Witness/insight claims of the authors of the Bible

[The Grand Nudger]

That's fascinating... I'd never thought of it like that. So true... starts with a small group of people following one person... a self-proclaimed prophet... and I guess morphs from cult to religion the more widespread it gets, and thus less directly reliant on the original prophet?

Not necessarily, and it's important to note that it's not a ladder style classification, some cults form out of religions.   Typically, designation as a cult has centered around the adherents attitude toward the outside world, or the outside worlds attitude toward the adherents.  If they can overcome that attitude (whether outward or inward) we cease to call them cults and use other designations.  That they get bigger is seen as  consequence of a successful recruiting and normalizing strategy, it's not the reason that they become schisms or sects, it's an effect of their having become schisms or sects.  Still a ways to go to be a religion, though.

Typically, the earliest stage of development, and particularly in the case of cults, is some form of mysticism, not religion.

[Minimalist]

Meaning if there were no God how would these book be written and compiled?

The same applies to the koran, dumbass.  I bet you aren't willing to say that allah is real.

[Mr Greene]

I'd like to point out that Deuteronomy is supposedly written by Moses, it includes the description of his own funeral and loss of his tomb...

[Wyrd of Gawd]

I'm curious about the implicit, base claims of the authors of the Bible. I'm not talking about the content... because anyone can write content... but rather the implicit or explicit claims to knowledge that authorship implies. For instance, most if not all books in the Bible are in the form of a third person narrative rather than a first person eye-witness account; and as such appear to implicitly claim 'such and such happened but I wasn't there to see it directly'... eg the story of the Garden of Eden. In the case of the Gospel authors it may be the case that they claim to be eye-witnesses to some of it, but it can't be all unless they were all with Jesus at every moment, which they clearly were not.

1. So from a reductionistic point of view, for each book of the Bible, I'd like to know:
a) who was the author (if it's possible to know)?
b) what was their implicit, or ideally explicit, claim about the source of the information they are relating? (ie eye-witness, second-hand testimony, or from God; and if so in what form? eg 'inspiration', vision, dream etc)

2. And these questions then extend further up the tree to those who compiled the Bible; considering the Bible a compilation, the 'author/s' is/are the compiler/s of that compilation. So again:
a) Who were the author(s) (if it's possible to know... I think it was the Catholics but I'm not sure)
b) what was their implicit, or ideally explicit, claim about the source of inspiration about which books should be included or not? (ie did they claim divine inspiration or not, and if so in what form did it take? intuition, vision, in the case of Catholics, Papal Infallibility etc)

An English committee wrote the Bible around 700 AD as a gift to the Pope and to also counter the Koran that Uthman's committee had written.  The Bible as an unified book didn't exist before then.  Later on other people and committees upgraded it.  Eventually it was put into chapters and numbered verses.  The English also did the same thing to the Koran.  

All of the biblical stories illustrate the ideas expressed in one of the Ten Commandments.

[The Grand Nudger]

Take the accounting course, btw, Emjay.....you can just read about the other shit, no one cares, lol.

[emjay]

Take the accounting course, btw, Emjay.....you can just read about the other shit, no one cares, lol.

Sorry, already started the philosophy course and well into it I've just spent the last ten hours or so reading a book about the five ways and am now onto reading Aristotle to get a handle on predicate logic, in the hopes of understanding the squiggles in the book I've just read (ie logic statements with upside down A's etc) it was a good book and it gave me all the context I needed to be able to understand it in depth (in the future I mean... in the sense I don't think I'll need any other books). That was just the first pass though... it'll take a few more reads, and reading Aristotle, to get the full grip of it... but I do understand a lot better now and it did address a lot of my objections, though not all of them. Anyway what particular shit are you talking about that no one cares about?

[Harry Nevis]

Much of the 'truth' is subjective speculation based on a no God senerio. Meaning if there were no God how would these book be written and compiled? So the 'truth' is not true. by definition of the word. it simply provides those who do not believe in God with a possible alternative based on 'other' failed religions.

And all of your "truth" is subjective speculation.

But what do you mean by 'commune' with God? That's a very vague term.... are you talking intuition, prayer, visions, or sitting down and having a beer with God?

from walking and talking with God to being pull from earth as the only Human being never having tasted death, because God loved him so much.

In essence God was a real interactive force in their lives and they as a result wielded the power of God. Some healed, some brought on drought, some raised the dead, some had power over animals, some were just crazy/God smart/wise, some were shown the future... think of all Jesus was and each power he had subdivided into individuals.

What crap.

[brewer]

Much of the 'truth' is subjective speculation based on a no God senerio. Meaning if there were no God how would these book be written and compiled? So the 'truth' is not true. by definition of the word. it simply provides those who do not believe in God with a possible alternative based on 'other' failed religions.

And all of your "truth" is subjective speculation.

from walking and talking with God to being pull from earth as the only Human being never having tasted death, because God loved him so much.

In essence God was a real interactive force in their lives and they as a result wielded the power of God. Some healed, some brought on drought, some raised the dead, some had power over animals, some were just crazy/God smart/wise, some were shown the future... think of all Jesus was and each power he had subdivided into individuals.

What crap.

Hello HN (trichomole). Interest you in an intro thread? 

Woof.