Liars? Or Lunatics?

Religious beliefs based on revelation from God exhibit a high degree of trust. God chose to relay information through single sources as opposed to everybody (as an all powerful deity).

How are people expected to determine when a messenger is false? Jesus may well have been a liar, Moses a nutter etc etc.

Miracles be one example, I might be swayed, but I have never seen verifiable evidence of miraculous happenings.

Any thoughts, ideas?

While I have used, and feel confident, in the liar/lunatic argument, it must be substantiated with a long argument, and then, it doesn't apply to all claims to divine revelation, or maybe even most.

The person that you would be proposing this question to has two very valid responses you must first overcome.

First, he may ask, "And how do you know it wasn't a hallucination induced by gas, drugs, 'a piece of undigested beef,' or the like?" If you cannot rule this out, then the prophet/messiah/whatever may be fully sound and completely wrong. They simply didn't realize it was a hallucination.

The second question, is "And how do we know that this is actually what he said?" There are more than a few people who don't believe in a Moses. Some don't even believe Jesus existed, though there are fewer of those. To these people, the question really isn't valid. As far as they're concerned, the character in question never existed.

To propose the question in serious discussion, you must do so in a way that overcomes both of those. It is not often possible.

truthseekingsoul said:

Religious beliefs based on revelation from God exhibit a high degree of trust. God chose to relay information through single sources as opposed to everybody (as an all powerful deity).

How are people expected to determine when a messenger is false? Jesus may well have been a liar, Moses a nutter etc etc.

Miracles be one example, I might be swayed, but I have never seen verifiable evidence of miraculous happenings.

Any thoughts, ideas?

Click to expand...

Well, I always understood that faith was the 'mainstay' of most religions. Perhaps that is why I call my faith 'my own'; although U.U is slowly drawing me to it...........
I thought that acceptance was a pre-requisite of most churches.
Perhaps its me? I don't know

No*s said:

The person that you would be proposing this question to has two very valid responses you must first overcome...

...First, he may ask, "And how do you know it wasn't a hallucination induced by gas, drugs, 'a piece of undigested beef,'...

...To propose the question in serious discussion, you must do so in a way that overcomes both of those. It is not often possible.

Click to expand...

Good points.

I was implying that revelation is based on trust between humans which as you will know is open to abuse whether intentionally or not. My point was less in eliminating possible responses but seeking how a believer might justify this trust.

truthseekingsoul said:

Good points.

I was implying that revelation is based on trust between humans which as you will know is open to abuse whether intentionally or not. My point was less in eliminating possible responses but seeking how a believer might justify this trust.

Click to expand...

Ah, OK. I'm sorry for the misunderstanding. How might a believer justify this trust? I can say only by lifestyle and piety .

It's always good to check the fine print.

If you tell that a stove is going to burn me and I touch it and find out it doesn't hurt me, what am I to think?

So you change your story, and say, "no, no, I MEANT when it is turned on (like this) that it's going to hurt you." Well then the stove had best be hurting me or else, I will REALLY begin to doubt.

But what if it was unplugged? Or the receptacle bad? Or, Or, Or, Or, ad nauseum!

But if the stove burns us... even if only once... then we might believe in spite of a billion "Ors". We may not know what's stopping it NOW, but we know that it WILL burn. I will be right back to finish this up...

It's always good to check the fine print (cont.)

So with every CLAIM there is always some kind of assertion. Just as a theory makes a prediction, a belief almost always entails a claim.

Christianity has made a TON of claims. Some we can't test until the Judgement Day, but there are quite a few that we can look at now. In fact, these claims (the fine print if you will) can not only be used to determine the validity of Christianity, but also used to verify who is actually a Christian.

My favorite "acid test" is Galations 5. Whoa! Fruits of the Flesh and of the Spirit. What a list. This is where you can figure out if your friend claiming to be a Christian is even close. But these aren't the only fine print in the scriptures. There are a ton more. The problem is: they all rely on one thing that I can't prove and you can't disprove. The empty tomb. The entirety of Christianity revolves around this one crucial fact. Of course I have some purported eye-witness accounts. I even have some miracles that are recorded. So what? You can find all sorts of zany stuff on the internet now. Even a picture of Mary on a pipe!

But go back to the fine print. Find someone who CLAIMS to be a Christian and then give him the FRUIT test (Galations 5). IF he passes this test (which means s/he IS plugged in and turned on), then start comparing the rest of the scriptures to them. If they fit like a glove, then you just might be able to come up with something useful.

PS... whatever you do though, DON'T use me! I always seem to have more than my fair shares of "Ors" that I am dealing with.

Religious beliefs based on revelation from God exhibit a high degree of trust. God chose to relay information through single sources as opposed to everybody (as an all powerful deity).

How are people expected to determine when a messenger is false? Jesus may well have been a liar, Moses a nutter etc etc.

Miracles be one example, I might be swayed, but I have never seen verifiable evidence of miraculous happenings.

Any thoughts, ideas?-truthseekingsoul


Personally ive found through meditation and prayer to a higher Being that ive recieved answers.

No*s said:

While I have used, and feel confident, in the liar/lunatic argument, it must be substantiated with a long argument, and then, it doesn't apply to all claims to divine revelation, or maybe even most.

Click to expand...

I have yet to see a coherent, much less compelling, defense of the trilemma that does not presuppose much of what it hopes to prove.