Originally posted by uberarcanist
I think the only people who take this argument by Marduk seriously are dyed-in-the-wool atheists who just want some moral justification for refusing to follow any authority other than their own whim.

Look, ask a million different scholars when a certain book of the Bible was written, you'll get a million different answers.

Furthermore, dates of writing prove nothing about antecedent oral tradition.

1/ you generalize - coz Christians are just 1/6 of earth population

2/ be atheist or not is irelevant in a discussion about facts - in logic it is called argumentum ad hominem , and it is not argument at all

3/ and if atheist - there is no murky 'moral' from the dawn of humanity - it's ethic




But - let's look at 'oral tradition' that you mention - for example event on Mount Sinai ( a corner stone of OT). You say oral tradition confirm that this 'miraculous' event happened in the presence of the entire ancestry of Jews nation. But how do we know that? We know that because it is in OT!
There is NO other source to confirm OT story. So - we have here circular argument, which, again is not argument at all.
(this is famous 'Kuzari principle' in a defense of 'credibility' of Sinai event and hence the whole OT).

How about some evidence? For decades, Israeli archeologist are searching desert - an till today they didn't find not one artefact or anything - that would support OT claims of Israelis wandering throw desert for 40 years.


* great thread



[edit on 31-3-2007 by blue bird]

And why should someone have to follow any religions rules?

Does that mean I am not in the club? Or maybe I am not in the know?

Let's see if you don't follow a particular religions rules, by your words this person is not moral?

Sounds like judgmental dogmatic values to me.

Originally posted by uberarcanist
Atheists are rebelling against moral principles that the vast majority of mankind has agreed to accept. Yeah, I've heard the tired old atheist line of "we're not atheists because we don't like the rules, we're atheists because the truth is that there is no God." What a load of hooey. The only good reason to be an atheist is that one doesn't want to follow a religion's rules.

A person ought to follow community rules, even if they are religious rules, because "no man is an island". Following one's own whim is a recipe for chaos, not for utopia.

Originally posted by uberarcanist
A person ought to follow community rules, even if they are religious rules, because "no man is an island". Following one's own whim is a recipe for chaos, not for utopia.

You give the human individual far to little credit my friend.

You know what, you're right, every time when law an order have broken down in a country and the people were liberated to do whatever they pleased, genius creative utopias have emerged, just like in Somalia, Sierra Leone, Reign of Terror France, Iraq, etc.

Alot of the confusion dates from the days of German Higher Criticism, which resulted in the removal of almost all ancient texts that mentioned a supernatural or metaphysical being, from historical document consideration. As Marduk has heard me mention several times, one such example was when they tried to claim Troy couldn't possibly exist because the Greeks couldn't even write at the time the text was supposed to have been written. This turned out to be untrue, the Greeks could write. However, several greek historians were removed from consideration as support for events on the timeline. This would have ramifications on dating biblical texts and the egyptian timeline later, and it was never recanted. There were several similar examples. By the time they got around to deconstructing the biblical texts, they had already removed from consideration, any ancient text that might support its claims.

Nice post but I thought this is common knowledge?

btw I never hear of the bible being put forth as literal words from god.
as far as I know it never pretended to be more then a recount of events (and in my opinion mythology based on grains of facts)

one thing I miss with the bible (and ufo's and and and) is simple common sense

it's 4 gospels (actually 4 gospels picked from the various gnostic texts. the rest were destroyed, some survive to this day though but are not recognized by the christian church)

so it's a selection to boot, not the whole story.

(you could go on on how the gospels were already translated, rewritten and son and so on and end up with oral tradition which is even worse for keeping the story correct)

it's been translated to and fro for hundreds of years. with some texts we're talking a thousand years or more.

additions and alterations have been made.

e.g. did you know that mary being a virgin did not creep up untill the 17th century... but most people believe the virgin... ow well...

I'm not an atheist or something trying to debunk anyone's belief in the bible.
But to me there is a difference between believing and being gullable.

another very common sense. you really think 2 grown ups, even not in love, would stay virgins so long? at that time even?

and so on and so on... i won't go indepth, I think your opening post is very good and apart from some alterations and additions I agree.

First observation: the apocryphal gospels were not accepted because they came on the scene way too late and were such a big departure from the original four as to not be believable.

Second observation: you merely assume Joseph and Mary were in love, Mary may not've even been pubescent when engaged to Joseph and also marriage at that time was often a business transaction that had nothing to do with love.

Originally posted by uberarcanist

Second observation: you merely assume Joseph and Mary were in love, Mary may not've even been pubescent when engaged to Joseph and also marriage at that time was often a business transaction that had nothing to do with love.

After re-reading, it is you who is assuming this. Never did he say they were in love nor out of love. He only put forth a scenerio. "even not in love". Moreso this conclusion would contradict more Biblical teaching that we are supposed to be in "love" before "marriage".

Marriage doesn't require permission from any institution or church, marriage is a union between individuals on their own accord.

A religious Human will go to the grave defending the delusion that it is too deluded to see.

Pick and choose to suit a scenerio of your liking. This conversation is not about winning or personal agenda, it is about facts. Let's please quote and respond to each other accordingly

[edit on 31-3-2007 by LastOutfiniteVoiceEternal]

Marduk, you can give it your best shot, but I've heard better atheists than yourself make better and more informed cases against the Bible. Yours is the typical rant about timelines and the erroneous supposition that the various "books" of the Bible didn't exist until such-and-such date. Ho-hum. That's all very nice, and perhaps it lays out an infrastructure for your professed atheism; but, to the people who follow Christianity, or Judaism, or Islam, or Buddhism, or Hinduism, the revelations of an atheist amount to less than a hummingbird fart.

So who are you trying to convince? Other atheists?



— Doc Velocity

Originally posted by Doc Velocity
Marduk, you can give it your best shot, but I've heard better atheists than yourself make better and more informed cases against the Bible. Yours is the typical rant about timelines and the erroneous supposition that the various "books" of the Bible didn't exist until such-and-such date. Ho-hum. That's all very nice, and perhaps it lays out an infrastructure for your professed atheism; but, to the people who follow Christianity, or Judaism, or Islam, or Buddhism, or Hinduism, the revelations of an atheist amount to less than a hummingbird fart.

So who are you trying to convince? Other atheists?



— Doc Velocity

they arent revelations. they are facts. look em up. do a little research. for xtians and such, nothing hurts more than the truth.

So because some of choose not to believe in christianity we are amoral?

SO it was atheists and agnostics that helped various german war criminals escape to south america through their extensive network of Abbey's and sacred sanctuaries?

So it was those pesky atheists that talked all the early american christian ministers to revel in the slaughter of natives?

So it was atheists and agnostics who terrorized burned raped and tortured the european and mediterranean populace for around a thousand years after the fall of rome?

It seems to me that so called "religious" people find all sorts of ways to excuse theirs and their ancestors appalling behavior while blaming it all on other religions and those crazy atheists. As a matter of fact rome didn't really start it's backwards slide until the virulent mental illness some like to call christianity started it's inexorable choking off of the rule of logic in the empire. It was at that point that so called heretics instead of criminals and dangerous fanatics got thrown to the lions in the stadiums.

Christianity and islam love to make excuses for all of the evil stuff they have done... and they almost always seem to find a way to blame the jews atheists or "heathens" for their reprehensible action.... BEsides all they have to do to regain their never to be questioned morallity after the fact is do whatever ritual their sect demands to secure forgiveness from their god...

Whereas us lowly evil and deviant atheists or agnostics don't repent so if we do something bad or even if we just refuse to believe their INSANE and dangerous mythology we go to hell!!

At least agnostics and atheists take responsibillity for their lives we don't claim things were gods will or try to justify insanelly horrible actions in the name of a god... WE jsut acknowledge that we are human, and unlike christians we generally don't do some penance ritual then assume we are once again a super duper special wonderful godlike person. If we screw up we try an fix the problem instead of just pretending to be sorry to an imaginary spirit and saying hail maries or forgoing various so called sacred rituals for a set amount of time based on the severity of our offenses.

The sooner people realize that rationalizing their deeds in the name of some religion is a dangerously seductive crutch the better off they are. I have watched too many sane and smart people throw away any logical objectivity in a euphoric haze of devotion that is dozens of times more dangerous and psychologically corrosive than drugs or alcohol...

[edit on 31-3-2007 by roguetechie]

[edit on 31-3-2007 by roguetechie]

These aren't "facts", what, did the researcher use a time machine or something and watch the dudes write the bible? What utter tripe.

From L.O.V.E., sorry way too lazy to do HTML quotes:

"Moreso this conclusion would contradict more Biblical teaching that we are supposed to be in "love" before "marriage"."

OK, you who lecture me about using facts, can you even quote an Old Testament verse (Mary and Joseph were adherents of Judaism) about love being a prerequisite for marriage? Even if you can, it doesn't change the fact that a lot of marriages in ancient times were cold business transactions.

Communist Atheist dictatorships slaughtered the most people of any government ever so atheists shouldn't even try to pretend they hold the moral high ground.

If there isn't a final and eternal judgment, the only way to maintain order (and do a poor job at it at that) is to have a brutal government that slaughters its people.

[edit on 31-3-2007 by uberarcanist]

Originally posted by I am Legend
they arent revelations. they are facts. look em up. do a little research. for xtians and such, nothing hurts more than the truth.

They're revelations for Marduk, because he thinks that these old arguments "solve" some sort of "mystery"... Same old material, and it's still not changing the course of any rivers.

And, in case you're assuming that I'm an "xtian," I'm not. If anything, I'm what Charles Fort described as an "intermediatist" — one who simply observes that all accepted fact is in transition to falsehood, and that all falsehood is in transition to accepted fact.

— Doc Velocity

[edit on 3/31/2007 by Doc Velocity]