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RE: Another argument for existence of God!
May 24, 2012 at 7:12 am
(This post was last modified: May 24, 2012 at 7:21 am by Reforged.)
(May 23, 2012 at 6:14 pm)Polaris Wrote: (May 23, 2012 at 5:14 pm)RaphielDrake Wrote: @Polaris
A hunch...
Any particular part of their Iron Age histories you have in mind? You're really not being very specific.
The Annals of the Kings of Judah.
Oh right? You mean one of the lost books of the Old Testament that could more or less say anything?
Thats quite the hunch, anything that makes you choose that one inparticular?
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RE: Another argument for existence of God!
May 24, 2012 at 8:47 pm
(May 23, 2012 at 8:39 pm)padraic Wrote: (May 23, 2012 at 2:31 pm)Polaris Wrote: Yeah. Evidence. It's what we look for in the academic field.
Do you mean 'credible evidence' and 'proof' ?
'Evidence' is NOT a synonym for 'proof'. I guess religious studies have 'looser' standards of evidence.
Quote:The Annals of the Kings of Judah.
Book of Kings I think. Mate religious texts are not credible prime source historical documents,period.
Like I said. I look for the evidence of those who follow religions.
They are credible when they are corroborated by the archeological record and extra-Biblical sources. Kings and Chronicles are merely a consolidation of the histories of the kingdoms of Judah and Israel with some religious elements mixed in.
@Drake. Because the Bible basically says if you really want to know more, go read these books. I doubt if they had not existed, the Chronicler would have made such a comment.
But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, His Son, purifies us from all sin.
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RE: Another argument for existence of God!
May 25, 2012 at 12:36 am
They are credible when they are corroborated by the archeological record and extra-Biblical sources.
Indeed,I think I used the phrase 'credible prime source". Could you give me a few specific examples of contemporary extra-biblical [credible] evidence for the contents to the book of kings?.
When I say 'sacred books are not credible sources of evidence, I mean as a rule of thumb. There is very little in the Torah or New Testament which meets modern standards of historic or acheaological proof.These books are mythology,not history as we understand the term.
There was no such thing as 'history' as a discipline before the eighteenth century (Gibbon) Before that time,writers made no pretence of objective reporting of events. 'Histories' were usually ( not invariably) based on fact. Howev4r,they invariably embellished for ego or for positive or negative propaganda.( Suetonius' scurrilous "Life of Calgula" is perfect example)
On the Book Of Kings:
Quote:The standard Hebrew text of Kings presents an impossible chronology.[21] To take just a single example, Omri's accession to the throne of Israel in the 31st year of Asa of Judah (1 Kings 16:23) cannot follow the death of his predecessor Zimri in the 27th year of Asa (1 Kings 16:15).[22] The Greek text corrects the impossibilities but does not seem to represent an earlier version.[23] A large number of books have claimed to solve the difficulties, but the results differ, sometimes widely, and none have achieved consensus status.[24]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Books_of_Kings
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RE: Another argument for existence of God!
May 25, 2012 at 12:24 pm
You ask for contemporary sources? Just wow.
But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, His Son, purifies us from all sin.
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RE: Another argument for existence of God!
May 25, 2012 at 11:05 pm
(This post was last modified: May 25, 2012 at 11:05 pm by Oldandeasilyconfused.)
(May 25, 2012 at 12:24 pm)Polaris Wrote: You ask for contemporary sources? Just wow.
Why wow? Too hard? The burden of proof applies as much to any religious or historical claim as to a scientific one.. Supporting contemporary evidence is THE basic standard of evidence required by historians.
Without supporting contemporary evidence, historical accounts are hearsay/anecdotal. The best that can be said of such accounts is "X MAY be thee case" 'NOT "X IS the case"
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RE: Another argument for existence of God!
May 25, 2012 at 11:08 pm
Oh wait. I was thinking of another definition, the use which donates the modern era. Sorry for the confusion.
The best are the Tel Dan stele and the Assyrian depiction of Lachish.
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RE: Another argument for existence of God!
May 26, 2012 at 12:31 am
The best are the Tel Dan stele and the Assyrian depiction of Lachish.
As proof of what exactly? I was not aware there is any consensus.
The Tel Dan is commemorative plaque of victories over local peoples,including "Israel" and POSSIBLY the "House of David" That certainly suggest the existence of a "House Of David",but NOTHING ELSE, certainly not the existence of a Davidic Kingdom.
More convincing archeaological evidence has shown David was probably nothing more than a local tribal chief.
What exactly is it you believe the Lachish inscriptions prove?
00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
The entire Wikipedia article is worth reading as a starting point,but the book is better..
Quote:The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts[1] is a 2001 book about the archaeology of Israel and its relationship to the origins of the Hebrew Bible. The authors are Israel Finkelstein, Professor of Archaeology at Tel Aviv University, and Neil Asher Silberman, a contributing editor to Archaeology Magazine.
Quote:Methodology
The authors describe their approach as one "in which the Bible is one of the most important artifacts and cultural achievements [but] not the unquestioned narrative framework into which every archaeological find must be fit." Their main contention is that
“ ...an archaeological analysis of the patriarchal, conquest, judges, and United Monarchy narratives [shows] that while there is no compelling archaeological evidence for any of them, there is clear archaeological evidence that places the stories themselves in a late 7th-century BCE context. ”
On the basis of this evidence they propose
“ ...an archaeological reconstruction of the distinct histories of the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, highlighting the largely neglected history of the Omride Dynasty and attempting to show how the influence of Assyrian imperialism in the region set in motion a chain of events that would eventually make the poorer, more remote, and more religiously conservative kingdom of Judah the belated center of the cultic and national hopes of all Israel. ”
As noted by a reviewer on Salon.com[2] the approach and conclusions of The Bible Unearthed are not particularly new. Ze'ev Herzog, professor of archaeology at Tel Aviv University, wrote a cover story for Ha'aretz in 1999 in which he reached similar conclusions following the same methodology; Herzog noted also that some of these findings have been accepted by the majority of biblical scholars and archaeologists for years and even decades, even though they have only recently begun to make a dent in the awareness of the general public.[2]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bible_Unearthed
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RE: Another argument for existence of God!
May 26, 2012 at 12:52 am
Quote:The best are the Tel Dan stele and the Assyrian depiction of Lachish.
Read George Athas' The Tel Dan Inscription: A Reappraisal and a New Interpretation before committing too much to that one. Once again, it seems that people see what they wish to see. The reconstruction of the stele is a bit of a Rohrschact test for Israeli archaeology.
Still waiting for some evidence that the Annals of the Kings of Judah is something more than wishful thinking on the part of bible apologists.
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RE: Another argument for existence of God!
May 26, 2012 at 12:53 am
Lachish was a fortified town in Israel (it was actually not originally an Israelite settlement, but one they captured by force; the Bible claims there were no survivors left) that was taken by siege by the Assyrians. It is described in the Bible and was considered such a momentous victory by the Assyrians that they engraved a fresco in Sennacherib's palace at Nineveh depicting what they did to the inhabitants. It may have been a much more important city than the Bible gave credit...the Bible only mentions that the Assyrian incursions were based at this town, possibly because of it's strategic locating on the path towards Jerusalem.
Compared to the other nations of the world, Israel was just some back-water power and David only ruled a relatively small sliver of land deemed so unimportant at the time that the nation was left to its own accord until changing political ambitions three centuries later....this was the same time as the Egyptian Dark Ages.
But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, His Son, purifies us from all sin.
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RE: Another argument for existence of God!
May 26, 2012 at 10:08 am
So essentially polaris..your god does not exist?
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