousand years.