# Question about Matthew for Christians **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 23, 2014, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984 "2014-12-23T02:26:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2014, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/81 "2014-12-25T23:16:21Z")
> [@TonySinclair](#): > > Mat 2:8 (KJV) And he sent them to **Bethlehem** , and said, Go and search diligently for the young child; and when ye have found him, bring me word again, that I may come and worship him also. > Mat 2:9 When they had heard the king, they departed; and, lo, the star, which they saw in the east, went before them, till it came and stood over where the young child was. > Mat 2:10 When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceeding great joy. > Mat 2:11 And when they were come into the **house** , they saw the young child with Mary his mother, and fell down, and worshipped him: and when they had opened their treasures, they presented unto him gifts; gold, and frankincense, and myrrh. > > Other translations of Matthew 2:11: > > (ASV) And they came into the house and saw the young child with Mary his mother; and they fell down and worshipped him; and opening their treasures they offered unto him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh. > > (CEV) When the men went into the house and saw the child with Mary, his mother, they knelt down and worshiped him. They took out their gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh and gave them to him. > > (ESV) And going into the house they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him. Then, opening their treasures, they offered him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh. > > (Geneva) And went into the house, and founde the babe with Mary his mother, and fell downe, and worshipped him, and opened their treasures, and presented vnto him giftes, euen golde, and frankincense, and myrrhe. > > (ISV) After they went into the house and saw the child with his mother Mary, they fell down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasure sacks and offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. > > (LITV) And having come into the house, they saw the child with His mother Mary. And falling down, they worshiped Him. And opening their treasures, they presented gifts to Him: gold and frankincense and myrrh. > > (MKJV) And coming into the house, they saw the child with Mary His mother. And they fell down and worshiped Him. And opening their treasures, they presented gifts to Him, gold and frankincense and myrrh. > > (YLT) and having come to the house, they found the child with Mary his mother, and having fallen down they bowed to him, and having opened their treasures, they presented to him gifts, gold, and frankincense, and myrrh, > > (GNT) καὶ ἐλθόντες εἰς τὴν **οἰκίαν** εἶδον τὸ παιδίον μετὰ Μαρίας τῆς μητρὸς αὐτοῦ, καὶ πεσόντες προσεκύνησαν αὐτῷ, καὶ ἀνοίξαντες τοὺς θησαυροὺς αὐτῶν προσήνεγκαν αὐτῷ δῶρα, χρυσὸν καὶ λίβανον καὶ σμύρναν· > > Strong’s Greek Dictionary > G3614 > οἰκία > oikia > oy-kee’-ah > From G3624; properly residence (abstractly), but usually (concretely) an abode (literally or figuratively); by implication a family (especially domestics): - home, house (-hold). > To anticipate your response, no, Matthew does not explicitly say that Mary and Joseph always lived in Bethlehem. But as I said in the sentence you quoted, Matthew says they were living in a house when the Magi were led to them by the Star (evidently after it downloaded a new set of maps in Jerusalem), and gives no indication that they ever lived anywhere else. There is no mention of Nazareth until after they are returning home from Egypt, and are warned by God to stay out of Judea, and go to Galilee instead. All this shows is that the child was found in a house, ‘the house’ that the child was found in. My understanding is it was not a barnyard setting as commonly portrayed but a common area of a house perhaps even the floor level of a dwelling where the animals were kept. So no contradiction there, yes he was found in a house. As you correctly pointed out there is no indication at all it was M&J’s house (for if that were the case it would conflict with Luke ). > [@](#): > > Call me crazy, but that sure makes it sound like they hadn’t lived in Nazareth before then. The detour was mentioned: [QUOTE=Matt 2] 21 So he got up, took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel. 22 But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning in Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. Having been warned in a dream, he withdrew to the district of Galilee, 23 and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth. [/QUOTE] So It does appear Nazareth was a new location here however this is the first time Mathew mentions Nazareth. It is also evident that Nazareth was not their planned destination as the Angel of the Lord was sending them into the land of Israel. Joesph warned in a dream chose the district of Galilee instead and this is the first time Mathew introduced Nazareth to the reader, saying nothing one way or another if they lived their previously. I’d say it was the introduction to the reader of Nazareth made in Mathew, rather then it was a new place for them. Even the words they ‘withdrew’ to Nazareth hints that they knew it and has a place to go there. > [@](#): > > The only way to reconcile Luke’s census with Matthew is to suppose that they were staying in a barn/stable/whatever when Jesus was born, but managed to find a house a few days later, where the Magi found them, and then they fled to Egypt. Except that Luke says they didn’t flee to Egypt; they went to Jerusalem six weeks after Jesus was born, had Jesus publicly proclaimed as the Messiah in the Temple, and then went home to Nazareth, with no trouble from Herod or anyone else. All it says is [QUOTE=Luke 2:7] She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no guest room available for them [/QUOTE] So the child was placed in a animal feeding trough (manger) because there were no private rooms (and evidently no accommodation for a baby.) There is no indication it was outside. Just again no private rooms in the house. Yes the typical outdoor scene has problems but that does not disqualify the scripture. ---
**Author:** ![TonySinclair](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/49beb7/32.png) [@TonySinclair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TonySinclair)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2014, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/82 "2014-12-26T23:06:33Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > When perusing the various accounts of the gods written by the ancient Greeks, one does not encounter strident debates over which story was “real” or “accurate.” It takes two to make a debate. I’m unaware of any sizable faction who claimed that the myths weren’t embellished. On the contrary, the most famous poets were the ones who were the best at embellishing them. > [@](#): > > The very question of accuracy in religious texts only originated when science, following directly on the tumult of the Reformation, provided a separate challenge to religious belief in a totally new way of surveying the world. Well, yes, that’s what I’ve been saying. Nobody questioned that the creation or the flood or the miracles of Jesus actually happened, as written, before modern science took hold, because there was no reason to. And as always, when I say “nobody,” it’s a metaphor/allegory/poetic license for the vast, vast majority of lay Christians, not including a few scholars who wrote for other scholars. > [@](#): > > "There is no evidence that anyone in prescientific ages even thought in terms of literal accuracy when reading religious texts. " That’s just playing with words. As I said above, they didn’t frame the issue the way modern literalists do, because there was no opposition, except in scholarly (yet still pious) debates completely beyond their ken. Let’s skip the formal definition bullshit, and give me a straight answer: all through the Middle Ages, say from 500 AD to 1500 AD, what percentage of Christians do you claim did not believe that the world was created in six literal days, and that there was a Flood, and an Exodus, and that every story in the Gospels not clearly labelled a parable actually happened? What percentage of Christans do you claim noticed the kinds of issues raised in this thread and dismissed them as metaphors or allegories, rather than simply being unaware of them? People like you make me wish I knew more about psychology. You’re obviously intelligent and educated, but when it comes to your religion (and only YOUR religion, because your brain is fully functional when it comes to the scriptures of other religions), your rationality is just somehow bypassed. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/83 "2014-12-27T03:05:49Z")
> [@TonySinclair](#): > > That’s just playing with words. As I said above, they didn’t frame the issue the way modern literalists do, because there was no opposition, except in scholarly (yet still pious) debates completely beyond their ken. It is not "playing with words to point out that you are framing the discussion in ways that people prior to the eighteenth century would not even have understood. > [@TonySinclair](#): > > Let’s skip the formal definition bullshit, and give me a straight answer: all through the Middle Ages, say from 500 AD to 1500 AD, what percentage of Christians do you claim did not believe that the world was created in six literal days, and that there was a Flood, and an Exodus, and that every story in the Gospels not clearly labelled a parable actually happened? What percentage of Christans do you claim noticed the kinds of issues raised in this thread and dismissed them as metaphors or allegories, rather than simply being unaware of them? The overwhelming majority almost certainly accepted them as true. However, they accepted them as true from the perspective of those eras that did not regard truth as a " literal" manifestation. They did not spend any energy attempting to reconcile the fact that Jesus went to Jerusalem every year in one Gospel while he only journeyed to that city one time in another Gospel. They did not spend any effort to reconcile Genesis 1, where humanity is created, male and female, at the end of creation against Genesis 2, where Adam is created first, then all the animals, then Eve. No religious preacher or writer attempted to purge the verses in Genesis that only had two of each animal entering the ark or the verses that described seven pairs of every clean animal. It was simply not relevant to their view of literature, whether as scripture, history, or biography. And despite your dodge, that was true for all the peoples in those locales, which is why we do not findd pagan debates as to whether Athena was sired by Zeus or Pallas. > [@Controversial encounters between law-enforcement and civilians - the omnibus thread](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/controversial-encounters-between-law-enforcement-and-civilians-the-omnibus-thread/700942/546): > > People like you make me wish I knew more about psychology. You’re obviously intelligent and educated, but when it comes to your religion (and only YOUR religion, because your brain is fully functional when it comes to the scriptures of other religions), your rationality is just somehow bypassed. I suspect that most of what you think you know about my beliefs is wrong. Note, for example, that in this discussion I have clearly made no efforts at special pleading for Judaism or Christianity. In fact, I have argued that the approaches to religious literature were the same among pagans, Jews, ànd Chritians and made no claim that my beliefs are superior to others and have actually compared Jewish and Christian belief on an exactly equal footing with ancient Greek belief. ---
**Author:** ![TonySinclair](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/49beb7/32.png) [@TonySinclair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TonySinclair)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 5:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/84 "2014-12-27T05:44:45Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > I suspect that most of what you think you know about my beliefs is wrong. Note, for example, that in this discussion I have clearly made no efforts at special pleading for Judaism or Christianity. In fact, I have argued that the approaches to religious literature were the same among pagans, Jews, ànd Chritians and made no claim that my beliefs are superior to others and have actually compared Jewish and Christian belief on an exactly equal footing with ancient Greek belief. No need for an explicit claim about the superiority of your beliefs; the condescension toward Greek belief in that last statement speaks volumes. The ancient Greeks were at least as smart as anyone today; why shouldn’t you treat them as your intellectual equals, let alone the intellectual equals of whoever wrote the Hebrew myths, 3000 years ago? And yet, you act like it’s the height of magnanimity. FWIW, I have long thought that the Greek gods, with their petty rivalries and capricious natures, provide a better explanation for the real world than the loving God who sees every sparrow fall, as depicted in the NT. But since there is no evidence that either set of beliefs is true, I think it’s far, far more likely that there is no supernatural concern for humans at all. The assumption that Christianity is the One True Religion is so deeply ingrained in many Christians that they simply can’t see it, no matter how intelligent and perceptive they are otherwise. But to an outsider, it’s so obvious how they go from “you can’t prove it’s true” wrt other religions, to “you can’t prove it’s not true” to Christianity, and then say they’re not special pleading. Not to single out Hector, because it’s very common with Christian apologists, but they say, “So what if Matthew didn’t mention the census or the journey from Nazareth, or Luke didn’t mention the Slaughter or the Flight to Egypt. It doesn’t prove they didn’t happen.” Yes, it fucking does! If you’re writing the story of the Messiah’s birth, and you have access to details that could only have been provided by either Mary or God himself, then you don’t leave out the Star and the Magi and the Slaughter, especially when they contradict what you didn’t leave out. It defies reason that Luke would go into detail about Mary’s pleasant visit to her cousin Elizabeth before Jesus was born, but leave out how she had to flee in terror to Egypt after he was born. It would be like a biography of Lincoln that didn’t mention the Civil War, and simply noted that his term as President ended in April of 1865. Yes, it’s physically possible to write such a book, but no, nobody would ever do it. And your own approach may be more sophisticated, but IMO it’s just as bizarre to an objective (i.e. equally skeptical of all religions, not just all but Christianity) observer, namely “I don’t care if many of the stories or claims (e.g. “Whatever you ask for in prayer, even something as silly as casting a mountain into the sea, will be granted”) are demonstrably false, it’s still the one true faith.” Good heavens. If your child called you and said he was joining the Church of Scientology, and you pointed out how demonstrably false some of their beliefs were, and he said, “Well, maybe those things aren’t true, but I don’t care,” how would you answer him? Perhaps you would be as frustrated as an atheist debating a Christian. I’m sure there’s not an intelligent, educated Christian in the world who doesn’t believe that his faith is rational, arrived at and defended by rational thought (excluding those who believe they have had a direct revelation from God, but I can’t argue with a memory). But the same could be said for Muslims or Hindus or any other believers. So how do you explain the amazing coincidence that 90+% of people, after their rational examination of world religions, end up in the same major faith that they were most exposed to, either from their parents or from the culture they grew up in? If the choice of religion is a rational process, why aren’t the various religions evenly spread around the world, with a very strong correlation, no matter where you look, between IQ and chosen religion? Instead of almost everyone in Iran – dumb or smart; Persian, Kurd, or Arab – being Muslim, and almost everyone in Alabama – dumb or smart; black, white, or Latino – being Christian? Well, we’re not going to settle any of that here. Anyone arguing religion on the Dope has very likely satisfied himself that he is right, and is not about to let some anonymous stranger (other than the Gospel writers) tell him what to think. So let me ask you (collective you, everyone’s responses welcome) this — forget the debate, this is an honest request for information: If what superficially appears to be straight historical narrative is actually a metaphor (or simply wrong), then how do you know when Jesus, the master of the parable, was meant to be taken literally? How do you know he wasn’t using a metaphor when he said he was the only way to Eternal Life? And how do you know Eternal Life wasn’t just a metaphor for inner happiness, or whatever? ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 6:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/85 "2014-12-27T06:44:42Z")
> [@TonySinclair](#): > > No need for an explicit claim about the superiority of your beliefs; the condescension toward Greek belief in that last statement speaks volumes. The ancient Greeks were at least as smart as anyone today; why shouldn’t you treat them as your intellectual equals, let alone the intellectual equals of whoever wrote the Hebrew myths, 3000 years ago? And yet, you act like it’s the height of magnanimity. You seem to want to project some odd beliefs of your own onto me that have nothing to do with what I have posted. The entire rest of your post is a series of arguments against positions that I do not hold and have never expressed. I would not accuse you of building a straw man argument because there are certainly people who hold some of those positions, but they really have nothing to do with me. My participation in this thread is limited to the ways in which a “literal” view of the world expressed in religious writings of Europe and Western Asia and North Africa have changed over time and how twenty-first century people often fail to recognize the change in those views that occurred between the Renaissance and the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution. Debating the superiority of various religious beliefs is a pointless exercise in which I do not choose to engage. ---
**Author:** ![JohnClay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c37758/32.png) [@JohnClay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnClay)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 7:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/86 "2014-12-27T07:37:48Z")
> [@TonySinclair](#): > > …claims that his (and my) immortal soul depends on believing what is written in a certain book… > **[Believe What the Jewish Apostles Taught -- Why Conditional Immortality Is...](https://jewishnotgreek.com/)** > > Why hell is destruction, not eternal torment. Absolute Biblical proof of conditional immortality. What was taught in the Old Testament? What did Judaism teach? In-depth discussion on Conditional Immortality, Annihilationism, Traditionalism, and... “Why there is no “immortal soul” doctrine in the Bible, for the lost, at all.” ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/87 "2014-12-27T15:04:05Z")
> [@TonySinclair](#): > > Well, yes, that’s what I’ve been saying. Nobody questioned that the creation or the flood or the miracles of Jesus actually happened, as written, before modern science took hold, because there was no reason to. And as always, when I say “nobody,” it’s a metaphor/allegory/poetic license for the vast, vast majority of lay Christians, not including a few scholars who wrote for other scholars. Evidence? > [@TonySinclair](#): > > That’s just playing with words. As I said above, they didn’t frame the issue the way modern literalists do, because there was no opposition, except in scholarly (yet still pious) debates completely beyond their ken. > > Let’s skip the formal definition bullshit, and give me a straight answer: all through the Middle Ages, say from 500 AD to 1500 AD, what percentage of Christians do you claim did not believe that the world was created in six literal days, and that there was a Flood, and an Exodus, and that every story in the Gospels not clearly labelled a parable actually happened? What percentage of Christans do you claim noticed the kinds of issues raised in this thread and dismissed them as metaphors or allegories, rather than simply being unaware of them? > > People like you make me wish I knew more about psychology. You’re obviously intelligent and educated, but when it comes to your religion (and only YOUR religion, because your brain is fully functional when it comes to the scriptures of other religions), your rationality is just somehow bypassed. I don’t know how many Christians between 500 and 1500 AD doubted that the world was created in six days, or the flood or the exodus, but I suspect rather a lot. As noted above (and I’m not sure why you are persistently ignoring it) there were _entire Christian sects_ that denied the creation of the world. The New Testament is presented as explicitly historical, not mythological, so I’m sure most Christians then, like most Christians today, accepted the miracles of Jesus as historical (as do I). ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/88 "2014-12-27T19:16:08Z")
> [@Flyer](#): > > Contrast that to the mindset of modern translators, who in far too many cases, view the Word of God as merely a piece of literature to be edited according to modern standards. (And even copyrighted! – A practice that is dangerously close to blasphemy.) I’m curious - what’s blasphemous about copyrighting the Bible? ---
**Author:** ![ISiddiqui](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/97f17d/32.png) [@ISiddiqui](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ISiddiqui)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/89 "2014-12-27T20:21:58Z")
> [@TonySinclair](#): > > So let me ask you (collective you, everyone’s responses welcome) this — forget the debate, this is an honest request for information: > If what superficially appears to be straight historical narrative is actually a metaphor (or simply wrong), then how do you know when Jesus, the master of the parable, was meant to be taken literally? How do you know he wasn’t using a metaphor when he said he was the only way to Eternal Life? And how do you know Eternal Life wasn’t just a metaphor for inner happiness, or whatever? Faith. With the understanding that we don’t know everything (only God does), so we may be shown wrong. (Though the original Greek doesn’t necessarily say “eternal life” - the word translated as eternal (aionion) really stands for the age-during or age-abiding. So, one can see it as life during the age. There is an age to come, as the end of the Book of Revelation discusses) If that sounds too flippant, I think that a quote from (of all places) Call the Midwife’s Christmas Special hits it on the nose: “Certainty is fleeting. That is why we must have faith” Anyways, a brief response to your other points - you are not an objective observer. You can claim your skepticism of all faiths makes you objective, but you are merely another subjective observer with your own biases and beliefs influencing your views. And I don’t think my faith is arrived at by rational processes. I don’t think many Christians believe that. It may be defended by rational processes after the fact, but faith is arrived through by religious experience and then rationality comes into play. I think, or at least I hope, most Christians are turning away from the notion that hyper-rationality is the only way to truth. I think its something we owe to Post-Modern theorists, who may not have been friends of Christianity, but definitely were not friends of Modernist views of the pre-eminence of rationality and concepts of objective observers (or even truth itself). This is coming from someone who rejected the faith he was raised in (Islam), and was a happy atheist for 10 years until his world was rocked by a different faith (Christianity). Yes, people do fall into the faiths of their family or culture - it doesn’t necessarily mean their faiths are all wrong (saying that I’m sure part of my faith is wrong, I just need to be open to see where that may be as the years pass). ---
**Author:** ![Ulfreida](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ulfreida/32/8014_2.png) [@Ulfreida](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulfreida)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/90 "2014-12-27T20:30:21Z")
Faith is not irrational. It is non-rational. It partakes of a different plane of knowledge. If you, personally, cannot access that plane, that does not keep it from existing. And that is all that believers can say to rationalist atheists. I know it is not satisfactory in any way, in terms of the way you understand the world, but that’s all that can be said. This coming from someone raised as an atheistic secular humanist, with an infinitesimal access to Christian beliefs. I’ve been a Catholic for over 20 years and I expect I will die as one. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/91 "2014-12-27T21:14:29Z")
> [@Ulfreida](#): > > Faith is not irrational. It is non-rational. It partakes of a different plane of knowledge. If you, personally, cannot access that plane, that does not keep it from existing. And that is all that believers can say to rationalist atheists. I know it is not satisfactory in any way, in terms of the way you understand the world, but that’s all that can be said. The issue with non-rational claims is that… well, they’re non-rational. If 1+1 doesn’t necessarily equal 2, then maths and logic go out the window. Good is evil, or at least there’s nothing keeping it from being so. Up is down. Being is non-being. Acceptance of a non-rational concept at the foundation of existence means we can’t accept any possibility. And I like using my computer! And actually, if I, personally, cannot access that plane, then that would put paid to several forms of religious concept upon which existence is defined. Fairness and justness, to name two (or one, depending on your philosophical bent! :p) ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/92 "2014-12-27T21:25:23Z")
> [@ISiddiqui](#): > > Faith. With the understanding that we don’t know everything (only God does), so we may be shown wrong. (Though the original Greek doesn’t necessarily say “eternal life” - the word translated as eternal (aionion) really stands for the age-during or age-abiding. So, one can see it as life during the age. There is an age to come, as the end of the Book of Revelation discusses) > > If that sounds too flippant, I think that a quote from (of all places) Call the Midwife’s Christmas Special hits it on the nose: “Certainty is fleeting. That is why we must have faith” But that’s asinine. Absolute certainty in _anything_ is a fool’s game. No philosophy has managed to solve hard solipsism and it’s not unreasonable to assume that no philosophy ever will (anyone bringing up Sye Ten Bruggencate gets whacked with a fish :mad: ). What we can have is a certain degree of _reasonable_ certainty. It’s _reasonably certain_ based on the evidence we have that the theory of gravity applies. It’s _reasonably certain_ that the world is approximately a spheroid. Could all of these things be false? Yeah! You could be a brain in a vat. But appealing to hard solipsism is basically a complete waste of time. We can’t be _absolutely_ sure of anything, but we can be _reasonably_ sure of a lot of things. Inserting faith doesn’t help. At all. Faith is not a pathway to truth. By applying faith, it is trivially easy for two different people to come to completely contradictory conclusions. Faith is what the Muslim and the Christian both appeal to, and yet their gods _cannot_ coexist. How does faith help resolve _anything_? > [@](#): > > And I don’t think my faith is arrived at by rational processes. Then why hold it? Honestly - why? If it’s not rational, why would you hold it to be true? > [@](#): > > faith is arrived through by religious experience and then rationality comes into play. At what point do you subject these religious experiences to rationality? I’ve heard several such incidents, and in every case I tried to see through the eyes of the religios and came to the conclusion, “Hang on, that’s totally not adequate”. Like, did you ever take that religious experience and subject it to scrutiny? At all? > [@](#): > > I think, or at least I hope, most Christians are turning away from the notion that hyper-rationality is the only way to truth. I’m not going to claim that rationality and the scientific method is the _only_ way to truth. What I will say is that so far, it’s the only one we’ve found. If you have an alternative, hey, I’d _love_ to hear it. > [@Ulfreida](#): > > Faith is not irrational. It is non-rational. Potato, Potahto. ---
**Author:** ![Ulfreida](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ulfreida/32/8014_2.png) [@Ulfreida](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulfreida)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/93 "2014-12-27T22:03:30Z")
> [@Revenant\_Threshold](#): > > The issue with non-rational claims is that… well, they’re non-rational. If 1+1 doesn’t necessarily equal 2, then maths and logic go out the window. Good is evil, or at least there’s nothing keeping it from being so. Up is down. Being is non-being. Acceptance of a non-rational concept at the foundation of existence means we can’t accept any possibility. And I like using my computer! > > And actually, if I, personally, cannot access that plane, then that would put paid to several forms of religious concept upon which existence is defined. Fairness and justness, to name two (or one, depending on your philosophical bent! :p) It doesn’t work that way. But to be quite honest, I have nothing more to say about it. Some people have only their minds to decide things with, and I pity those people but I cannot help them. ---
**Author:** ![Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slow_moving_vehicle/32/291_2.png) [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slow_Moving_Vehicle)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/94 "2014-12-27T22:21:12Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > Interesting. Not only have you not provided proof that literalism is not of recent origin, you have quoted people who are not even addressing the same issue. Discussing the inerrancy of scripture, (which addresses the truths revealed about God), is a different discussion than whether the methods of presentation of those truths are based on literal depictions. Your citations also fail in that they only present the beliefs of a pair of nineteenth century religious writers with no references to the actual thoughts of Christians in the first two centuries. > > You have not merely failed to prove your point, you have established that your whole argument is rooted in personal beliefs and not facts. I remember that thread. I also remember **Flyer** using the phrase “the true Church” in several of his posts. (I assume he’s male; I apologize if you’re not, **Flyer**.) “The true Church”, as in, “true Scotsman”. As in, the [No True Scotsman logical fallacy](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_true_Scotsman). ---
**Author:** ![TonySinclair](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/49beb7/32.png) [@TonySinclair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TonySinclair)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/95 "2014-12-27T22:31:52Z")
> [@ISiddiqui](#): > > Faith. With the understanding that we don’t know everything (only God does), so we may be shown wrong. (Though the original Greek doesn’t necessarily say “eternal life” - the word translated as eternal (aionion) really stands for the age-during or age-abiding. So, one can see it as life during the age. There is an age to come, as the end of the Book of Revelation discusses) > > If that sounds too flippant, I think that a quote from (of all places) Call the Midwife’s Christmas Special hits it on the nose: “Certainty is fleeting. That is why we must have faith” > > Anyways, a brief response to your other points - you are not an objective observer. You can claim your skepticism of all faiths makes you objective, but you are merely another subjective observer with your own biases and beliefs influencing your views. Well, sure. We’re all a product of our environment and experiences, and nobody can be completely objective. But I think it’s pretty obvious that if person A approaches the claims of all religions with equal skepticism, and person B does that for everything except Christianity, while using his sometimes very formidable intellect to rationalize away the contradictions and absurdities of the Bible, then the outcome is, er, predestined. I was raised a Christian in a Christian country, and continue to live in a Christian country, so I’m much more familiar with the Bible than with other scriptures, but seriously, the more I read it, the more puzzled I am about how anyone can believe it. I appreciate the responses about faith, and I can see how faith could fill in gaps in knowledge. But I just can’t see how anything but mindless, blind faith can make you overlook all the problems in the Bible. It’s not just the obviously fabricated tales in Matthew and Luke; excluding the books of pure poetry, you can hardly read any ten pages picked at random without finding a contradiction, or an error in science or history, something morally repugnant, or a prophecy or promise that never came true. Can any Christian here honestly tell me that if the Quran made an unambiguous promise that anything a believer prayed for would be granted, and emphasized that there were no conditions about the request having to be noble/unselfish/in accordance with God’s will, and even gave examples of the silly and spiteful things you could ask for, like killing a fig tree for not having figs out of season, or casting a mountain into the sea for no particular reason, you wouldn’t want to test that? And when you found that Muslims could not only not get anything they wanted, they couldn’t even realize the other, more specific promises of healing the sick or whatever, you wouldn’t consider that a failed promise? Jesus said that anyone who believed in him would have eternal life. Jesus said that anyone who believed in him could cast a mountain into the sea. What is the difference between those two promises? At least in some states, our society has advanced to the point where we lock people up who believe they can pray away their children’s life-threatening ailments without calling a doctor. We consider them bonkers. Why don’t we consider people who believe in other promises from the same source bonkers? ---
**Author:** ![Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slow_moving_vehicle/32/291_2.png) [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slow_Moving_Vehicle)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/96 "2014-12-27T22:37:49Z")
> [@Ulfreida](#): > > It doesn’t work that way. But to be quite honest, I have nothing more to say about it. Some people have only their minds to decide things with, and I pity those people but I cannot help them. Stephen Jay Gould argued that way, with his notion of “non-overlapping magisteria”; religion, like philosophy and art and storytelling and emotion, are areas of the human experience that are not parseable by the tools of rationality; they are concerned with qualitatively different phenomena, and cannot be analyzed with the same tools that mathematics or physical phenomena can. You can’t repair a car with a surgeon’s scalpel and forceps. However, that also means that those same things cannot be claimed to be objective truths, and they cannot be cited as “evidence” for any one faith or viewpoint. Which, to your credit, you haven’t tried to do so. Though your “pity” for us benighted folk who “only have [our] minds to decide things with” is a bit condescending. ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/97 "2014-12-27T22:41:17Z")
> [@Ulfreida](#): > > {…} Some people have only their minds to decide things with {…} You have more than one organ in your body that you use to decide things? CMC fnord! ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/98 "2014-12-27T23:35:44Z")
> [@Ulfreida](#): > > It doesn’t work that way. But to be quite honest, I have nothing more to say about it. Some people have only their minds to decide things with, and I pity those people but I cannot help them. So what do you use to decide whether something is true or not? I mean, if I told you that my god was throwing an awesome party with a solid gold waterslide, unicorns, and everyone’s favorite bands, would you show up at the address? Why not? How would you decide whether or not my claim was worth taking seriously? I can answer that question, and tell you exactly why I think it’s not worth taking seriously. Can you? And if not, why don’t you think that’s a problem? Faith is nothing more than the willingness to accept something for which there is no rationale. It is not a virtue. It’s gullibility. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2014, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/99 "2014-12-27T23:35:45Z")
> [@Ulfreida](#): > > It doesn’t work that way. I’d ask you to lead me to where I’m mistaken, or explain what you mean, but since you write what you do later I’ll just hope you change your mind on responding. > [@](#): > > But to be quite honest, I have nothing more to say about it. Some people have only their minds to decide things with, and I pity those people but I cannot help them. None of whom can be in this thread, though, right? Given that a discussion of ideas necessitates the recognition of other minds? I mean, I’m responding to information from your mind - and indeed, any other sources you have to make your decisions - right now. To put it exceedingly simply and meaning no offense, if someone speaks directly to their god or gods, and then relays the information gained to a non-believer, then that non-believer still has access to those sources. If your understanding comes from whatever other sources, and you’ve relayed it here, then I and everyone else in here absolutely have other than their minds to decide things with. We have each other’s experiences, too! A very useful tool. ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2014, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984/100 "2014-12-28T00:22:48Z")
Personally, I pity those who cannot see the folly of faith. I may be condescending, but at least I can rationally justify my condescension. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-matthew-for-christians/707984.md?page=6)