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Okay so, I've been wanting to ask you guys this for a while, so, bear with me. I'm a Christian, but I was raised in a church that believes that everything in the Bible is true. I don't really believe this because, basically, man wrote the Bible. Yes, they tell me that God was speaking through man, but if man is sinful, how can he write a book that's entirely true and valid? Adam and Eve were in direct communication with God, but they still fell into sin. Could the men writing the Bible have done this also? There are so many interpretations of the Bible these days; I just don't know what to believe anymore.

I think its good you are thinking for yourself, i don't think god wants robots without a free will.
I have thought about that before as well. I think what it comes down to is do you believe that jesus was who he said he was? If so he was not just another man, he was a direct link to god, therefore a very trustfull source of information

I definitely believe that Jesus came back and saved me, but some people don't think that's enough...

...or they don't think Christianity fits their beliefs or life. *shrug*

Yeah, but I mean, whatever. People just naturally have a higher power. I don't understand atheists.

Why is it so hard to understand that atheists don't believe in a higher power? We simply don't.

Frankly, I don't understand how people can believe that there is some sort of higher being out there.

No, I understand that you don't believe in a higher power, but I guess it's just the complete opposite of what I believe, which is why I don't understand why you don't believe. It's kinda complicated.

Usually, they are given a reason to believe, and they experience something in their personal lives to solidify said beliefs.

Man wins I know thats not what the thread is aboot, but its the answer to the name of the topic.

Sometimes, I'd swear you're Canadian, lol.

Abra, you can't really take the Bible word for word, anymore. A lot of it is outdated, but if you can distinguish between what works NOW and worked THEN, you'll be fine. The positive teachings usually carry right over. Examples where the non-religious say that the Bible is outdated, otherwise we'd be killing homosexuals and etc is false, as it never claimed to do such a thing, not that it was our will or in our power to do it.

Much has been lost in translation, in regards to both man's interpretation of Jesus' teachings, and how they read in text.

not canadian yet, trying to be though.

I think the Bible has a set of god morals and has to be considered as a philosophical book, not more. As that it has mistakes made by humans scientifically and some morals that are also outdated,, especially the OT.

There were a great many texts that were regarded by both Christians and Jews as having divine authority. Others gave equal weight to the writings of the prophets. Others would have said that the earliest collections of the teachings of Jesus and the narratives of this birth, death and resurrection were to be counted as "inspired." But even within this short list of the most highly regarded texts there was wide room for disagreement with different local communities of faith having their own preferences and producing their own texts. It was not until several centuries later that Christians finally reached consensus about what was to be included in "the Bible."

We humans have a tremendous capacity for filtering, distorting or spinning any text we read, any event we observe, any truth we learn. The biblical writers and editors were no different in this than any of us. Fact is that century after century, generation after generation, people have found wisdom and inspiration upon its pages.

God influenced the Holy Bible, through the Holy Spirit, using men as His instruments. The Holy Bible is the King of religious books. Other books claim divine inspiration as well, such as the Koran, the Book of Mormon, and parts of the (Hindu) Veda. But none of these books contain predictive prophecy.

If you are an intelligent person, you will read the one book that has drawn more attention than any other, if you are searching for the truth.

Welcome to the Holy Bible!

All religious books (including the Holy Bible) are vulnerable to human error to some degree. Regardless, with the wealth of original manuscripts Historians, Archaeologists, and other accredited men and women, are able to confirm the authenticity of the Holy Bible in reference to others.

Let me break this down for you. The Holy Bible and ALL other religious books have been translated numerous times throughout history. To cross reference the accuracy of the new translated scriptures, one must study the original scriptures. Makes sense right?

If I hand you two newspapers with the same headline story, and one contradicts the other, how can you make an intelligent decision in regards to which one is more accurate. Certainly, having one more newspaper to compare the two would help? How about 24,970 other newspapers to aid in your decision process?

The Holy Bible has more original manuscripts to verify present day scripture, than any other religious book in the world! You read right, the Holy Bible has 24,970 original manuscripts. Homer's Iliad is second, with only 643 original manscripts. Obsolutely amazing! In regards to other religious books, the originals are lost and gone forever.

If these other religious books are so divine in nature, where are the lost original manuscripts? And why so few compared to the Holy Bible? And what about false prophecy? If I were a betting man, I'd put my money on the Holy Bible! Hands down.

As far as I know is that yea man did write the bible.But the man that did this was followers of god and also knew him as a person or a man or whatever he is.
But quite interesting thoughts you have.JM

God vs Man?

Is obvious mankind makes a mess of everything. So I'll go with God (if he exists)

Originally posted by ushomefree
God influenced the Holy Bible, through the Holy Spirit, using men as His instruments. The Holy Bible is the King of religious books. Other books claim divine inspiration as well, such as the Koran, the Book of Mormon, and parts of the (Hindu) Veda. But none of these books contain predictive prophecy.

If you are an intelligent person, you will read the one book that has drawn more attention than any other, if you are searching for the truth.

Welcome to the Holy Bible!

All religious books (including the Holy Bible) are vulnerable to human error to some degree. Regardless, with the wealth of original manuscripts Historians, Archaeologists, and other accredited men and women, are able to confirm the authenticity of the Holy Bible in reference to others.

Let me break this down for you. The Holy Bible and ALL other religious books have been translated numerous times throughout history. To cross reference the accuracy of the new translated scriptures, one must study the original scriptures. Makes sense right?

If I hand you two newspapers with the same headline story, and one contradicts the other, how can you make an intelligent decision in regards to which one is more accurate. Certainly, having one more newspaper to compare the two would help? How about 24,970 other newspapers to aid in your decision process?

The Holy Bible has more original manuscripts to verify present day scripture, than any other religious book in the world! You read right, the Holy Bible has 24,970 original manuscripts. Homer's Iliad is second, with only 643 original manscripts. Obsolutely amazing! In regards to other religious books, the originals are lost and gone forever.

If these other religious books are so divine in nature, where are the lost original manuscripts? And why so few compared to the Holy Bible? And what about false prophecy? If I were a betting man, I'd put my money on the Holy Bible! Hands down.

Great answer.

Originally posted by ushomefree
God influenced the Holy Bible, through the Holy Spirit, using men as His instruments. The Holy Bible is the King of religious books. Other books claim divine inspiration as well, such as the Koran, the Book of Mormon, and parts of the (Hindu) Veda. But none of these books contain predictive prophecy.

If you are an intelligent person, you will read the one book that has drawn more attention than any other, if you are searching for the truth.

Welcome to the Holy Bible!

All religious books (including the Holy Bible) are vulnerable to human error to some degree. Regardless, with the wealth of original manuscripts Historians, Archaeologists, and other accredited men and women, are able to confirm the authenticity of the Holy Bible in reference to others.

Let me break this down for you. The Holy Bible and ALL other religious books have been translated numerous times throughout history. To cross reference the accuracy of the new translated scriptures, one must study the original scriptures. Makes sense right?




In ancient times there was no standardized version of the Old Testament. Different Jewish groups and different regions had their own versions. There were the Septuagint, the Aquila, Theodotion's version and Symmachu's version, all containing different text and different numbers of books. The Old Testament used by modern Christians is based on the Massonetic version which only appeared after the Jamnia Synod at the end of the 1st century AD. The New Testament did not appear in its present form until the year 404 AD, nearly four hundred years after the death of Jesus. Before that time, the Gospels of Thomas, the Gospel of Nicodemus, the Acts of Peter, the Acts of Paul and a dozen other books were included in the Bible. In 404 AD these books were simply cut out of the Bible because they contained teachings that were contrary to Christian theology of that time. One of the oldest existing Bibles, The Codex Sinaiticus, includes the Epistle of Barnabas, a book that is not included in the modern Bible. If these books were considered to be revelation by early Christians why don't modern Christians consider them to be revelation?

When we look at the Bibles used by modern Christians we find that there are several different versions. The Bible used by the Ethiopian Church, one of the most ancient of all churches, contains the Books of Enoch and the Shepherd of Hernias which are not found in the versions used by Catholics and Protestants. The Bible used in the Catholic Church contains the books of Judith, Tobias, Banuch, etc which have been cut out of the Bible used in Protestant churches. Prof H.L. Drummingwright of the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in his introduction to the Bible explains how these books came to be cut out of the Bible used by the Protestants. These books were, he says, "in most Protestant Bibles until the 19th century, when publishers, led by the British and Foreign Bible Society voluntarily began to omit them". Once again, these books contained ideas which the churches did not like so they just cut them out. How can a book like Judith be the infallible word. of God one moment and not the next? Why are there so many different versions of the Bible? And which version is the infallible word of God?


In my country i, was raised to believe that I should always think for myself, that I should discern fantasy from reality, that violence is not something that should be glorified, and that God is greater than our ability to describe in words or to limit with ideas. For these reasons, I do not accept the Bible as a unique authority on God or any other subject. That does not mean that I dismiss it entirely, however.

To begin with, I will not accept anything just because it is written in the Bible. As far as I am concerned the Hebrew Scriptures (Old Testament from the Christian point of view) is a collection of the tribal legends, historical records, and religious writings of the ancient Hebrews. I am a modern man - not an ancient Hebrew. Therefore, my entire worldview is informed by scientific data and cultural assumptions that are extremely far removed from those of the ancient Hebrews. Unlike them, just to name a few examples, I am convinced that this universe is billions of years old; that life as it now appears on Earth is part of an ongoing process of evolution; that different languages and dialects developed over time; that it is not an abomination to eat pork, shrimp, or lobster, or to mix beef and dairy products; that slavery is immoral; that it is immoral to execute disrespectful children; and that one is never justified in committing genocide or ethnic cleansing. The ancient Hebrews, however, were ignorant of modern astrophysics, ignorant of geology, ignorant of the fossil record and carbon dating, they believed that all of the existing language groups originated from God's curse at the tower of Babel, they believed that it is an abomination to eat certain kinds of foods or to prepare foods in certain ways, they believed that disrespect to God or one's parent's is a capital offense, they practiced slavery, and they believed that God had commanded them to kill every man, woman, and child in certain towns during the conquest of the promised land (in other cases the men and boys were killed and the woman and girls enslaved). So, for scientific and moral reasons I do not view the Bible as an authority.

The Bible also relates stories wherein a donkey speaks to its master, a flood covers the entire world and all life on earth today is descended from only the animals aboard Noah's ark, a woman turns into a pillar of salt, people are lifted up bodily into the heavens never to return, the sun stands still in the sky, and finally a man physically comes back from the dead and proceeds to walk through walls and ascend bodily into the heavens. I am leaving out a lot of other miraculous tales that are either logistically impossible, or which could be explained in a more rational way. The point is that the reality I live in does not operate that way, and I have never been given any good reason to believe that any of these things happened in real life other than the testimony of the ancient Hebrews who (as I said) had a prescientific mythical worldview; and the testimony of a small sect of Judaism which became the nucleus of a minor mystery religion in the Roman Empire, which eventually became the official religion of that empire, which then become the reigning religious ideology of various European nation-states. I must say that I require objective, empirical, and verifiable and irrefutable evidence before I throw common sense out the window and accept that any of these things happened in real life.

I apply the same standard to the more fantastical stories and anecdotes which appears of 84,000 doctrines in Buddhism which is 5 times larger manuscripts than the Holy Bible. In Buddhism, however, the fantastic elements are never the main point and they almost always exist to underscore a point that does make sense. In most cases, the metaphorical nature of the supernatural and miraculous in Buddhism is very easy to see and the Buddhist scriptures themselves state that they are using metaphorical language on many occasions.

I also cannot accept the Biblical God's use of violence, terror, and threats to get people to do what He wants. This includes Joshua's conquest of the promised land, the behavior of the Judges, Jesus and St. Paul's threats of eternal damnation for those who do not believe, and finally the Armageddon promised in the Book of Revelations. Jesus even says at one point that he comes not to bring peace but a sword to divide families against one another (Matthew 10:34). It seems to me that the violence and threats of violence in the Bible are nothing more than a very human way of abdicating responsibility and laying all of our very human shortcomings at God's door. I do not accept the Biblical portrait of a God who commands, condones, and makes use of violence and terror.

If the Bible really is God's word it indicates that he is a very strange being indeed One would expect that the creator of the universe would only speak to man when he had something of great importance to say and that what he said would be of universal significance. Not so. The book of Chronicles for example consists of little more than lists of names of people we know little or nothing about and who died thousands of years ago. No commandments, no ethical principles, no hints on how to live properly or to worship God - just page after page of useless names. Why would God waste his and our time revealing such things? And what about the Songs of Solomon? This book consists of a collection of erotic love poetry. Once again, with the world in such a mess one would have supposed that God could have thought of something more important to say to man than this.

Then we come to the Gospels which recount the life of Jesus. Why has God decided to reveal the whole of Jesus' biography, not once, but four times? And why has he revealed what are, quite clearly, four different and contradictory versions of the same story? Unlike Christians, historians have given perfectly plausible answers to these questions. The Bible is not a revelation from God, rather it is a compilation, a fairly untidy compilation, written by many different people, over many centuries, changed and edited from time to time, and containing legends, stories, genealogies, fables, sacred and secular writings. It is no more a revelation from God than are the Iliad or the Odyssey, the Ramayana or the Mahabharata, books which the Holy Bible resembles quite closely.

man vs god? a better question would be Evil Dead vs God. I've been challenging that pussy to a debate/fight/whatever he wants for years now............he just keeps ducking and dodging. It's either because he's non-existant.......or he's the biggest pussy ever. It must be the former as millions of people say he does indeed exist........they know because some cave dweller wrote it down a couple thousand years ago that he existed.

Originally posted by Abra
Okay so, I've been wanting to ask you guys this for a while, so, bear with me. I'm a Christian, but I was raised in a church that believes that everything in the Bible is true. I don't really believe this because, basically, man wrote the Bible. Yes, they tell me that God was speaking through man, but if man is sinful, how can he write a book that's entirely true and valid? Adam and Eve were in direct communication with God, but they still fell into sin. Could the men writing the Bible have done this also? There are so many interpretations of the Bible these days; I just don't know what to believe anymore.

I like your reasoning. I wish everyone was as open minded as you.

If you doubt something, then there is a probably a reason for your doubt. If God gave you a brain he would expect you to use it, and you are.

Originally posted by ushomefree

All religious books (including the Holy Bible) are vulnerable to human error to some degree. Regardless, with the wealth of original manuscripts Historians, Archaeologists, and other accredited men and women, are able to confirm the authenticity of the Holy Bible in reference to others.

Let me break this down for you. The Holy Bible and ALL other religious books have been translated numerous times throughout history. To cross reference the accuracy of the new translated scriptures, one must study the original scriptures. Makes sense right?

If these other religious books are so divine in nature, where are the lost original manuscripts? And why so few compared to the Holy Bible? And what about false prophecy? If I were a betting man, I'd put my money on the Holy Bible! Hands down.

Buddhism is vast array of sutras containing of the so-called 84,000 teachings which is 5 times larger of the manuscripts of the holy Bible or the doctrines containing therein. Sutras are recorded Buddha's teachings transmitted orally by the Buddha's disciples and written it down into words exactly what the Buddha taught. Unlike the Bible, original Buddhist sutras or manuscripts never been cutted or removed or changed from its original text and verses throughout time of its history. Thus , Buddhism in general remains its real purpose and the spirit of of Buddha's teachings NOT have been tainted, obscured or lost.

Originally posted by 42Bardock
Man wins I know thats not what the thread is aboot, but its the answer to the name of the topic. Look, look...it's me

Originally posted by Abra
Okay so, I've been wanting to ask you guys this for a while, so, bear with me. I'm a Christian, but I was raised in a church that believes that everything in the Bible is true. I don't really believe this because, basically, man wrote the Bible. Yes, they tell me that God was speaking through man, but if man is sinful, how can he write a book that's entirely true and valid? Adam and Eve were in direct communication with God, but they still fell into sin. Could the men writing the Bible have done this also? There are so many interpretations of the Bible these days; I just don't know what to believe anymore.

I admire your character of being broad-minded personality. I wish people here have the same mind or an attitude that a seeker of the Way must emulate.

As we are told by this open-minded and spirited religious leader:

"Don't believe in anything simply because you heard it.
Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations.
Do not believe in anything because it is spoken and rumored by many.
Do not believe in anything simply because it is found written in your religious books.
Do not believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers and elders.
But after observation and analysis, you find that anything agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all, then accept and live up to it." --Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha

Originally posted by mahasattva
And what about the Songs of Solomon? This book consists of a collection of erotic love poetry. Once again, with the world in such a mess one would have supposed that God could have thought of something more important to say to man than this.




Song of Solomon 8:1-2

"O that thou wert as my brother, that sucked the breasts of my mother! when I should find thee without, I would kiss thee; yea, I should not be despised. I would lead thee, and bring thee into my mother's house, who would instruct me: I would cause thee to drink of spiced wine of the juice of my pomegranate."

*BONERZ*

Originally posted by Bardock42
Look, look...it's me

Or more like an evil mirror Bardock42 caused by a transporter accident... I just bet 42Bardock has a goatee, is female and lives in France (not necessarily in that order.)

Star Trek should have had more wacky transporter accidents.