A debate? Meh . . . I doubt any of the panelists would change their minds regardless of how cogent the arguments of the other side, and, short of offering a tournament afterwards, where attendance gained you a bonus to your starting stack, I doubt enough members would be interested.
I'm still not sure how this thread turned from a discussion about a seemingly guilty man being let off thanks to some um....'quirky'* laws in Florida to a debate about religon, but I'd to say this about religon:
IMO, a persons personal faith-or lack there of- should be just that. Personal. Whatever you need(or don't need) to get through the night is fine, but keep it to yourself.
You'll never convince everyone of you believe (again, both ways) and overall you'll just make more enemies and cause grief to those who don't need it.
A debate? Meh . . . I doubt any of the panelists would change their minds regardless of how cogent the arguments of the other side, and, short of offering a tournament afterwards, where attendance gained you a bonus to your starting stack, I doubt enough members would be interested.
Those that believe in GOD should start with 1/2 stack IMO...
I, too have always wondered why it is that the Bible is not considered an "historical text", more particularly the New Testament.
Can a non-believer explain this please.
I love how you parse the new and old testament...but I'll still give you that one. By your definition of "historical text (which I'll await) I would then propose that the Lord of the rings is a "historical text" as the only definition we have so far is that it is an "old" text. The bible was created by men hundreds of years after the death of Jesus. And as we know groups of men always make the right decisions.
if you believe that the bible used by Catholics is correct and the word of God (again I'll give you the old Testament as you'll be crushed otherwise) there are still problems of translation. God oversaw the printing and translation of all the books? God oversaw the choosing of which texts were included/removed from the Catholic version? Ever heard of Michelangelo's Moses? In the 1500's the world thought Moses had horns because of a mistranslation of the bible. You think that's the only one? or is this correct:?
1 Timothy 2:12 I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet.
1 Corinthians 14:35 If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church.
Lord of the Rings? Uh, no. Historical text as in it is a collection of works that are written by authors who were witness to the events under discussion. The Gospels in particular fall into this category, yet religious people are constantly told that the Bible is "fiction", more often to diminish it's import than for any valid reason or argument.
1 Timothy relates to the role of women in the Church and this passage is typically used during discussion of whether or not women should be ordained as Ministers/Priests. Catholics believe that, as Jesus, and his Apostles (the foundation of the the Church) were men, that women should take complementary roles within the Church structure.
1 Corinthians requires context as well. It is a letter from St. Paul to the Corinth Church that he established in the first Century. He is responding to questions they have regarding his instructions in Church Law. the references to women and silence relate to "public" speaking about the liturgy (which is to be led by men), and not private conversation or singing.
I am probably a little "off" in my response, not being a Bible scholar, but I would have to say that yes, those quotes are correct. but I would remind you, though I doubt it necessary, that context is everything, and pulling quotes in isolation is pretty standard debate practice. I am sure there were other more inflammatory ones you could have used.
The bible was created by men hundreds of years after the death of Jesus. And as we know groups of men always make the right decisions.
This is true of the bible, but as I mentioned in an earlier post, the bible is a collection of documents and letters. As these are letters and documents that tell of events their authors believed to be true, they are historical documents. To put them on a level with a work of fiction like the Lord of The Rings is backwards:
- "these documents are fiction because Jesus didn't exist and do those things"
- "Wait, how do we know Jesus didn't exist and do those things?"
- "There's no historical documents!"
There are copies of NT letters dating from within a hundred years of their writing. So 'hundreds of years' is correct for the collecting, but not for (at least some of) the documents therein.
From what I've learned of the process of creating the bible, it's more likely that stuff that could have made it in didn't than vice versa. Which of course assumes that God didn't work it out that the exact books he wanted in, got in. Note that as a protestant, I don't consider several books of the Catholic bible to be scripture.
Translation errors, omissions and additions? There have no doubt been many, but I am not aware of any with serious ramifications theologically. Moses with horns? Never heard that one, interesting, but again no affect on the narrative of what the teaching of the pentateuch is for us today.
Translation errors, omissions and additions? There have no doubt been many, but I am not aware of any with serious ramifications theologically.
i'm too lazy and sore (crushed my finger moving bricks today), so i won't be commenting on everything here. however, thought i'd add a good link about the specific bible content here:
easily anyone can see that there must be errors in the bible and strange additions to the bible. if god meant everything in there, he was really messed up.
some omissions can be found here, but honestly i've never read them:
i'm too lazy and sore (crushed my finger moving bricks today), so i won't be commenting on everything here. however, thought i'd add a good link about the specific bible content here:
easily anyone can see that there must be errors in the bible and strange additions to the bible. if god meant everything in there, he was really messed up.
I'm just lazy - so I admit to only looking at about 4 different pages on the Skeptics site.
1 - every biblical scholar and theologian knows all about these 'contradictions', etc.
2 - Some of them are super obvious; for example the genealogies in Matthew and Luke not matching or being 100% consistent. Now, the question is - does that make these books more or less likely to be completely made up? If I was putting a 'Bible' together for my fake religion, I'm pretty sure I'd clear up the glaring inconsistencies. This would indicate that the earliest christians considered the texts authentic - we're talking people whose grandparents or great-grandparents could literally have been witnesses to the events described.
3 - The whole Skeptics thing seems to be based on the King James Version; which while cutting edge in the 17th century, has been long surpassed in quality and accuracy of translation. In many cases because older (closer to the original) portions of some documents have been found.
1 Timothy relates to the role of women in the Church and this passage is typically used during discussion of whether or not women should be ordained as Ministers/Priests. Catholics believe that, as Jesus, and his Apostles (the foundation of the the Church) were men, that women should take complementary roles within the Church structure.
And to show that reasonable people can disagree, in my denomination we ordain women as ministers, and have since like 1920.
The reason being that even as Paul was writing what would become canonized as scripture, he was also writing a letter to a specific church at a specific time in history/culture. If we fail to understand that, we are likely to misinterpret many things. Like the slavery example I think someone noted earlier (cf. the book of Philemon).
Not sure why but the interwebs in France would not let me access the pfc.ca site within it's borders under any circumstances...and for that I declare it the nut worst country in the world because it made me miss the most of this gem thread.
Comments
IMO, a persons personal faith-or lack there of- should be just that. Personal. Whatever you need(or don't need) to get through the night is fine, but keep it to yourself.
You'll never convince everyone of you believe (again, both ways) and overall you'll just make more enemies and cause grief to those who don't need it.
*And by 'quirky' I mean totally fucked up.
I think this is where we went off the rails . . .
Frozen Peas FTW
Those that believe in GOD should start with 1/2 stack IMO...
...where's you messiah now, see
I love how you parse the new and old testament...but I'll still give you that one. By your definition of "historical text (which I'll await) I would then propose that the Lord of the rings is a "historical text" as the only definition we have so far is that it is an "old" text. The bible was created by men hundreds of years after the death of Jesus. And as we know groups of men always make the right decisions.
if you believe that the bible used by Catholics is correct and the word of God (again I'll give you the old Testament as you'll be crushed otherwise) there are still problems of translation. God oversaw the printing and translation of all the books? God oversaw the choosing of which texts were included/removed from the Catholic version? Ever heard of Michelangelo's Moses? In the 1500's the world thought Moses had horns because of a mistranslation of the bible. You think that's the only one? or is this correct:?
1 Timothy 2:12 I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet.
1 Corinthians 14:35 If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church.
1 Timothy relates to the role of women in the Church and this passage is typically used during discussion of whether or not women should be ordained as Ministers/Priests. Catholics believe that, as Jesus, and his Apostles (the foundation of the the Church) were men, that women should take complementary roles within the Church structure.
1 Corinthians requires context as well. It is a letter from St. Paul to the Corinth Church that he established in the first Century. He is responding to questions they have regarding his instructions in Church Law. the references to women and silence relate to "public" speaking about the liturgy (which is to be led by men), and not private conversation or singing.
I am probably a little "off" in my response, not being a Bible scholar, but I would have to say that yes, those quotes are correct. but I would remind you, though I doubt it necessary, that context is everything, and pulling quotes in isolation is pretty standard debate practice. I am sure there were other more inflammatory ones you could have used.
This is true of the bible, but as I mentioned in an earlier post, the bible is a collection of documents and letters. As these are letters and documents that tell of events their authors believed to be true, they are historical documents. To put them on a level with a work of fiction like the Lord of The Rings is backwards:
- "these documents are fiction because Jesus didn't exist and do those things"
- "Wait, how do we know Jesus didn't exist and do those things?"
- "There's no historical documents!"
There are copies of NT letters dating from within a hundred years of their writing. So 'hundreds of years' is correct for the collecting, but not for (at least some of) the documents therein.
From what I've learned of the process of creating the bible, it's more likely that stuff that could have made it in didn't than vice versa. Which of course assumes that God didn't work it out that the exact books he wanted in, got in. Note that as a protestant, I don't consider several books of the Catholic bible to be scripture.
Translation errors, omissions and additions? There have no doubt been many, but I am not aware of any with serious ramifications theologically. Moses with horns? Never heard that one, interesting, but again no affect on the narrative of what the teaching of the pentateuch is for us today.
i'm too lazy and sore (crushed my finger moving bricks today), so i won't be commenting on everything here. however, thought i'd add a good link about the specific bible content here:
Skeptic's Annotated Bible / Quran / Book of Mormon
easily anyone can see that there must be errors in the bible and strange additions to the bible. if god meant everything in there, he was really messed up.
some omissions can be found here, but honestly i've never read them:
Not in the Bible
I'm just lazy - so I admit to only looking at about 4 different pages on the Skeptics site.
1 - every biblical scholar and theologian knows all about these 'contradictions', etc.
2 - Some of them are super obvious; for example the genealogies in Matthew and Luke not matching or being 100% consistent. Now, the question is - does that make these books more or less likely to be completely made up? If I was putting a 'Bible' together for my fake religion, I'm pretty sure I'd clear up the glaring inconsistencies. This would indicate that the earliest christians considered the texts authentic - we're talking people whose grandparents or great-grandparents could literally have been witnesses to the events described.
3 - The whole Skeptics thing seems to be based on the King James Version; which while cutting edge in the 17th century, has been long surpassed in quality and accuracy of translation. In many cases because older (closer to the original) portions of some documents have been found.
And to show that reasonable people can disagree, in my denomination we ordain women as ministers, and have since like 1920.
The reason being that even as Paul was writing what would become canonized as scripture, he was also writing a letter to a specific church at a specific time in history/culture. If we fail to understand that, we are likely to misinterpret many things. Like the slavery example I think someone noted earlier (cf. the book of Philemon).