How do you know the Bible is from God?

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now dont go putting words into my mouth. I am sure you have a good appreciation of science, which makes it all the more remarkable that when it comes to religion and supposed godly experiences you appear to be ignoring or at least excusing your your beliefs from science.

Homo sapien sapien. Our kind of critter. And we know of no other source of written language than other humans past and present. It would be very exciting to find a communication that makes sense to us that was not produced by other humans but this has not yet happened.

ruveyn

You choose to be vague with your answer. This often indicates deception and a lack of willingness to be honest with oneself. If you're certain God is in your life, and in the lives of others, then how do you sense Him exactly?

So it's reasonable for us to believe that you exist ... even, if in the long run, we are ultimately wrong.



It may be distantly possible but not reasonably likely. We don't have conclusive evidence that, if God does exist, He is a personal God who is in our lives and who supernaturally inspires a select few to write a bunch of books.

Therefore, it's not reasonable to accept that the Bible could've indeed been inspired by God just as it's not reasonable to accept that there could be an invisible three-headed Cerberus guarding the fig tree in the backyard of my house.

There are communications that do NOT make sense to us [yet, always insert "yet"].

The Phaistos disk, the Lemnian inscritions, and the Harappan writing are probably [if not certainly] human because of imbedded or associated iconography.

But there are indecipherable probable instances of writing or pictography whose humanity is not [yet] verifiable.

You've chosen not to give us a proper answer due to it being too "private" to discuss. But then how can we know you're telling the truth - that you really did experience something spiritual, that's made it clear beyond reasonable doubt, that God, as described in the Bible, is in your life?

Give it up ... they'll never admit to knowing that there is no material evidence to prove the validity of their faith. Even Biblical "Evidence" is faith-based, the root of which exists solely in the mind of the Believer.

Just once, I'd like to read a post addressed to me by my real name, and that says "In His infinite mercy, God has healed your afflictions. Give thanks and go in peace" (or something like that), and to immediately receive complete healing and rejuvenation.

THAT would prove the existence of God, Biblical validity, and prophets in the general population.

Any takers?





<* Insert sound of crickets here *>

There is no stupidity like that of those who have chosen it.

A. I have said several times - and I think you will find others have said the same - that there is no evidence [yet] available for the materialist. That is part of why much of contemporary science insists on exclusively material evidencence You cannot find what you define as outside your field of vision.

So much for THAT nonsense: "they'll never admit to knowing that there is no material evidence"

B. If you were capable of intellectual honesty AND of serious thought you would nor repeat THIS nonsensical mantra: "Faith...the root of which exists solely in the mind of the Believer."

C. I will pray that you DO receive what you need from God. But rejuvenation is not part of it - this place is temporary and asking for rejuvenation is ridiculous.

D. When and if God does a work in you, YOU wlll have proof. And you will find as the rest of us do that you cannot use that proof to convince those who demand a sign of you - because THIS is also nonsense: "THAT would prove the existence of God, Biblical validity, and prophets in the general population."

I am sorry if my previous post was a bit aggressive; I falsely reached the conclusion that you were implying that I deny science. What I do find interesting is the new implication that you are making that I am excusing my beliefs from science. I see no reason to think the science contains within the limits of reason; it cannot function without logical inference to begin with and there are good reasons to think that one needs God in order to ground logic (because if abstract objects exist we have good reasons for thinking that they are not mind independent).



The question of how I would describe it to you is a separate one. As is the question of what constitutes 'reasonable doubt'. Take the biologist and philosopher David Wood (recent antics aside), he was an atheist who sat down and took stock of the historical argument for the Resurrection of Jesus and from this, became a Christian. While the Resurrection Argument gets on to Christ; there are dozens of arguments for the existence of God. For example, from natural theology; the Kalam and Cosmological Arguement from Contingency. Or there are presuppositional arguments, like the transcendental and moral arguments. Or there is Planting's Ontological argument from modal logic. There are dozens of other arguments that can be easily found in the writings of modern philosophers.

If the bible or Torah had not been divinely inspired, it would not have been written, and/or certainly not in the way we receive it today. It's genius is unrivaled, grant what you will the authors but no one deny's the intelligence of its authors and the concepts they deal with are too great to have been just thought up by some desert people.

I would take his word that he believes in the things that he does, and that he has found a path to God.

His ethics and the sum totality of his/her actions would determine whether that path is the right one or not, but that is the point: It is not his religion(theistic, political, social, etc.) that determines the truthiness of anything - it is his actions and the way he behaves towards other. If your religion or lack thereof makes you a better person in the way you act or behave, wherein you care about and try to behave ethical as often as possible, give to charity, help the widowed, orphaned, and homeless, help the victims of spousal abuse, feed the hungry, etc, then go for it. I can find common ground with good people in that way, and though they speak as if Goodness is sourced from and exclusive to them, their religion, and their God(or, for some atheists, the total absence of theistic religion), I can still relate on a more basic level, you know the part that instructs to do the above and try to be ethical every day.

Well I am presuming (yes I do realise assumptions can be the mother of all f-ups) that you are a Christian, who believes the bible to be the word of god and that this god is interventionist. If you answer yes to any of these then it is my belief that you have a far degree of cognitive dissonance occurring. Of course if you are a deist then this maybe does not apply, although given our rapidly expanding knowledge of our universe and the many proposed theories I feel those in the Deist camp are rapidly running out of time.


With regard to my anti-theism it has nothing to do with any personal prejudices aimed at myself, rather the damage some believers do in the pursuit of keeping the world 'moral' according to their religious beliefs anti: abortion, embryonic stem cell use, homosexuality and womens rights being highly placed in my reasoning

I actually think the evidence runs the other way.



Well I could list moral relativism, determinism, utopianism and the end of religious liberty as serious worries I have with atheism. These issues however are not central to the truth of the mater nor are they necessary beliefs with regards to the central message of either. The real question relates to the truth of the proposition 'that God exists'. I actually don't even think that the opposite can be reached using purely naturalistic induction (see the creationists thread).

If the proposition "God exists" cannot be verified by empirical means and its negation cannot be verified by empirical means nor falsified then it can be ignored. Why waste time and energy (both available only in finite amounts) on such unresolvable stuff?

ruveyn

Around the same time as Genesis and Exodus are supposed to have been written, Plato was writing The Republic, which deals with much greater concepts than the Torah. Most of the Torah is very similar to the stories circulating at the time, and three of the five books were essentially lists of laws. The equivalent Hindhu texts are much more spiritual and were written even earlier.

I'm a liberal Christian. I don't think the Bible is divinely inspired all the way through by any means. I imagine sections of it were created by the Jews to scare their enemies, or adopted by the Jews from enemies who had previously used it to scare their enemies. I think other sections are just-so stories, other sections were people recording the ways they worshipped God (e.g. Psalms), the letters were just attempts to frighten enemies of Christianity in more elaborate ways, and Revelations is straight up rubbish. Doubtless rulers and translators changed passages to suit themselves.

I believe in God because I have experienced the Holy Spirit. I don't expect anybody to take my word for it, and I don't force my religion on people. I choose to focus on Christianity because I think the general nature of the Christian God seems to fit with the God I experienced best, but I draw my teachings from all manner of religions.

Translation: If there is no difference between a thing being real and the same thing being not real, then it follows that the thing is not real.

Why waste the time? Trolling is fun!

True, these in-your-face Theists can all hide behind their interpretations of ethics, morality, and righteousness; but trolls are still trolls, no matter how "godly" they may think themselves to be.

A troll is a troll is a troll...