Good reason

[nobspeople]

In a different thread (listed below), when discussing, in part, if the bible is true, TRANSPONDER said " It is a well known argument that asserting what is in the Bible is true because it is in the Bible is a fallacy. A Lawyer would know that a witness statement is not going to be accepted as true just because he or she has said it. Nor of course rejected without good reason."

The above bolded section caused me to think (not claiming this is TRANSPNDER's assertion): is there good reason to think the bible isn't true?

For discussion: Is there good reason (define what is 'good reason' to you) to think the bible is or is not true*?

*TRUE here being used as 'legitimate, real word of God which was written by men, inspired by God' - this would assume everything written in it is true and agreed upon by God - in other words, nothing written is personal opinion of the writer.



Reference viewtopic.php?f=8&t=38540&start=10

[Tcg]

The Bible contains reasonable answers to many questions that people ask.

That is not evidence that those supposed "reasonable answers" correlate to truth. Some Christians think that the fact that the Bible answers questions some folks ask proves that Christianity is true. It doesn't.


Tcg

[JehovahsWitness]

Sure. A multitude of reasons to believe it's not true:

- Many books written by many people with differing perspectives not consistent with each other.

While the bible is indeed a collection of many books, written by many people with differing perspectives, this is no reason to believenit is not inspired of God. The books are indeed "consistent with each other" if by thatnyou mean they can be harmonizee to form a united whole free of contradictions.

[OnceConvinced]

The Bible contains reasonable answers to many questions that people ask. For example: where does life come from, what happens when a living being dies, why is there so much suffering in the world, what is the future of humanity and the planet, etc.

It comes up with a lot of unsupported claims about these things.

It gives effective advice on matters of daily life, and despite being such an ancient document, his advice still yields the results expected of a book of higher wisdom.

I see nothing out of the ordinary when it comes to good advice or wisdom that we couldn't figure out without the bible.

The Bible contains many prophecies, and many of them were fulfilled in great detail, which offers full confidence that the few that remain to be fulfilled will also be so.

It comes up with a lot of vague prophesies that could be interpreted to mean many different things. None of them are very specific. And of course you have people going out of their way to try to fulfil these so-called prophesies.

The Bible has survived all the struggle that many human institutions have made to prevent it and its content from becoming known, and if it were an ordinary book long ago it would have been silenced. Contrary to that, it is the most printed book on the entire planet.

We have no original versions of any of the bible books. None that survived. You'd think a God would ensure we would have!

All we have are copies of copies of translations of copies. Every bible printing institution has put their own spin on it and yet we still have people trying to retranslate the English versions we do have. You can't go for very long before some Christian tries to redefine the meaning of words by pointing to Hebrew or Greek. We have at least one such member active here at the moment who seems to think they are a better translator than the professional publishers.

The Bible contains a compendium of historical events in chronological form and in great detail. The origin of Jesus can be traced, for example, from the very first man who was created. It also offers a compendium of historical characters, ancient places that no longer exist, and narratives of events that could not be known were it not for it.

None of that is reason to put trust in the bible. Many books and movies contain real historical figures, but often use artistic license. Harry Potter books take place in England, but does that mean we should take tales of wizardry and witchcraft seriously?

It is obvious that the information in the Bible is not of human origin.

Funny. To me it shows the hand of very fallible man. I see nothing in it that could be seen as "not of human origin".

Best of all, it makes our Creator known to us

Not at all true. It in no way proves any god exists. The more I read it and study it the more and more it leads me to believe God doesn't exist.

and tells us what He is going to do in favor of humans who decide to live according to his just standards, and what will happen to bad people who harm the planet and its inhabitants.

None of which there is any good reason to take seriously.

[DrNoGods]

[Replying to Eloi in post #19]

The Bible contains reasonable answers to many questions that people ask. For example: where does life come from, what happens when a living being dies, why is there so much suffering in the world, what is the future of humanity and the planet, etc.

We don't actually know how life originated on this planet yet, there is virtually no evidence that humans have afterlives, and we don't know for certain what the future of humanity and the planet will be because the future cannot be predicted.

Believing the creation myth of Genesis and that Adam and Eve were real people (and the first humans), or the Noah's flood story (to pick two examples), is simply faith that the stories are true because they are in a book some consider divinely inspired. We know for certain that these two stories cannot possibly be true as described in Genesis, and such outlandish tales are one reason it is easy to discard certain parts of the bible as complete fiction. The various rules for behavior can be good advice, but that is accompanied by a lot of very bad practices as mentioned in earlier posts (slavery, murder, etc.).

There are some historical accuracies of course relating to the times the various books were written (eg. Nebuchadnezzar was a real king), but the scientific knowledge humans have accumulated over the past 500+ years has disproven many of the biblical stories and descriptions beyond any reasonable doubt. This is the "good reason" I'd invoke to discard many of the bible stories and predictions as being correct.

The origin of Jesus can be traced, for example, from the very first man who was created.

Man wasn't "created" as a fully-formed Homo sapien, as described in Genesis. We evolved from a primate ancestor which is not conjecture anymore but a scientific fact. This is another problem with many biblical stories ... they just are not compatible with known science (which again is good reason to reject the biblical description of a suddenly created, modern human).

[JehovahsWitness]

Sure. A multitude of reasons to believe it's not true:


- God did not provide an already translated bible for all languages.

There is no good reason to conclude a book cannot be authentic unless initially universally translated.


NOTE: The original manuscripts of the bible were indeed translated into the common languages of the day namely from ancient Hebrew to Greek, and from Greek to Latin. The bible has since become is the worlds most translated book.

To learn more please see other posts related to...

THE BIBLE , HERMENEUTICS* and ... BEST TRANSLATION

* bible interpretation

[brunumb]

The Bible contains reasonable answers to many questions that people ask. For example: where does life come from, what happens when a living being dies, why is there so much suffering in the world, what is the future of humanity and the planet, etc.

That depends on how far one has to stretch the meaning of reasonable. For many, the biblical answers are far from reasonable. One can make up many different answers to those questions, but without demonstrating that they are true, those answers are actually worthless.

It gives effective advice on matters of daily life, and despite being such an ancient document, his advice still yields the results expected of a book of higher wisdom.

Things like how to treat your slaves, using pigeon blood to cure leprous houses, washing your hands to prevent you from getting sick,.... Oh, wait. That last and most useful advice is missing.

The Bible contains many prophecies, and many of them were fulfilled in great detail, which offers full confidence that the few that remain to be fulfilled will also be so.

No biblical prophecies have been fulfilled unless you twist the language to breaking point. That said, biblical prophecy is not about foretelling the future. That practice is actually forbidden in the Bible.

The Bible has survived all the struggle that many human institutions have made to prevent it and its content from becoming known, and if it were an ordinary book long ago it would have been silenced. Contrary to that, it is the most printed book on the entire planet.

Given that Christianity was spread across the world largely at the point of the sword and persecution of unbelievers, it's hard to take your claim seriously. perhaps you can supply some verification.

The Bible contains a compendium of historical events in chronological form and in great detail. The origin of Jesus can be traced, for example, from the very first man who was created. It also offers a compendium of historical characters, ancient places that no longer exist, and narratives of events that could not be known were it not for it.

The actual existence of Jesus has been heavily debated, so it is hard to accept that his origin can be traced in any way. Countless works of fiction, even fantasy fiction, contain actual places and characters who were real people. There is nothing extraordinary about them occurring in the Bible. When one examines some of the 'great detail' it quickly becomes apparent that much exaggeration and poetic license is involved.

It is obvious that the information in the Bible is not of human origin. Best of all, it makes our Creator known to us and tells us what He is going to do in favor of humans who decide to live according to his just standards, and what will happen to bad people who harm the planet and its inhabitants.

There is nothing written in the Bible that necessitates the involvement of anyone or anything other than imaginative human beings. It invents a version of a creator being that is one among thousands of others invented by different cultures throughout human history. It includes many threats concerning the fates of unbelievers which no doubt is used as an incentive for people to join the club, or else.

[brunumb]

While the bible is indeed a collectio of Many books written by many people with differing perspectives, this is no reason to believenit is not inspired of God.

The real problem is that there is no demonstrable evidence that it was actually inspired by God, or any other supernatural being.

[JehovahsWitness]

- The bible contains blatant lies. eg: God's existance is obvious to all...

I know of no scriptures that says this. Could you provide a reference.

- The bible contains blatant lies..... All things will be made known when needed, etc etc.

Ditto.

- The bible contains blatant lies.....Seek and ye shall find

This is not a lie.

[brunumb]

NOTE: The original manuscripts of the bible were indeed translated into the common languages of the day namely from ancient Hebrew to Greek, and from Greek to Latin. The bible has since become is the worlds most translated book.

Given that we don't have the original manuscripts for comparison, any claims regarding them are unwarranted.

[JehovahsWitness]

NOTE: The original manuscripts of the bible were indeed translated into the common languages of the day namely from ancient Hebrew to Greek, and from Greek to Latin. The bible has since become is the worlds most translated book.

Given that we don't have the original manuscripts for comparison, any claims regarding them are unwarranted.

I disagree. Although it is true we do not have the original scripts there is little doubt amongst bible scolars as to the language the originals were written in. The translation of the Hebrew bible into Greek is a matter of historical record and we have thousands of early greek manuscripts and their later latin eqivalents that provide verifiable evidence of the Christian bibles translation history.

To learn more please see other posts related to...

THE BIBLE , AUTHORSHIP & TRANSMISSION and ... BIBLE TRANSLATIONS

* bible interpretation