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Why do Christians trust the Bible?
RE: Why do Christians trust the Bible?
Quote:Yeah If I'm wrong about this then 250 million others are also wrong.

Numbers is not a defense from ignorance.
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RE: Why do Christians trust the Bible?
(October 20, 2014 at 11:10 am)Vivalarevolution Wrote: I do not feel that the bible is to be taken literally and as divinely inspired.
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The letters and all just magnify the greater picture that's all.

Judging by what you wrote, you seem to think most of the bible is full of stories with only a few historically accurate people, places or events thrown in here and there. So, I'm curious - how is it different from fiction?
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RE: Why do Christians trust the Bible?
(October 20, 2014 at 12:10 pm)Vivalarevolution Wrote: Are you sure all those people knew how to write?They were peasants in the middle east 2000 years ago

Are you sure they didn't? Granted the literacy rate was probably less than 10%, so that leaves potentially 50 possible literate people in attendance out of Paul's claimed 500 eye witnesses. Also, bear in mind, the NT claims *thousands* saw Jesus working his magic. Now, we have potentially hundreds of literate people who could have written something, anything down. And yet, there is nothing. Not one contemporaneous word.

Why do you think second or third hand accounts, written 2000 years ago, of admittedly extraordinary claims ought to be seriously considered?
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RE: Why do Christians trust the Bible?
Even with a low literacy rate, it shouldn't have taken until decades he died before someone decided to write something down about him. And what made Yahweh choose some backwater tribe anyway? If they're descendants of abraham, Yahweh certainly didn't take good care of them until then. They're surrounded by advanced societies, yet they are the chosen people?
Poe's Law: "Without a winking smiley or other blatant display of humor, it is impossible to create a parody of Fundamentalism that SOMEONE won't mistake for the real thing."

10 Christ-like figures that predate Jesus. Link shortened to Chris ate Jesus for some reason...
http://listverse.com/2009/04/13/10-chris...ate-jesus/

Good video to watch, if you want to know how common the Jesus story really is.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88GTUXvp-50

A list of biblical contradictions from the infallible word of Yahweh.
http://infidels.org/library/modern/jim_m...tions.html

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RE: Why do Christians trust the Bible?
(October 20, 2014 at 12:10 pm)JesusHChrist Wrote:
(October 20, 2014 at 12:07 pm)Vivalarevolution Wrote: Christianity is not about believing the bible word for word.

What is it about?

Be prepared to get the cosmic Jewish zombie response.
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RE: Why do Christians trust the Bible?
(October 20, 2014 at 12:07 pm)Vivalarevolution Wrote: Christianity is not about believing the bible word for word.
That depends on which Christian you ask.
"Well, evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world's data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts don't go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein's theory of gravitation replaced Newton's in this century, but apples didn't suspend themselves in midair, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from ape- like ancestors whether they did so by Darwin's proposed mechanism or by some other yet to be discovered."

-Stephen Jay Gould
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RE: Why do Christians trust the Bible?
(October 20, 2014 at 11:10 am)Vivalarevolution Wrote: Believing something else than what was written in the bible doesn't mean you can't be Christian.

I never said that wasn't the case. I just asked why you so readily dismiss parts and not others. How do you know the parts you accept are true?


(October 20, 2014 at 11:10 am)Vivalarevolution Wrote: But the difference between new testament and old is that there is no longer a need for writings of gods witness. Jesus served as proof to the character of god witnessed by hundreds. So authors couldn't interpret god as they wished (as they could in old testament). Here there was a definite picture which had little chance of being changed or corrupted. The letters and all just magnify the greater picture that's all.

Why didn't any of the eye witnesses write about it?

Not a single author of the New Testament was an eye witness (or at least none claim to be). Any of those things could easily be forged or corrupted. If none of the original witnesses wrote their accounts, who would contradict an erroneous one?

When Paul writes his epistles based on divine revelation, how do you know he was actually talking to God and not just lying or insane? You still haven't addressed that, and it's the crux of my original post.
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RE: Why do Christians trust the Bible?
By faith
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RE: Why do Christians trust the Bible?
(October 20, 2014 at 12:07 pm)Vivalarevolution Wrote: Yeah If I'm wrong about this then 250 million others are also wrong.

So? Let me show you why your statement is meaningless:

If there are 7 billion people in the world and your belief is shared by 0.25 billion, then your response could be rephrased "If you are wrong about this then 6.75 billion are right."

Just because a lot of people believe a particular nonfalsifiable thing doesn't mean it's right. How many people have to start believing in leprechauns before leprechauns become real?
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RE: Why do Christians trust the Bible?
(October 20, 2014 at 12:35 pm)Vivalarevolution Wrote:
(October 20, 2014 at 12:10 pm)JesusHChrist Wrote: What is it about?

Be prepared to get the cosmic Jewish zombie response.

But what is your response? All you know of Christianity comes from a book, which you already agree is not to be taken word for word.

How do you know which words to take and which to disregard? And if your method generates correct results, why do other Christians vehemently disagree with your approach and results? Not to mention every other religion disagreeing with you.

What is the process? I'm trying to understand how this works.
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