I think you need to take a remedial class in reading comprehension if you think that the first link is talking about “tone” and the comments from Miller are in any way insulting.
It’s no wonder you’re not winning this debate - and hey, this atheist’s scorebook agrees with Millers.
Sorry, I thought you might have read at least my last couple of posts before jumping in to criticize me. I was referring to his previous “contribution.”
And I make the same suggestion to you — don’t just say I’m wrong; show me where I’m wrong.
I’ve read this thead, and your comments, as they unfolded.
You clearly don’t get what tomndebb has been saying, and there would be no way for me to explain it better than him -
And again - that post (from Miller) -is not directly insulting you - in fact, he goes out of his way to be sure to be very clear about what he is referring to in that post.
You, at this point, are taking offense just to take offense when none is given, and in many posts in this thread have been very insulting with the ad hominem attacks. (another posters ‘whining’ etc).
This is why you’re losing.
Oh, anything that gets you caught can just be written off as a “joke.” OK. I am glad we have that straight.
And I see that you are still infatuated with the word “indoctrinated.” Now you claim that I have said that Pope Leo was “indoctrinated,” when I have said no such thing. I have certainly never said that he could not think clearly on the topic and if that is your take-away, then it is pretty clear that you have spent no effort actually understanding the discussion.
More silly claims of “indoctrination,” again claiming that I have made such an accusation when I have not.
My explicit point regarding Pope Leo was that he was speaking at a time before new information became available. That is not an accusation of fault and it is certainly not an accusation of “indoctrination.”
So?
I did not claim that Chrysostym did not accept the scriptures, as written. He did, however, note that contradictions could be found in them that did not have to be reconciled. (He did so in a minor point, so I have not attempted to use him to buttress my argument. I just noted that I wish that his perspective had become more prominent among church authors.)
This is bullshit on two levels.
First, I have never claimed that “a passage . . . could not possibly be taken literally by a scholar.”
Second, he is using the passage in exactly the way that I would expect him to use it, drawing a moral principle from the Story.
Your first “rebuttal” fails because it has not happened. The argument Thomas Aquinas used dipped into Aristotelian philosophy, relying on potency and act and other philosophical constructs to get around the clear contradiction in the text. Others holding to a strictly literal interpretation use other methods. None of them are “easily resolved” so much as they are resolved by necessity.
This reads as though you are looking at a totally different thread in which I have not even posted.
I have never claimed that anyone would declare any part of the bible as “nonsense.” (Why do you keep attributing to me things that I have not said?) As to the Vatican’s declarations, I note a rather long absence of such declarations before Leo’s. The church has always maintained that the bible was true.
Regarding current Biblical Literalists, I have not expressed an opinion because they are not relevant to this discussion. I am perfectly willing to accept your favorite word, indoctrination, to explain their beliefs.
That, however, has rather little relevance to whether or not people of prior ages accepted contradictory passages as both true. Indoctrination certainly plays a part. However, so does a general approach to scripture.
Piffle. All of my arguments have been based in the science of anthropology along with historical records. Using “indoctrination” is simply a way to undercut my statements and there is nothing “charitable” about it. Along with your accusations regarding “integrity,” you are simply being disparaging.
Since I have not expressed any of my personal beliefs, your claims or inferences about my beliefs are not relevant to the discussion.
I read the Aquinas link, but, as I noted, the version I used did not use the same scriptural citation notation, so I did miss the point as I noted.
The response to “citations from Popes, scholars, Vatican councils, and the Catholic Encyclopedia (all of which contradicted your statements)” was deliberate and does not change. Every one of them was written in the period when the church was wrestling with the conflict between science and theology and at a time when numerous authors were challenging the scriptures as “false.” Relying on Aquinas for their resolution, their decisions make sense. However, that does not mean that they were historically accurate. I do not take something as “authoritative” if I find that it is in direct conflict with other facts.
Had I been “helpfully contributing” about the error you made, I would certainly have commented upon it with thanks for the clarification.
My “helpful contribution,” however, was not at all in reference to your leaving off “literally true.” Honestly, it was a correction that I found unnecessary, as your gist was clear the first time.
I believe that last part, at least.
It’s not insulting for me to tell you that you lack imagination and intellect? I shudder to think what your life must be like in order for you to believe that.
Impossible. I have been reliably informed that my tone has nothing to do with it — that I’m losing on the self-appointed experts’ scorecards because I’m just wrong. But I note that, again, you’ve offered nothing to demonstrate that.
This reads as though you are looking at a totally different thread in which I have not even posted.
I have never claimed that anyone would declare any part of the bible as “nonsense.” (Why do you keep attributing to me things that I have not said?)
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I’ll just let this excerpt stand as representative of your debate technique. I said even if you found X, it wouldn’t prove your point, and your response is, Why do you keep falsely claiming I said X?
I didn’t. The clear meaning of my statement was that even if you found something beyond what you claimed, it still wouldn’t prove your point, but you don’t see that, and neither does your fan club.
Well, we will clearly never see eye to eye, and I have better things to do than waste my time answering snipes from people who won’t post anything but snipes, so thanks for the debate.
We don’t need to. tom has already done all the heavy lifting for us there.
ehhh- whatever.
He is very specific in what you lack there ‘… to see something else’ - it is not a general slam about you. It is evident in your posts as well as in your general tone.
It’s actually constructive criticism.
That you can’t see that is your failing - and only backs up the comment.
You have a reasonable argument on a couple of fine points - but you are not listening to the responses - you keep resorting to attacks (‘his whining’ ) (‘his indoctrination’). I don’t have to demonstrate you as ‘wrong’ - you’re simply losing the argument and these things don’t help you.
Actually, there was no “clear meaning.” You have truncated the portion of your post that I quoted to give it a different appearance than the section which I quoted and to which I responded. You have also truncated my response to give it a different appearance.
At this point, (since I have already conceded one issue), I am simply noting that as you continue to post you continue to post errors–and i am correcting those.
As an example of things I need to correct: the above has no similarity to anything I have posted.
Actually Jesus made exceptions to the Mosaic Law, he spoke of David eating the tabernacle bread when he was hungry, stopped the people from stoning the Prostitute. He also seemed to have been quoted as saying "I give you a new law;“That you love one another” He didn’t tell people to judge one another or try to convert others . He told his followers to spread the good news that the kingdom of God was at hand.