Abusive Theology 101

[Locke]

I can answer that from a Biblical perspective, but in a forum post, that would be circular reasoning, without listing full-blown evidence for the Bible's validity outside of itself.

If you actually had that - or if such evidence actually existed - we wouldn't need religious apologists to defend it against scientific, historical and philosophical issues.

Well, you're right on one account; if the Bible is false, then it is not God's book to man, and should be exposed as a fake because its authors claimed to of spoken from God. On the other hand, if it is God's Word, it should be taken seriously indeed.. So let's get to the bottom of it. Considering the Bible was written thousands of years ago, we first need to be certain that modern Bibles are reliable copies of the originals, as significant changes to manuscripts would of caused the message to be distorted. If you've ever played the telephone game you know how quickly a message can be distorted.

For example, in the telephone game someone makes up a phrase. They pass it to the second person, who then passes it to the third, then the fourth, etc. and each time it becomes more distorted.
People have a similar view on the Bible, as if the English version was translated from another language, which was translated from another language, and another before that, and so on, so that the message is completely botched, going all the way back to when it could of been incorrectly copied from the original manuscripts. This idea is widespread, and misleading, as the English manuscripts were copied directly from the Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek texts, respectively.

Then there is the issue of differences in manuscripts. With almost 1200 chapters in the Bible, there are thousands of variants, despite copyists' painstaking efforts. Nearly all of these mistakes are spelling errors and variations of word order, such as 'Jesus Christ' as opposed to 'Christ Jesus', as well as instances with a missing word, such as "Jesus sat down began to teach". When such an error occurs during translation or analysis, the manuscript is compared against other, older manuscripts, and a decision is made about which is original. In over 98% of all cases, agreement among the scholars is total (that is, approximately 97% for the Old Testament, and 99.5% for the New Testament). With this in consideration, it is safe to say the Bible has suffered a very low level of deterioration, and not a single one of these variants has ever caused a difference in church doctrine, or in the Biblical message from the founding of the church until present day.

When the original manuscripts were produced, thousands of copies were made from them. These copies were then duplicated, producing what are called 'families' of manuscripts. Any copying errors would be confined to a particular manuscript's descendants until corrected later on my a scribe, making any variations easy to catch. The original manuscripts were used for making copies until they fell apart from use. If you care to know more on that, feel free to research textual criticism.

The Old Testament manuscripts we still have today predate Jesus by over 800 years, including the books containing prophesies of His coming, which, if you haven't read them, are weighty evidence in themselves considering the minute details of the prophesies.
The gap between events of the Bible and the times they were recorded is approximately 87% shorter than that of other ancient historical events, and there are still many original copies of the New Testament.
In addition to the manuscripts, there are tens of thousands of letters between the churches and other written documents from early Christians that include the entire Bible in and of themselves. There is more evidence on it if you care to look into it, but all of this is to say, the Bible has staggeringly greater amounts of historical evidence than any other ancient document (yes, the Koran included, contrary to popular and misguided belief.. but we can address other religions later).

Of course this is just touching on historical evidence of accurate manuscripts. If you're genuinely interested, we can continue looking at evidences.

---

Science is a man-made enterprise of discovery and prediction about nature.

More accurately, science is man discovering a system that is already in place. I understand you don't believe that, and will probably come back with the human ability to establish patterns, but along that same line it is equally arguable that God has programmed the neural networks of humans to evolve the ability to do so.. so let's try to keep this conversation free of logical debates - they will prove nothing for either argument as they are purely theoretical, and thus won't help us get to the truth of the matter.
_____________________________________________________________

The Bible's descriptions of nature haven't done well. From claiming rabbits chew cud (they don't) to claiming the Earth is a disc and that the sky is a firmament (dome). Now, you can ad hoc explanations of those clear falsehoods, but all such 'explanations' that I've seen are insanely deceptive.

Yes, it has many such descriptions of nature. It also refers to sunrise and sunset, a term we still use even today.. though of course, we know the sun does not rise or set, but in fact we orbit the sun: The Bible is not meant to be a science textbook - it's meant to meet us where we are at, and for the people it was written to then, it did just that. Imagine if the Bible actually said, "The Lepus Curpaeums, though it practices refection, does not have a cloven hoof; it is unsanitary for consumption." You may have failed to mention that every law and regulation for food and cleanliness listed in the Old Testament was 100% on point with modern medicine and nutrition that they couldn't possibly of known.. but I digress.
I imagine in a thousand years, people will look back and laugh at our scientific textbooks, but the Bible was written in a way that the people of the time (whom it was written through) understood it and in a way that is wholly relevant even today. That's more than can be said for any other book its age, and in addition it can still be understood clearly. Try your luck reading some other religious texts. If I tried to use a calculus book to gain insight into relationships, my approach could be considered equally confused.
To sum up: Context
_____________________________________________________________

You see, one can play that same game in the opposite direction. There is a bit in Hebrews that claims that faith is "hope in the things unseen". Not to mention verses which specifically say "Test not the Lord your God".

Yet when God makes a promise, He expects us to test Him and hold him to it:
"Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,” says the Lord Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it." - Malachi 3:10,
"Then the Lord said to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh and say, ‘Will I really have a child, now that I am old?’ Is anything too hard for the Lord? I will return to you at the appointed time next year, and Sarah will have a son.”" - Genesis 18:13-14,

Yes, "Faith is the confidence is what we hope for, the proof of what we cannot see." So in essence, faith is confidence. Humans gain confidence in what they do not see by tried principles.
_____________________________________________________________

Okay, no. Darwin is somewhat ambiguous, but it is known (from his own writings) that he became what I like to call a strict agnostic. Einstein - NO. Einstein was, at best, only akin to a pantheist and stated multiple times (when questioned) that he neither believed in a god, nor found belief in an interventionist deity interested in the trivial affairs of man or wanting of worship, to be anything more than childish.

You're right, I was dead wrong about those two, I'm sorry.
_____________________________________________________________

One of the most terrible things someone could do is become a theist without thoroughly analyzing the evidence. Unfortunately, it's exceedingly common - I'd say at least 99.9% of theists. When a certain person asked Jesus what he had to do to make it to heaven, Jesus told him to love the Lord with all his heart, soul, strength, and mind.

Not to mention accepting him as savior, otherwise they get Hell.

Accepting Him as savior.. you know, if all I had to do was say, "Okay, Jesus is the man." and carry on about my day, and if I didn't I got tormented forever? Yeah, that would be pretty dumb. In fact, that's kinda what I thought Christianity was when I was growing up - that's why I went Atheist for like 6 years.