For a change, how about an actual and honest discussion of Noah's Ark-

Then let's discuss HOW that happened exactly. I'll revise the questions based ONLY on the Bible and mathematics and one tiny bit of zoology. You DO agree that mathematics isn't "subjective"...right?

1. What were the dimensions of the Ark, according to Genesis?

2. What would have been the internal space of the Ark, as described in Genesis. How much square footage inside the Ark?

3. How much space would you be able to cram Noah, his wife, his 3 sons, and their three wives into, to sleep. Not even gather about a table or have separate rooms. Bunkbeds, in a space, more narrow than a German U-boat. You can even have them "hot-cotting" like they do on subs....Noah wakes up, his wife takes his bunk.

4. Deduct the figure from #3 from the internal space of the Ark.

5. How many elephants were on the Ark? Again, REFERENCE THE BIBLE....it says 2 "unclean" and 7 "clean". According to the Bible, are elephants "clean" or "unclean"?

6. How much square footage on a wooden floor does an elephant take up? If elephants are "unclean", double that. If elephants are "clean", multiple by seven.

Six basic questions....only using the Bible and math (and a bit of zoology...the size of an elephant...make it an African or an Indian...your choice).


Will you even TRY to answer them? Or is now even the Bible and mathematics "off limits" for gathering information?

 

1) 450 feet long, 75 feet wide, and 45 feet high.

2) No idea.

3) Who knows?

4) Umm... OK?

5) Probably two. Chances are, they weren't fully adult elephants. Also, the bible doesn't mention anything about clean and unclean before the flood since that's a Jewish reference, and the Israelites didn't exist until after the flood.

6) Considering clean and unclean are Jewish references, that doesn't apply here. Also, who honestly knows? These details aren't written in the bible.

7) Africa and India didn't exist before the flood. Does that make sense to you?

 

Wait, he has just claimed that the only thing he believes is that there was a global flood and noah was saved inside an ark. apparently he doesn't believe in the animal story.

In which case we have been discussing exactly the wrong thing. the real discussion should center around the possibility of a global flood that took 40 days to cover the earth to a depth of anywhere from 3 to 5 MILES and lasted for 1 year, in roughly 2300BC.

In which case there isn't a shred of geological evidence to support such a claim.
There isn't any climactic evidence to support such a claim.
There isn't any archeological evidence to support such a claim.
There isn't any historical evidence to support such a claim.


In fact there are mountain ranges of evidence to the contrary.

So he believes something with all the fiber of his being that has no evidence. That's called faith and therefore evidence has absolutely no impact.

 

I like the "retelling the tale" part. That's exactly what has happened to all those 2000-5000 year old sheepherder's tales.

 

It makes rational sense, and it bridges the gap between the bible and reality. Admittedly by scholars of the old testament, it was an oral tradition far before it was ever written down. You've done it, I've done it, retelling a tale or yours or another's and embellished upon it. and expanded it in some way. Everyone does.

Some guy named Noah, probably did survive a flood, with his livestock in tow. The two of every animal was probably two of every domestic animal they had.

It just makes more logical sense.

 

People also forget the numerous miracles required after the ark landed. I don't know whether antelopes and lions count as clean or unclean, but even if there were 7 of each, you've got a problem on your hands. Carnivores eat, um, meat, and the only meat available would have been the tiny number of animals coming off of the ark, and eating any one of them would have jeopardized the survival of the species. And, of course, there was nothing left for the herbivores to eat either. Fitting all of the animals onto the ark is a small problem compared to repopulating the earth with nothing more than an ark's worth of animals.

Why did God even bother with such a "solution" when it requires piles of miracles just to work? Why not just use one miracle and vaporize the part of the population you want to do away with? And, of course, we come back to the vomit-inducing Biblical concept of corporate guilt. Man sinned, and the entire earth bore the guilt. Sounds about as reasonable as kicking a random dog because someone cut you off on the interstate.

 

Once I was attending a management class at the place I worked. When communication skills was on the agenda the instructor set up an activity. There were about 12-14 of us in the class and the instructor told one of us a story about a simulated problem event in the plant. He then had that person step outside the door of the classroom into the hallway and tell the story to the next person. One by one each of us were told the story and then the last one stood up and told his version, what he understood. The entire class laughed out loud. Now that was something we were telling without any embellishment and we still didn't get it right.

Yes.....there's no doubt each of the ancient shepherds wanted to sound like a newsman and I'd say anything short of a bare faced lie was passed along...maybe a few of those.

 

It's just like you and me, or anyone else that tells an awesome story. We put an emphasis on it to really sell it, and then the next guy does the same, and then it goes on and on, till someone writes down the outlandish tale of a huge boat and every creature on earth. It's human behavior at work.

There's geological evidence that the black sea had previous shorelines. The region and what evidently happened probably was passed on by the survivors and embellished on till you get the Epic of Gilgamesh and the Noah story.

The flood of the black sea explains it all. and offers up to support it. It also allows Christians to retain their faith, because an actual flood event occurred that would have been for the people at the time world ending.

Several cultures talk about this same flood myth, which would make sense if there were several survivors of said flood, and an actual horrible flood existed. The Mediterranean emptying into the black sea, which prior to the event would have been awesome farmland, would have been end of the world apocalyptic. Compound that with the bigger fish phenomena and you get a tale of biblical proportions when it's finally written down.

 

I think it was aliens. Aliens were creation humans as a slave race, and when they left earth, they destroyed all of their bases on earth. They destroyed them by flooding them (Dragon's Triangle, Behmuda Triangle, etc), some humans who had been stranded in one of the cities built a boat to escape. They told people about their escape, and the story spread. This is why there are several religions around the world with similar flood stories, including Native Americans.

 

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You forget, with God anything is possible.
So why the need for the flood? Impossible to know.

 

You read all 500 stories? Each story has the entire planet covered in water?

 

No they don't. Did you even read your very biased link?

So far you're the only christian here and you are still making christians look bad. Is this on purpose?

 

Thanks...now stop claiming you are "educating people" on Noah's Ark....when clearly you have little information on the topic.

 

Ridiculous. Many are not of the same time frame. The 500 stories are not related.
Educate yourself. At least read your own links.

 

Including not having to send a flood to accomplish the desired goal.
Just wave the magic wand and he could've restarted the earth and left a sinful family to repopulate.

 

What would that achieve, the flood was a teachable moment.

 

The earliest version of the flood and the ark date back to the Mesopotamians...over 4,000 years ago. Archaeologists have found tablets describing the Ark as round. The Biblical canon has a different description of the ark.

 

Again, the answer the Bible Literalist give is..."THAT version of the Ark was distorted from the REAL version which is the Bible's version!"

It's like how they say Greco-Roman myths about demi-gods....born of virgins...who can turn water into wine...and can be resurrected from the dead ...

are "distortions by the Greeks of Old Testament prophecies about Christ's coming."

They ignore the Occam's Razor simple answer.....those myths (flood, demi-gods) came FIRST...and the Bible, which came later, was influenced by them.

The Sumerian Flood story was the "original version"...the Hebrew Chroniclers stole it (likely during the Babylonian Captivity) and turned it into THEIR tribal myth and claimed it was historical.

 

Well the New Testament establishes a new covenant with God. The God of the Hebrews ends at that point...and the Holy Trinity begins.

Christians accept the Old Testament and all its teachings as inspired.

I do not believe there was a literal flood that covered the Earth and that every creature on the planet was saved "two by two" aboard an Ark built by Noah. I don't know about the historicity of Noah and what evidence exists that he was a real person...only that personally I believe the story to be one of inspiration and not of historical fact. This doesn't mean what I believe is necessarily what all Christians believe. It does not matter to me, the fundamental truth in Christiantiy is to accept Christ as the Savior and Messiah. Noah was merely a prophet, whether real or allegorical it is not the core tenet of Christianity...Christ is.

 

So you think an alleged god who created a universe would worry about feeding a few animals?

 

What is your rock solid evidence that atheism is wrong? Because you say so? Because some books that you choose to believe tell you so, without any actual scientific backing?

All you do is make assertions based on something you have read or been told.

Because you buy it, doesn't make it true and other beliefs false. If you are trying to "educate" others in this thread, perhaps you should gain some education yourself.

 

Trying to rid the world of falsehoods and misconceptions is a worthy endeavor in itself. These misconceptions tend to lead to dangerous behavior.

 

Fantasy mixed with adherence to fairy tales?

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In other words, you have no facts to argue with so wish to tuck tail and leave. Got it.

 

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Well, atheism itself has no evidence to prove it's accurate and correct. Based on that fact, atheism is, therefore, incorrect... Unless, of course, you can provide evidence that atheism is accurate and correct.

That's a bit unlikely. Also, you're assuming that the stories are based upon visual confirmation of events.

But you asked questions that no one would know. That's like asking about what Hitler's cologne smelled like during the holocaust, and then concluding that because we don't know, we know little about the holocaust. This is faulty logic.

If this is the best argument you can come up with, then I suppose we don't really have much to argue about.


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