Desirability is a subjective thing. There's nothing being offered that's either of any interest to me, that my Gods are incapable of providing, that I'm incapable of providing for myself, or that my friends and family are incapable of providing.
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What do you think the Good News of Jesus Christ is?
- Thread starter jah59
- Start date
Desirability is a subjective thing. There's nothing being offered that's either of any interest to me, that my Gods are incapable of providing, that I'm incapable of providing for myself, or that my friends and family are incapable of providing.
As you do seem to be sincerely in the dark about the manuscript evidence of the Bible, here are a few references:fantôme profane;3887940 said:
"...the New Testament was originally written in Greek, of which 5,650 handwritten copies have survived in Greek, over 10,000 in Latin. When other languages are included, the total of ancient copies approaches 25,000. The next ancient text to come close to rivaling that number is Homer's Iliad, which is thought to have survived in 643 ancient copies."[2]
(Historicity of the Bible - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) (Komoszewski, J. Ed; Wallace, Daniel J. (2006). Reinventing Jesus: What the Da Vinci Code and Other Novel Speculations Don't Tell You. Grand Rapids, Mich: Kregel Publications. p. 70. ISBN 0-8254-2982-X).
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There are now more than 5,300 known Greek manuscripts of the New Testament. Add over 10,000 Latin Vulgate and at least 9,300 other early versions (MSS) and we have more than 24,000 manuscript copies of portions of the New Testament in existence today.
No other document of antiquity even begins to approach such numbers and attestation. In comparison, the Iliad by Homer is second with only 643 manuscripts that still survive. The first complete preserved text of Homer dates from the 13th century. 58/145
McDowell, Josh (1992-09-01). Evidence That Demands a Verdict, 1: 001 (pp. 39-40). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition.
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Also see p. 34 of How We Got the Bible where basically the same is confirmed.
Neil R. Lightfoot (Ph.D., Duke University) serves as Frank Pack Distinguished Professor of New Testament at Abilene Christian University in Abilene, Texas. He is the author of several books, including Everyone’s Guide to Hebrews.
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You may have heard it said that those who do not know history are destined to repeat it. You would do well to learn a little history so you could know such things.
The claim I made about Julius Caesar is my own words, but they by no means originated with me and they are but a logical deduction from the weight of the numbers. How do you logically dispute it?
________________________
I firmly believe that when God wants to emphasize a matter in his written word such as in John 1:3, Colossians 1:15-17, and 1 John 4:8, He so inspires it that it is difficult, if not impossible to mistranslate.
Learn about the Bible by mail or online-for free!
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I'll let you know that I am one of the Bible school helpers, myself. No, I do not hold a Ph.D at a prestigious university. However I have read through the Bible over 20 times in addition to making innumerable topical Bible studies, studying Bible archaeology, and Bible evidences. After all of this I can attest that this is a valuable resource for anyone who wants to learn more about the Bible.
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I firmly believe that when God wants to emphasize a matter in his written word such as in John 1:3, Colossians 1:15-17, and 1 John 4:8, He so inspires it that it is difficult, if not impossible to mistranslate.
Learn about the Bible by mail or online-for free!
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I don't know where to begin. You are making a comparison between the evidence we have for the existence of one person, a Roman Emperor no less, with the historical accuracy of 27 different books written by different people over a period of several decades. The comparison barely makes any sense.
We have textual, and archeological evidence for the existence of Julius Caesar. We have books written about him during his life. We have coins with his image on them, we have busts of him made during his life. We have things written about him by his supporters and written about him by his enemies.
Now you wish to compare this to the 27 books. Books as I said written by many different people, people who don't all agree on the historical details that they relay to us.
Don't misunderstand me. I believe there are things recorded in the New Testament that should be understood as reliable historical facts. In fact I am right now arguing with someone else in a different thread in support of some of these historical facts. But there are also things recorded in the NT that cannot be taken as reliable historical facts. It is absolutely impossible for all of these details to be historically accurate because as I have already mentioned some of the things in the NT are directly contradicted by other things in the NT.
And you want to compare all of the things said in the NT to the simple fact of the existence of Julies Caesar. I don't care how many people you have heard say that, it is nonsense.
fantôme profane;3889581 said:
While I should have qualified my statement to historical manuscript evidence as far as Julius Caesar goes, we have a wealth of archaeological evidence supporting the New Testament as well. As far as "books written" about Julius Caesar, this speaks to the very documentation I've already pointed out. Nothing written about Julius Caesar comes anywhere close in manuscript evidence!
As far as things you "think" are contradictions in the NT, I'll be happy to help you with them one by one.
________________________
I firmly believe that when God wants to emphasize a matter in his written word such as in John 1:3, Colossians 1:15-17, and 1 John 4:8, He so inspires it that it is difficult, if not impossible to mistranslate.
Learn about the Bible by mail or online-for free!
Fine, I will consider the original statement to be withdrawn.
Thank you, but I don't think I need your help.
outhouse
Atheistically
Only if you call wealth, getting a check from welfare.
You have unknown authors, less Paul writing decades after the fact, far removed from Jesus actual life.
Not one word was written by a single person who seen or heard a singe word from Jesus.
Bunyip
pro scapegoat
And yet you imagine the historicity of Jesus to be axiomatic, can you see the problem there?
roger1440
I do stuff
22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23 "The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel"--which means, "God with us."( Matthew 1:22-23)
John Martin
Active Member
Jesus proclaimed the good news of the kingdom of God with the words: the time has come to an end. The kingdom of God is at hand, repent and believe in the goodnews.
Matthew writes: repent,for the kingdom of God is at hand.
The kingdom of God has many aspects: ultimately it means to transform one's life into God's life and one's actions into God's actions, in such a way a person will say, my life is not my life but God's life and my actions are not my actions but actions. Jesus said, the works which I do are not my own but the Father who dwells in me does his works.This is the experience of the kingdom of God. This is also salvation, when our life ends and God's life begins.
As a good news it has two aspects: objective and subjective. Objectively it means that God is everywhere and we are are all in God. It is the good news of the universal presence of God. Subjectively it means that ultimately human consciousness is one with the divine consciousness. Jesus said,'the Father and I are one'.
The word repent means: realize the universal presence of God,experience oneness with God.
This is also good news Jesus asked his disciples to proclaim: God is every where, everyone is already in God. Human consciousness is ultimately one with God. And invite people to realize this truth.
The time has come to an end. There are two creations: one that comes from God and another that began with the big bang. The creation that comes from God manifests eternity. There is no time and space The creation that comes from the big bang creates time and space and the limited human consciousness or ego. The end of time means the end of time and space created by the big bang. When this time comes to and end the creation of God begins, the eternity begins, the kingdom of God begins.
Repentance means transcending the identity(ego) that we receive from the big bang and entering into the creation of God, which is discovering the image and likeness of God,which is our true self.
roger1440
I do stuff
Jesus represents the unity between God and Israel. 22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23 "The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel"--which means, "God with us."( Matthew 1:22-23) The good news is that God was always with the Jews. The Old Covenant leads to the New Covenant. John the Baptist is six months older then Jesus. John represents the Old Covenant, Jesus the New Covenant. The older shall serve the younger.
I see you subscribe to one of the conspiracy theories of Bible authorship. Thank you for your opinion, nonetheless.
If you broaden perspective beyond that presented in Christian Apologetics you would know that what you characterize as "conspiracy theories" about the authorship of the books in the NT are mainstream biblical scholarship.
While this may be considered by some to be a Bible difficulty, I fail to see how it could be considered a contradiction. There are many thoughts as to how this should be understood. I am in line with the explanation provided at Isaiah 7-14 Answers to Objections especially considering how the "you" in verse 14 is plural:
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"It is important to understand who this prophecy goes out to. Because Ahaz has a chance to ask for a sign (include God in the decision making process) and Ahaz refuses (Ahaz is looking somewhere else for help besides God) Isaiah's prophecy is meant for the entire "house of David"!
God is allowing King Ahaz who is king of Judah to know that Judah will survive (no thanks to Ahaz who is viewed as an unrighteous unbelieving king). While in the near term the two kings, Rezin, king of Aram (i.e. Syria) and Pekah, King of Samaria (i.e. the northern ten tribes of Israel) will not be allowed to overthrow Ahaz kingdom, a little farther down the timeline of the prophecy (65 years) Ephraim's destruction is predicted.
In the long term Isaiah prophesied to "house of David" (Judah) that Israel and Syria would be deprived of their kings before Yeshua (Jesus) would know to refuse the evil, and choose the good. Not only was Israel and Syria forsaken of both her kings, but Israel and Judah (national Israel) were forsaken of both their kings before Yeshua/Jesus knew to refuse the evil, and choose the good. At the birth of the Messiah, national Israel was under the complete domination of the Roman Empire.
Another interesting comment is that the prophecy is viewed by the Septuagint translators to render the verb "shall give" in the future tense. They felt this rendering appropriate because the sign is promised for the future, grammatically and contextually. Claims that the Septuagint tampered with the text by changing the tense to the future are sometimes made. Since the Septuagint translation was done around 285 - 244 BC it could not contain a Christian slant because Jesus had not even been born yet. The translation was done only by Jewish scribes who still felt at that time that the prophecy had not yet been fulfilled completely.(2)"
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fantôme profane;3890849 said:
I see you are not ready to understand. Instead of graciously thanking me for providing you with scholarly documentation of the vast wealth of Biblical manuscript evidence that dwarfs all other ancient documents you continue to berate me with nonsense. What I provided you with if you had an open mind should be a great reason for you to rejoice and want to learn more.
In your opinion, can the Bible be used to any degree to determine the life of a historical Jesus?
I've kind of given up. I like the stories, but to determine what passages might be historically valid and what is myth seems a difficult undertaking, and lots of differing "professional" opinions on that.
I have my ideas about the Bible. I can find some claimed expert to support some of those ideas. I can find just as many to dispute them.
For example, I think it is reasonable to dismiss any events after the resurrection as historical in the gospels. I think Matthew had an agenda to justify Christ to the Jews.
However I do a lot of that because of the story I want to be true.
If it is mostly myth, then it doesn't matter. I feel I can believe whatever I want.
If there is a real story there, I'd like to at least correct my understanding as far as I can.
sojourner
Annoyingly Progressive Since 2006
I have yet to see you provide any scholarly documentation.
Okay, got to say I was tempted to just dismiss you as lazy, but that wouldn't be nice. Here you go, three references AGAIN:
"...the New Testament was originally written in Greek, of which 5,650 handwritten copies have survived in Greek, over 10,000 in Latin. When other languages are included, the total of ancient copies approaches 25,000. The next ancient text to come close to rivaling that number is Homer's Iliad, which is thought to have survived in 643 ancient copies."[2]
(Historicity of the Bible - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) (Komoszewski, J. Ed; Wallace, Daniel J. (2006). Reinventing Jesus: What the Da Vinci Code and Other Novel Speculations Don't Tell You. Grand Rapids, Mich: Kregel Publications. p. 70. ISBN 0-8254-2982-X).
----
"There are now more than 5,300 known Greek manuscripts of the New Testament. Add over 10,000 Latin Vulgate and at least 9,300 other early versions (MSS) and we have more than 24,000 manuscript copies of portions of the New Testament in existence today.
No other document of antiquity even begins to approach such numbers and attestation. In comparison, the Iliad by Homer is second with only 643 manuscripts that still survive. The first complete preserved text of Homer dates from the 13th century. 58/145"
McDowell, Josh (1992-09-01). Evidence That Demands a Verdict, 1: 001 (pp. 39-40). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition.
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Also see p. 34 of How We Got the Bible where basically the same is confirmed.
Neil R. Lightfoot (Ph.D., Duke University) serves as Frank Pack Distinguished Professor of New Testament at Abilene Christian University in Abilene, Texas. He is the author of several books, including Everyone’s Guide to Hebrews.
________________________
I firmly believe that when God wants to emphasize a matter in his written word such as in John 1:3, Colossians 1:15-17, and 1 John 4:8, He so inspires it that it is difficult, if not impossible to mistranslate.
Learn about the Bible by mail or online-for free!
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joelr
Well-Known Member
The NT was put together in 313 AD and the Romans made it mandatory. In 12 the Roman Catholic church continued this practice so of course there are many copies printed!? Appeal to authority or majority doesn't make things true?
There are more people who are a combination of other belief systems and that fact doesn't make them right either.
Please pay attention. You're arguing a totally different point. However, your 313 AD date is absolute nonsense. See below:
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1C. TESTS FOR INCLUDING A BOOK IN THE NEW TESTAMENT CANON
The basic factor for determining New Testament canonicity was inspiration by God, and its chief test, apostolicity. 32/181 Geisler and Nix amplify the above:
"In New Testament terminology, the church was 'built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets' (Eph. 2:20) whom Christ had promised to guide into 'all the truth' (John 16:13) by the Holy Spirit. The church at Jerusalem was said to have continued in the 'apostles' teaching and fellowship' (Acts 2:42). The term 'apostolic' as used for the test of canonicity does not necessarily mean'apostolic authorship,' or 'that which was prepared under the direction of the apostles....'
"It seems much better to agree with Gaussen, Warfield, Charles Hodge, and most Protestants that it is apostolic authority, or apostolic approval, that was the primary test for canonicity and not merely apostolic authorship." 32/183
N.B. Stonehouse writes that the apostolic authority "which speaks forth in the New Testament is never detached from the authority of the Lord. In the Epistles there is consistent recognition that in the church there is only one absolute authority, the authority of the Lord himself. Wherever the apostles speak with authority, they do so as exercising the Lord's authority. Thus, for example, where Paul defends his authority as an apostle, he bases his claim solely and directly upon his commission by the Lord (Gal. 1 and 2); where he assumes the right to regulate the life of the church, he claims for his word the Lord's authority, even when no direct word of the Lord has been handed down (I Cor. 14:37; cf. I Cor. 7 : 1 0 ) . . . ." 88/117,118 "
The only one who speaks in the New Testament with an authority that is underived and self-authenticating is the Lord." 67/18
2C. THE NEW TESTAMENT CANONICAL BOOKS
1D. Three reasons for a need to determine a New Testament canon: 23/41
--IE. A heretic, Marcion (ca 140 A.D.), developed his own canon and began to propagate it. The church needed to offset his influence by determining what was the real canon of New Testament Scripture.
--2E. Many Eastern churches were using books in services that were definitely spurious. It called for a decision concerning the canon.
--3E. Edict of Diocletian (A.D. 303) declared the destruction of the sacred books of the Christians. Who wanted to die for just a religious book? They needed to know!
2D. Athanasius of Alexandria (A.D. 367) gives us the earliest list of New Testament books which is exactly like our present New Testament. This list was in a festal letter to the churches.
3D. Shortly after Athanasius, two writers, Jerome and Augustine, define the canon of 27 books. 15/112
4D. Polycarp (A.D. 115), Clement and others refer to the Old and New Testament books with the phrase "as it is said in these scriptures."
5D. Justin Martyr (A.D. 100-165), referring to the Eucharist, writes in his First Apology 1.67: "And on the day called Sunday there is a gathering together to one place of all those who live in cities or in the country, and the memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read, as long as time permits. Then when the reader has ceased the president presents admonition and invitation to the imitation of these good things." He adds in his Dialogue with Trypho (pp. 49,103,105,107) the formula "It is written," to quote from the Gospels. Both he and Trypho must have known to what "It is written" refers.
6D. Irenaeus (A.D. 180)
F. F. Bruce writes of the significance of Irenaeus:
"The importance of evidence lies in his link with the apostolic age and in his ecumenical associations. Brought up in Asia Minor at the feet of Polycarp, the disciple of John, he became Bishop of Lyons in Gaul, A.D. 180. His writings attest the canonical recognition of the fourfold Gospel and Acts, of Rom., 1 and 2 Cor., Gal., Eph., Phil., Col., 1 and 2 Thess., 1 and 2 Tim., and Titus, of I Peter and I John and of the Revelation. In his treatise, Against Heresies, III, ii, 8, it is evident that by A.D. 180 the idea of the fourfold Gospel had become so axiomatic throughout Christendom that it could be referred to as an established fact as obvious and inevitable and natural as the four cardinal points of the compass (as we call them) or the four winds." 15/109
7D. Ignatius (A.D. 50-115): "I do not wish to command you as Peter and Paul; they were apostles...." Trail. 3.3.
8D. The Church Councils. It is much the same situation as the Old Testament (see Chapter 3,6C, The Council of Jamnia).
F. F. Bruce states that "when at last a Church CouncilThe Synod of Hippo in A.D. 393 listed the twenty-seven books of the New Testament, it did not confer upon them any authority which they did not already possess, but simply recorded their previously established canonicity. (The ruling of the Synod of Hippo was re-promulgated four years later by the Third Synod of Carthage.)" 15/113
Since this time, there has been no serious questioning of the 27 accepted books of the New Testament by either Roman Catholics or Protestants.
McDowell, Josh (1992-09-01). Evidence That Demands a Verdict, 1: 001 (pp. 36-38). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition.
________________________
I firmly believe that when God wants to emphasize a matter in his written word such as in John 1:3, Colossians 1:15-17, and 1 John 4:8, He so inspires it that it is difficult, if not impossible to mistranslate.
Learn about the Bible by mail or online-for free!