Part 7 of Post Your Tough Questions Regarding Christianity

Discussion in 'Religion & Philosophy' started by Mitt Ryan, Sep 30, 2013.

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  1. Mitt Ryan

    Mitt Ryan Well-Known Member

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    Part 7 is a continuation of Post your tough questions pertaining to God/Jesus/Holy Bible and I will do my best to clarify and make sense of it to those who are unaware...I still have questions unanswered in Part 3, 4, 5 & 6.

    Also I might answer questions that are on other members threads and so this will keep me real busy with the many questions that I will answer from my point of view/perspective keeping in line with Scripture.

    I don't want my intentions to come across as converting you or whatever lol... but rather clear up things etc... so ask away.
     
  2. Mitt Ryan

    Mitt Ryan Well-Known Member

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    Quote Posted by thebrucebeat on pg. 43 #423 of Part 3 in response to my post

    why do the four Gospels contradict each other as to such important details as when and where Jesus was born
    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    It is rather obvious now that you haven't really studied the Christian faith like you boasted on a previous post, telling us after all the intensive studying you decided to become an atheist because you just couldn't believe the faith anymore...sheesh! oh well this is the internet...lol

    For if you were well versed in the faith you would have known that the four Gospels do not contradict each other as far as to when and where Jesus was born. In the Gospel of Matthew, Matthew tells us that Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea during the reign of King Herold. The Gospel of Mark skips any details of Jesus' birth and moves straight into His baptism and ministry.

    The Gospel of Luke, tells us that during the time of the Roman emperor, Augustus, decreed that a census should be taken throughout the Roman Empire, so all had to return to their own ancestral towns to register for this census. And because Joseph was a descendant of King David, he had to go to Bethlehem in Judea, David's acient home, and there Jesus was born.

    In the Gospel of John, there is no mention of Jesus' birth. Each Gospel was written with a different agenda in mind, but only the Gospel of John made his agenda explicit when he said for example, "But these are written so that you may continue to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing in Him you will have life." (20:31)

    Unbelievers such as yourself are constantly making claims that the Gospel accounts contradict one another and thus cannot be viewed as inspired history. The fact of the matter is, those making such charges are either unaware of what constitutes a genuine contradiction or else they simply are unwilling to give the Bible a fair hearing.

    Of course the Gospel documents display some minute, petty differences, even when describing the same events. Actually, this is evidence of literary independence; it demonstrates a lack of collusion. This circumstance most certainly does not demand historical unreliability. (Post by Mitt Ryan)
    ----------------------------------------------------------------------

    It doesn't bother you that they couldn't even agree on his last words?
    Tip of the iceburg, of course. (Post by the brucebeat in response to my post above)
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    No, it doesn't bother me one bit. It would be collusion if they all got together and agreed to write the same exact thing. We must remember that as witnesses people will have different accounts from their vantage points.

    Let's consider the example of an accident. If one witness stands to the north side of the accident, he sees the accident from his vantage point. Now the other witness stands on the south side, the opposite side of the street, he sees different details because of his angle.

    Now would both men have identical accounts? Of course not, the one on the south side cannot see what happens on the north side of the accident nor can the man on the north side see what happens on the south side. However, when you put the two accounts together, you get a more complete picture of the accident. Both men include different details but they should not be contradictory.

    I hope this clears up your skepticism.
     
  3. taikoo

    taikoo Banned

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    What makes you think you have anything to teach, when you are so unwilling to learn?
     
  4. Swensson

    Swensson Devil's advocate

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    Imagine a person with no prior knowledge or preconception about how the world works, such as we all must have been at some point (if you think we are not, then other questions arise). What logic and what basis would you think are good reasons to become a Christian?

    This is after all the most common criticism against Christianity. It may be worded as a sarcastic reference to the flying spaghetti monster, pointing out contradictions in the Bible or recounting similarities between Jesus and Horus, but all in all, most arguments criticise the first reason for getting on "that" side, because it is only after that that arguments like "God works in mysterious ways" and Pascal's wager even make sense.

    Sorry if similar questions have been asked, I can't be asked to look through six threads.
     
  5. Mitt Ryan

    Mitt Ryan Well-Known Member

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    That's a good question.

    First let me start by saying in several nations, it is illegal to become a Christian. But despite penalties and even threats of death, people become Christians anyway. Each year thousands of believers are killed, but still more people become Christians.

    Christianity can spread even when it is persecuted. That is actually the way Christianity started... Jesus was killed as a political criminal. In the first 200 years after His death, many thousands of Christians were killed as the Roman Empire tried to exterminate this new faith. This is a historical fact.

    Millions of people become Christians each year. Scientists, farmers, historians, and clerks... people from all walks of life...even people who frequent forums such as this forum become Christians. Why?

    Well one reason is because of the teachings of Jesus. Jesus began His ministry as a teacher. During His ministry He emphasized love, mercy, faith, forgiveness and honesty.

    He taught gentleness rather than violence, generosity rather than selfishness, doing good rather than evil. Jesus had respect for all people, even people others looked down on. Jesus touched lepers, welcomed children, and treated women and foreigners with respect.
    People worldwide respect Jesus for His teachings. Many have tried to apply these teachings in their own lives. They have become disciples... followers of Jesus.

    I will continue later on with a few more good reasons for becoming a Christian and I will also respond to the belief that atheists have in that the story of Jesus is just a copycat of the Horus story and so in their minds Jesus never existed and is a myth.

    Of course the hard core atheists would love to believe that it is the "golden truth" but the reality remains it is a false belief...sorry to burst the bubble but Jesus is no myth, He is a historical figure who existed and still exist today. Again like I said I will continue later on...so stay tuned!
     
  6. Mitt Ryan

    Mitt Ryan Well-Known Member

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    What motivates you to keep coming to my thread? Are you interested in Christianity or not? Are you here just to be confrontational? Remember I'm just here to answer any questions you might have regarding Christianity as best and as thoroughly as I can to help you understand the faith all the while keeping in line with the Scriptures.

    I am really not here to have debates on proving or disproving anything. If you don't like what I have to offer, you know what you can do...simply ignore my thread. I still have many more questions to answer and so I got my work cut out for me.
     
  7. tecoyah

    tecoyah Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    In other words....ask you questions about your personal interpretation of a religion, then simply accept it as truth and do not question your version of something unbelievable.

    Yeah....your right....this thread should be avoided.
     
  8. thebrucebeat

    thebrucebeat Banned

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    Do you know why these threads are so popular?
    Because your answers are so hilarious!
    We have heard the excuse for the differing reporting of the gospel stories. Hundreds of times. Every apologist alive uses the same lame argument. It doesn't make them match each other, though, and so the differing stories incontrovertibly demonstrates that the scriptures are not inerrant, since if two of the stories don't agree one of them is not correct. It may make the general story more plausible to you, but somebody got the details wrong, so you are accepting that the scripture can be wrong.
    And there go the floodgates.
    As for my study of scriptures, I have been wallowing in them for about 20 years, some of that time professionally. I have preached them and even convinced myself of most of the arguments you make.
    Once you get away from hiding with only the educational sources that support the apologist meme, they fall apart quickly and you suddenly realize how easy it is to make people honestly believe what can not be.
     
  9. Swensson

    Swensson Devil's advocate

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    Woah there, I'm quite familiar with why people become Christians, and none can deny that it happens and that it happens to a large extent. The question was what you think are good reasons, not common reasons or reasons people might give.

    As you may have been told on the forum, there are those who think many become Christians for bad reasons. There are also many, myself included, who believe that many Christians omit an important part of the reason they are Christians when asked. The "badness" of the reason lies in that omitted part.

    Now, I don't know what that omitted reason is (which is why I'm asking). I believe it is a bad one, but I can't say exactly what the flaw is until I understand the reason. The reason I think it's a bad one is that it seems to be able to tell the difference between things that, to my mind, are not different in any relevant way.

    For instance, you give as a reason that Jesus advocated generosity and gentleness but if that was truly your reason, then you'd have just as much reason to believe John Lennon was some authority on absolute morality. Clearly, you are using some other criteria as well, but you have not disclosed it in your answer. That other reason (or rather, a full list of them, rather than whipping out a new one each time a new counter example is given) is what I want to know, for I think it is flawed. In fact, I think that reason has a lot to do with upbringing and cultural exposure, which I think we can agree are actually bad reasons.
     
  10. taikoo

    taikoo Banned

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    Cant even answer this:
    What makes you think you have anything to teach, when you are so unwilling to learn?

    :D
     
  11. WanRen

    WanRen New Member Past Donor

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    Avoiding the truth and spreading falsehood, distortion and lies about Christ and about the Bible is what anti Christians does. Maybe you want to share your version of truth?
     
  12. WanRen

    WanRen New Member Past Donor

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    We are very much interested to learn that is why we Christianity have so much to share and teach because too many anti Christians have refused to accept or open their eyes to learn about the Bible and Christ instead they spend their life in learning their own parallel version of the bible.
     
  13. thebrucebeat

    thebrucebeat Banned

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    "...we Christianity"[sic] want to learn so we teach others what we believe.
    I get it.
    This thread always attracts the deepest theologians.
     
  14. thebrucebeat

    thebrucebeat Banned

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    Why do I come to your thread?
    The entertainment value.
    To watch your logical train wrecks.
    To feel smarter than I probably am with so little effort by comparison.
    Leave!?
    Heck no!
     
  15. tecoyah

    tecoyah Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Sure....though it likely as accurate as your own version:

    Long ago people wanted something to make their lives feel better. Someone had the idea that being able to count on and blame something else for the difficulties of life might do the trick. Other folks liked the idea and started using this technique as well, but added their own twist to the story to make it more personal and effective. Soon, someone felt he need to chisel a picture of it into a rock, and everyone else bowed before it in awe.
     
  16. Troianii

    Troianii Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I'll start by saying I was also frustrated with the response you got. You basically got a non-answer, a response responding to something you didn't say.

    There is, however, a major problem with such a scenario. Now I enjoy hypothetical scenarios, but that's a hypothetical scenario that doesn't just raise doubts about Christianity, it brings doubt about practically everything. Take the same person, and why would he not kill someone who stole his food? Really, aside from feelings he may or may not have, there is no reason for him not to.

    It'd seem to me that, w/o any understanding of how the world works (and therefore no understanding of modern society), the individual couldn't make the jump to believe in Jesus. But then, the person couldn't make the jump to believe in Atheism, freedom, the scientific process, the big bang theory, evolution, etc. I get that a lot of people have this super-high expectation of religion, that it should be readily apparent, but I don't get why.

    The connection shouldn't be direct. For someone with no religious background (or seeking to find religion w/o influence from their religious background), the first question should be "is there a God." If you can come to the belief that there is a God w/o knowing his nature, then it's much easier to make the case for Christianity, but the jump really can't be direct, though I don't see any reason why it need be.
     
  17. Swensson

    Swensson Devil's advocate

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    But there are reasons to believe many of those things. I don't kill people who steal my food, for I have empathy. I believe empathy is a crude but in general good basis of morality. I can picture myself in the theif's shoes and I think I cause more bad than I am preventing in killing him. I believe in the scientific process because it has been proven to work. A perfectly executed scientific process cannot come up with a false answer, and I understand the logic behind that. Many versions of science are far from flawless, so I still have reasonable doubt about some results, but the process has earned my belief. Freedom is also based largely on empathy and maximisation of happiness. I am not sure that freedom is the best way to maximise happiness, but my experiences so far indicates that it probably is. Thus, I believe in freedom to that extent, and since that's where my reasons stop, I believe it no further than that.

    Atheism is a different notion. I know there are discussions of the nature of atheism, but the version that most subscribe to is modelled after the situation of that person with no prior knowledge and preconceptions. Most atheists imagine themselves starting out as a blank slate, allowing religions to make impressions on them. In the state where no religion manages to produce a good reason to believe, you are left with nothing. That is what many atheists call atheism.

    I'm not asking for complete and undeniable proof at this point, I'm just asking for whatever was enough for others. As I've indicated before, the geographical distribution of religions indicate that it has to do with cultural exposure, mainly from upbringing. That, I think we can agree is a bad reason, so I'm giving Christianity a chance to come up with a better one.
     
  18. Troianii

    Troianii Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I thought we were assuming someone who had no previous notions of how the world works? Forgive me if I misunderstood, but from that description I assumed you were talking about someone outside of society. If that's not the case, then forgive me for not responding to a majority of your post because it was a response to a misunderstanding of your question.

    The geographical distribution should not be much of a surprise. Were you to look at a geographical distribution of government types, kinds of philosophy, ideology etc., you'd have similar findings. The mere existence of this correlation doesn't show that people choose their given religion, government, philosophy, ideology etc. because of their location on maps. There are, of course, many outliers. I think the two best Christian apologists of the 20th century were an Irishman and an Indian.

    Like I said, I don't think you can make the direct kind of connection that you can with other things, because religion is more akin to philosophy or ideology. There's no even relatively brief rationale that can be given for any (at least not any good one), and the brief ones depend on a general understanding of how the world works. If you have time, I'd suggest C. S. Lewis' Mere Christianity. This is one of the few books I'm aware of that addresses the pointed question you're asking.
     
  19. Swensson

    Swensson Devil's advocate

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    I am referring to a person who comes from outside society, who was no preconceptions, but who may very well be introduced to society and allowed to draw conclusions from it. The idea is modelled after a child. A child knows nothing from the start, yet is bombarded with impressions from our society. After all, we must all have been these clueless children at some point, so unless we can point to a good reason for turning from such a child to a Christian, there can be no good reason for people to turn from such children to Christians.
    The geographical distribution is no surprise in itself, after all, I give an explanation myself. Just as I think the spread of philosophy and ideology is based on cultural exposure, I think that is true for religion. That remark is mostly to show that there does not need to be a "good" reason to believe in Christianity. I believe there are no such good reason, or at least not one which is relevant for all Christians in the world, and the distribution of religions over the world is compatible with this idea.
    I don't really have time to read Lewis' book, but I looked it up on wikipedia. The wikipedia page did not indicate any argument that I would feel convincing, but then again, it does not include the entire book. Were you referring to Lewis' trilemma or some other argument that I can look into without reading the entire book? If get referred to it from elsewhere I might take the time, because this unsatisfyingly leaves me again with no understanding of why supposedly people become Christians.
     
  20. taikoo

    taikoo Banned

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    Why are you unwilling to learn how to write even one grammatically correct sentence?
    People who pretend to be wise but cant write any better than you are lacking in credibility.
     
  21. thebrucebeat

    thebrucebeat Banned

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    The fact that on average nearly 80% of people in a geographic area will show the same religious bent makes an overwhelming argument for that being an insurmountable influence for most people. In countries that are more divided it comes down to which side of the tracks you were born into that allows you to find the chosen "truth". The outliers don't disprove anything, except that other influences overcame the norm in small minorities of people. It is probably the single largest influence on people's faith, and arguably the worst.
    C.S. Lewis' book is standard apologetics, but written by an erudite man of letters, so it isn't quite the ham-handed missive that most in the genre are, and it's a very enjoyable read, but the arguments will be familiar and no less flawed. Lewis makes the assertion, for instance, that one has to believe Jesus to be either a liar, a madman or exactly what he claims to be. That is a terribly flawed argument as it takes, though never mentions, the premise that what we are reading in the bible is accurate and all that is left is proper interpretation to land on our knees. People point to the passage all the time as if it has created an inescapable box, when it does nothing of the kind.
    Worth reading. You will get an idea of why even somewhat intelligent people in need of an external support system will allow themselves to believe the arguments in it are anything more than limited rationalizations.
     
  22. Mitt Ryan

    Mitt Ryan Well-Known Member

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    Quote Posted by thebrucebeat on pg. 43 #426 of Part 3 in response to my post

    Maybe it is just you that don't know that...let me say it again...something does not come from nothing. Because from nothing, nothing comes. This is very simple logic. (Post by Mitt Ryan)

    So wine couldn't come from water, as there are molecules in wine that don't exist in water.
    Simple logic, right? (Post by thebrucebeat in response to my post above)

    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    It would take a miracle to turn water into wine and we know our Lord Savior Jesus Christ did just that. Jesus performed an amazing miracle, actually altering the molecular composition of the water, changing it into wine.

    So from something (in this case water) came something else (wine) by altering the molecular composition of the water....simple logic right?

    We all know that a miracle is an extraordinary event, something that appears to defy the normal laws of physics. Miracles, from the Christian perspective, are authored by God.

    The parting of the Red Sea, turning water into wine, and the physical resurrection of Jesus are good examples of miracles.

    There is no logical reason why an omnipotent and omniscient God could not part the Red Sea, turn water into wine, and raise someone from the dead. In Christian theology God is the Creator of the universe and the master of all of its laws. Undoubtedly, God would have access to certain laws of the universe that we don't know about and could use them in such a way that they would appear to be miraculous.

    Also, since He transcends space and time and is not restricted to the physical universe, it is logical to assume that He has characteristics within His own nature that we cannot comprehend. For example, we cannot fathom what it means to be in all places at all time. How does God know all things? How can He be outside of time? We can understand the concepts but we cannot experience their reality.

    So, we can safely conclude that within the Christian perspective of God, He possesses attributes that allow Him to access laws of the universe that we do not know about and use them, in combination with His divine power in nature, to bring about the miraculous.

    There is nothing illogical about this. Therefore, there's nothing illogical about God performing miracles.

    So the laws of logic do not contradict miracles.
     
  23. Mitt Ryan

    Mitt Ryan Well-Known Member

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    Correction: pg. 43 #428 of Part 3
     
  24. thebrucebeat

    thebrucebeat Banned

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    You are not quoting posts of mine.
    Please learn to use this site.
     
  25. Mitt Ryan

    Mitt Ryan Well-Known Member

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    You are quoted as to saying "So wine couldn't come from water, as there are molecules in wine that don't exist in water.
    Simple logic, right?"...on pg. 43 #428 of Part 3.

    Simple way to find out is to go there and you'll see it's a verification...oh yes indeed!
     
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