MJFlores
Well-Known Member
The earth is described both as a circle and a four-cornered shape, both with edges, immobile, resting on pillars, the sun and stars embedded in a solid, hemispheric firmament circling under it to rise again, as well as separating the waters and heavens above it from the earth below. This is one of several similar renderings of biblical cosmology
Why do you suppose that the pictures shown at the link above all look more or less like the above if this is not what the artists drawing them understand the scripture to be saying?
Consider Matthew 4:8 - Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them.
That's not possible with a spherical earth, but it is with a flat earth as depicted above.
And there is all of this:
- Isaiah 11:12 - And he shall set up an ensign for the nations, and shall assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the FOUR CORNERS OF THE EARTH.
- Job 38:13 - That it might take hold of the ENDS OF THE EARTH, that the wicked might be shaken out of it?
- Jeremiah 16:19 - O LORD, my strength, and my fortress, and my refuge in the day of affliction, the Gentiles shall come unto thee from the ENDS OF THE EARTH, and shall say, Surely our fathers have inherited lies, vanity, and things wherein there is no profit.
- Daniel 4:11 - The tree grew, and was strong, and the height thereof reached unto heaven, and the sight thereof to the ENDS OF ALL THE EARTH
This was believed literally because it was once believable. The earth seems flat, fixed, and immobile, and centered within the sphere of heavenly bodies orbiting it.
- Isaiah 40:22 - He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth.
You're not guessing? Why can't it be you that is confused?
I say that the biblical cosmology described above was taught as if it were fact until it was learned that it is wrong, and is now being claimed to be a metaphor, because most believers simply do not allow themselves to see error in scripture. I say that this take is much more likely to be the case than implying that they knew their model was wrong, but presented it anyway.
When a person uses a metaphor, he knows what the metaphor stands for. @The Reverend Bob 's link gave "her lips are a blooming rose" as an example of a metaphor. The blooming rose stands for her lips, and clearly, the author knows that.
What is this cosmology a metaphor for? The truth? If so, how does that differ from an error, which is the word for a story not thought to stand for anythinng, but rather, is thought to be true, yet is incorrect?
Then that makes them useless as prophecies, doesn't it? What is the purpose or value of a prophecy? In the Bible, they're intended to be evidence of divine prescience and divine authorship of the prophecy. If they're mere poetry, they can't accomplish that goal when critical thinking is employed.
Another use for a prophecy is to provide useful information in advance of an event, such as a forecast of rain that warns you to take an umbrella, but biblical prophecy is never this. It is not useful to forecast any specific event at any specific time. Look at all the people giving away their worldly possessions based on some specific date and time assigned to a biblical prophecy.
For a prophecy to be convincing that it represents knowledge not normally available to any human, it must be what is called high-quality prophecy,
[a] High quality prophecy needs to be specific, detailed and unambiguous. Optimally, the time and place are specified.
It also needs to prophecy something unexpected, unlikely or unique - something that was not self-fulfilling and could not have been contrived or easily guessed.
[c] High quality prophecy must be accurate and unaccompanied by failed prophecies
[d] The prophecies must be verified that they came before the event predicted, and that they were fulfilled completely.
Biblical prophecy doesn't rise to this standard. It is no better than what palm readers, spiritual mediums, and professional psychics do - what they call cold readings: "I see somebody whose name begins with A, and she is near water." "That must be Aunt Esther, who loved to water her garden." It's a verbal Rorschach test, and demonstrates no superhuman quality.
Here's what you need to be convincing. It's fiction - from a movie some years back called Frequency, in which Dennis Quaid's character’s son contacts his father from his father's future by ham radio. To convince his father that he, the son, really is calling his father from his father's future - from 1998 back to 1969 - the son discusses the outcome of game five of what is for the father the as-yet unfinished 1969 World Series, which the father is watching live in 1969 on TV in a local pub
"Well, game five was the big one. It turned in the bottom of the 6th. We were down 3-0. Cleon Jones gets hit on the foot - left a scuff mark on the ball. Clendenon comes up. The count goes to 2 and 2. High fastball. He nailed it. Weis slammed a solo shot in the 7th to tie. Jones and Swoboda scored in the 8th. We won, Pop."
Then the father watches it happen on TV. Once tricks like a tape delay and replay of an already finished game are ruled out, that's convincing, unlike vague, poetic scriptural predictions.
Perfect example of a vague passage neither useful for anything and not persuasive. Compare it to the Frequency excerpt.
Faith is the willingness to believe with insufficient supporting evidence, or what I just called guessing. It's a logical error. With reason, 2 + 2 only equals 4. This is what faith does to reason:
That's a very poor way to think.
- “If somewhere in the Bible I were to find a passage that said 2 + 2 = 5, I wouldn't question what I am reading in the Bible. I would believe it, accept it as true, and do my best to work it out and understand it."- Pastor Peter laRuffa
That's also a logical error. It may be true, but you have unjustifiably eliminated other logical possibilities. By reason, we understand that we do not know if gods exist. Our list of candidate hypotheses for the origin of the universe should have a naturalistic option.
Less than a rarity. Impossibility. This is one of the unkept promises of Christianity, like Jesus returning before the present generation dies off. I assure you that this is false.
That's too simple an assessment. The words were probably believed when written - so they're not lies, just wrong and therefore not useful.
Is that a bad thing to you? Faith is also what the believers at Jonestown and Waco had. That's a bad thing to me.
Reason is mine. I can't find a use for faith.
Yeah, we see that one a lot as well as metaphor. But my answer is the same to the apologist calling mythology allegory. Allegory of what? Calling a myth an allegory presumes that its writers knew that no such thing had happened and that they were creating an account with a hidden meaning - perhaps political or moral.
As you undoubtedly know, Gulliver's Travels is an allegory, meaning that its author, Swift, realized that he was writing fiction intended to make a political statement about contemporary England in which each element of the allegory represents something from history known to the author.
"One clear example of Swift's use of political allegory is the Rope Dancers, who are Lilliputians seeking employment in the government, All candidates are asked to dance on the rope and whoever jumps the highest without falling is offered a high office . Very often the current ministers are asked to dance to show their skills . For instance, Flimnap, the treasurer, is required to dance on a tight rope to show his superiority to other in this respect.
"This jumping game may sound innocent to the children, however, politically its significance is far from innocent. Obviously, Swift makes a satire on the way in which political offices were distributed among the candidates by George I. Flimnap stands for Sir Robert Walpole the prime minister of England. Dancing on a tight rope symbolizes Walpole's skill in parliamentary tactics and political intrigues. In general, Swift wants to infer that England's system is arbitrary and corrupted." Political Allegory In Gulliver's Travels
That's allegory. The Genesis creation story and the flood story are not allegories or metaphors, which require that their source understands what the elements in the story actually stand for.
I'd like to respond to your statements but I fear I would just be redundantly repeating my posts.
And I have a hard time focusing what I should tackle since I am lost in a forest of words from Dennis Quaid to Gulliver's Travels.
So please one at a time, then I would dance with you.
But for now...