Ask a Bible college Student

[chimp3]

I feel like how I responded to the question about killing a child may not have included enough information, or adequately reflected the truth of my belief. The question and response is more complex than can be answered in a forum. While its true that if God told me to I would, it wouldn't be without confirmation that the message was actually from God. I would honestly probably seek guidance from pastors or respected members of the church, and spend time grieving the command before fulfilling. I may even see a Christian therapist and doctor to be sure it wasn't a mental health episode. It would NOT be an easy thing.

You are all very opposed to killing children- Good! I believe that unborn babies are human beings from the moment of conception. That is why I am against abortion. I value human life- even the lives of unborn babies. I also understand that there are some extenuating circumstances such as the mothers health, rape, etc, and it is not my place to speak on those issues; they are very tough, though theologically I still believe that those babies have a right to life. Back to my point- killing a child is not something I take lightly. I hope I would obey God, no matter what He commands, but it would be very difficult.

So abortion would be OK if god and your pastor agreed?

[GrandizerII]

If this life is as good as it gets, by all means I'm gonna do what I want and nothing can stop me.

Do what exactly? And why do you think that nothing can stop you in this case? Police arresting you for a crime you choose to commit wouldn't be stopping you? The love you have for select others wouldn't stop you from wanting to hurt them? The fact that you may still care about how you are perceived within society wouldn't stop you from wanting to do certain socially inappropriate things?

[abaris]

If this life is as good as it gets, by all means I'm gonna do what I want and nothing can stop me.

See, this is the thing pissing me off most about some religious people. Their own admission of nothing holding them back if there was no god and no afterlife. So you, like some before you, would be the perfect asshole. The only thing keeping you from graduating to become the next Ted Bundy is your religious fears.

Scary, but good to know.

[brewer]

I feel like how I responded to the question about killing a child may not have included enough information, or adequately reflected the truth of my belief. The question and response is more complex than can be answered in a forum. While its true that if God told me to I would, it wouldn't be without confirmation that the message was actually from God. I would honestly probably seek guidance from pastors or respected members of the church, and spend time grieving the command before fulfilling. I may even see a Christian therapist and doctor to be sure it wasn't a mental health episode. It would NOT be an easy thing.

How do you confirm a message from god that only you heard? Do you ask god to repeat it? And what if the message stated "do it now, with no hesitation, without speaking to mankind or you will receive eternal damnation "? 

Maybe you should play out the "seek guidance" scenario. Tell your pastor, church members, therapist, doctor, that you got a message from god telling you to kill and see what happens. Ask them what will happen if you disobey god. Or even make it hypothetical and see what happens. 

Stand by the courage of your convictions.

Edit: Woof, woof, arf, bark, grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

[GUBU]

Third year Bible college student studying the Bible, intercultural studies, and counseling. Ask anything~

Have you realised yet how much of the bible is bare faced lies?

[GUBU]

Yes! There is a course about world religions, and I've studied various worldviews. The arguments are given for all sides, but with the focus being on the Christian worldview. Professors generally explain opposing world views, but continue to show the ways they are inadequate to explain the world we live in.

Second question: You do understand that the arguments your professors give to "show" other religions are wrong are equally as applicable to christianity?

[GUBU]

Also, looking objectively at the New Testament as a historical document, It was written close to the time of the events it talks about, and the earliest copy we have found is within 30 years of the original writing. There are 5800 historical copies found, and the accuracy compared to the originals is incredible. The New Testament as a historical document is historically reliable, which is a good reason to me to believe in it. Internally, it is consistent, even though there are many writers who contributed to the overall Bible who wrote over a long period of time.

First the bolded bit: The oldest copy we have of a substantial part of any new testament book was written at c200 CE not 63 CE as you imply (any fragment before the 200 mark is a tiny fragment of a single leaf, not even something that we could use to reconstruct the original document). The generally accepted earliest date for Mark the oldest of the gospels is c80CE a whole two generations after the supposed death of Yeshua bar Yosef. It is third hand hearsay based on the corrupted memories of what people were told by their dead relatives who may or may not have witnessed the events depicted in the bible.

Second to the italicised bit: No it is not, first to the "Legion" story. The town depicted in the story, Gerasa lies about 50km (30 miles) away (and is downhill from) from the Dead Sea yet the story has Yeshua casting the demons into pigs and chasing them into the sea, non historic. The crucifiction is also ahistoric, as Yeshua was convicted under sanhedric law which proscribed either hanging or stoning as the death penalty, crucifiction at the time was a Roman punishment for traitors or rebels against the empire. As Iudea wasn't a part of Rome proper and as Yeshua wasn't rebelling against Roman suzerainty he wouldn't have been crucified at all. Corinth at the time that Paul supposedly visited was a tiny village living in the smouldering ruins of the city destroyed by Rome in 146BCE. It didn't regain any prominence within the Hellenistic world until at least the 70's CE, twenty years after Paul supposedly visited it.

Finally to the underlined bit: First of all the 5,800 manuscripts bit counts the number of Greek manuscripts, fragments and copies for which we have currently. From wikipedia I lifted the following:
Distribution of Greek manuscripts by century[10]

PHP Code:

New Testament manuscripts Lectionaries
Century Papyri Uncials Minuscules Uncials Minuscules
2nd 2 - - - -
2nd/3rd 5 1 - - -
3rd 28 2 - - -
3rd/4th 8 2 - - -
4th 14 14 - 1 -
4th/5th 8 8 - - -
5th 2 36 - 1 -
5th/6th 4 10 - - -
6th 7 51 - 3 -
6th/7th 5 5 - 1 -
7th 8 28 - 4 -
7th/8th 3 4 - - -
8th 2 29 - 22 -
8th/9th - 4 - 5 -
9th - 53 13 113 5
9th/10th - 1 4 - 1
10th - 17 124 108 38
10th/11th - 3 8 3 4
11th - 1 429 15 227
11th/12th - - 33 - 13
12th - - 555 6 486
12th/13th - - 26 - 17
13th - - 547 4 394
13th/14th - - 28 - 17
14th - - 511 - 308
14th/15th - - 8 - 2
15th - - 241 - 171
15th/16th - - 4 - 2
16th - - 136 - 194 


As you can see the vast majority of those manuscripts came from the 11th century or later with only a tiny from from the 6th century or earlier. As a testament to the historical validity of the bible, the number of Greek manuscripts is clearly not worth shit.

So my third question to you is; do you have any actual evidence for the veracity of the bible, or are you going to just parrot the long discredited assertions parroted by many fundagelicals who did fly by nights on af.org before you?

[vorlon13]

I feel like how I responded to the question about killing a child may not have included enough information, or adequately reflected the truth of my belief. The question and response is more complex than can be answered in a forum. While its true that if God told me to I would, it wouldn't be without confirmation that the message was actually from God. I would honestly probably seek guidance from pastors or respected members of the church, and spend time grieving the command before fulfilling. I may even see a Christian therapist and doctor to be sure it wasn't a mental health episode. It would NOT be an easy thing.

You are all very opposed to killing children- Good! I believe that unborn babies are human beings from the moment of conception. That is why I am against abortion. I value human life- even the lives of unborn babies. I also understand that there are some extenuating circumstances such as the mothers health, rape, etc, and it is not my place to speak on those issues; they are very tough, though theologically I still believe that those babies have a right to life. Back to my point- killing a child is not something I take lightly. I hope I would obey God, no matter what He commands, but it would be very difficult.

So abortion would be OK if god and your pastor agreed?

What's wrong with a bitter herb abortion ??

It's in the Bible, after all.


Hell, it's OK to dash unwanted actual babies against stones, why would God ever be POd about an abortion ?

[abaris]

Hell, it's OK to dash unwanted actual babies against stones, why would God ever be POd about an abortion ?

That's not about unwanted babies but about gods merciful nature. It's one of the punishments he dished out according to the bible. If memory serves it's the same part that goes on about slitting open women's bellies and some other nice recreational activities.

[Edwardo Piet]

Why are you wasting your time studying such an awful book?

Also, to AF!