Part 36 of Post Your Tough Questions Regarding Christianity

Speaking of getouts mate,you were a churchgoer and church organist for years, congratulations for finally getting out but sadly the bad vibes in there tainted you against Christianity.
I know other ex-religionists in the same boat, they eventually quit their churches but the demons they picked up there have still got a hold on them, influencing their thought processes.
Me, I've never been a churchgoer, I briefly tried a few churches years ago but thought "what the hell am I doing here?" and soon walked out..

 

Nah mate, it'd have been simplicity itself to cross out bits they didn't like, for example Moses admitted to being unable to think on his feet-
"O Lord, I have never been eloquent, I'm slow of speech and tongue..send somebody else." (Exodus 4:10)
And Jonah refused pointblank to be a prophet and jumped on a ship to escape, bad call -
"Jonah ran away from the Lord and headed for Tarshish." (Jonah 1:3)
And young Jeremiah tried to talk his way out of the job -
"Lord i'm no good at speaking, i'm too young and people won't take me seriously" (Jer 1:6)
and the disciples ran off when Jesus was arrested- "Then all the disciples deserted him and fled" (Matt 26:56)
and Peter later denied being Jesus's mate- “I don’t know the man!”(Matt 26:72)

The moral?- the fact that bits like that have not been edited out, (even though they show people in a less-than-perfect light), speaks volumes for the Bible's integrity..

 

If the Bible was neat and tidy like a glossy conmans brochure it'd be too squeaky-clean to be true, so be glad the contradictions haven't been edited out or modified in any way..
As for some newer versions, they try to be pol-correct, so take them with a pinch of salt.
Personally I use the dynamic duo of the dear old King James for its fearlessness, and the NIV (New International Version) for its modern language, they complement each other nicely..

 

The Hittites has horses. The Jews didn't.

 

Yes, for example for centuries atheists said Nazareth never existed in Jesus's time until modern digs proved them wrong..

 

Some did..-
"And Solomon had forty thousand stalls of horses for his chariots, and twelve thousand horsemen" (1 Kings 4:26)

 

The Hittites and Amorites were therefore mingled together in the mountains of Palestine like the two races which ethnologists tell us go to form the modern Kelt.

But the Egyptian monuments teach us that they were of very different origin and character. The Hittites were a people with yellow skins and 'Mongoloid' features, whose receding foreheads, oblique eyes, and protruding upper jaws, are represented as faithfully on their own monuments as they are on those of Egypt, so that we cannot accuse the Egyptian artists of caricaturing their enemies. If the Egyptians have made the Hittites ugly, it was because they were so in reality.

The Amorites, on the contrary, were a tall and handsome people. They are depicted with white skins, blue eyes, and reddish hair, all the characteristics, in fact, of the white race. Mr. Petrie points out their resemblance to the Dardanians of Asia Minor, who form an intermediate link between the white-skinned tribes of the Greek seas and the fair-complexioned Libyans of Northern Africa. The latter are still found in large numbers in the mountainous regions which stretch eastward from Morocco, and are usually known among the French under the name of Kabyles.

The traveller who first meets with them in Algeria cannot fail to be struck by their likeness to a certain part of the population in the British Isles.

Their clear-white freckled skins, their blue eyes, their golden-red hair and tall stature, remind him of the fair Kelts of an Irish village; and when we find that their skulls, which are of the so-called dolichocephalic or 'long-headed' type, are the same as the skulls discovered in the [16] prehistoric cromlechs of the country they still inhabit, we may conclude that they represent the modern descendants of the white-skinned Libyans of the Egyptian monuments.

http://www.attalus.org/armenian/hsfe1.htm

 

That is a lie. Solomon may have had a few horses, but Solomon's Stables were built by Omri much later.. and were only large enough for goats.. so perhaps they were store houses rather than stables.

Archeologists have never excavated any horse bones in Palestine.

There's little water and pasture so it makes sense.

 

Tell it to Solomon..
"Solomon accumulated chariots and horses...the royal merchants purchased them from Kue at the current price.They imported a chariot from Egypt for six hundred shekels of silver, and a horse for a hundred and fifty" (1 Kings 10:26-29)

 

Its a lie.. After being exposed to the Babylonian civilization which was prosperous and grand.. and had a rich history of mythology etc, the Jews created a history and identity for themselves.. making Solomon and Israel very grand indeed.

Jerusalem was never more than a whistlestop on the trade route .. in bandit territory. Probably wasn't bigger than 30 acres and 2,000 people. Archeologists have done a lot of work in Palestine. In David's time it was probably 12 acres.

Nazareth in the first century was less than 200 people.

 

19 And the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth; and all the high hills, that were under the whole heaven, were covered.
20 Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail; and the mountains were covered.
​

Do you believe that Mt Everest was covered by the waters?
Does (20) meant that Everest was covered by 20 feet of water?

 

Do you have any evidence to support your assertion that: for centuries atheists said Nazareth never existed in Jesus's time.

 

What exactly is your proof atheists said that "for centuries"?

 

I use Joseph Smith as an example because it's a perfect one for pointing out your hypocrisy and your willingness to use the special pleading logical fallacy with abandon.

 

Now all you have to do is prove Matthew and John actually wrote the Gospels that are named after them.

Being a Mormon was a dangerous business. Why would Joseph Smith and his followers invent Mormonism?

They got murdered by mobs led by Snooty Priests who you apologize for.

Why would someone sit down a write a "pack of lies" in the Quran or the Book of Mormon?

 

The only bad vibes were from studying a book I once believed inspired and finding so many errors it was unbelievable. But you are quite happy to accept the unbelievable. You believe that Jesus was forecast on the OT by taking verses out of context. Of course, Jesus was a prophet. Didn't the woman of Samaria say 'Sir, I perceive thou art a prophet'. Study of the context of the story gives the true meaning of what the woman came to believe, even as study of the OT would prove that your interpretation is wrong. But you want to focus on the NT - that which depends entirely on the OT for its existence. Remove the OT and you have no origin for the Preacher Jesus, other than that he was born. The 'virgin' birth, the events surrounding the Nativity in 'Matthew's' gospel are all stolen from the OT. What we have is a Jewish preacher to whom are ascribed 'miracles'.

 

That's a load of rubbish. The fact that we know the Hittites, their history and their Empire actually disproves the Bible.

I said it before. Abraham must have existed around 2100/2000 BCE. Ur was destroyed by Elamites around that time. The Hittites were newcomers to the region - arriving 1700/1600BCE. Their empire was at its greatest 1500BCE. Therefore 'Abraham' could not have bought land from them. He would have been dead 300 years at the least..
So-called 'Moses' was around 1400BCE. places 'Abraham' in Ur of the Chaldees. The Chaldeans came 1000 years later than Abraham and 400 years later than Moses, so how would Moses know the Chaldeans?

 

More reason to believe that Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Galilee - 8 miles from Nazareth. Ignore all Matthews quotes wrongly taken from the OT and Constantines wife deciding the site. Bethlehem in Galilee is the likely place for Jesus birth.

 

Here ya go mate, these people all made fools of themselves..-

Rene Salm has challenged the historical Nazareth in his The Myth of Nazareth: The Invented Town of Jesus (American Atheist Press, 2008 )
http://www.normgeisler.com/articles/Bible/Reliability/2012-IsNazarethAMyth.htm
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The evidence for a 1st century town of Nazareth does not exist – not literary, not archaeological, and not historical. It is an imaginary city for an imaginary god-man.
http://www.jesusneverexisted.com/nazareth.html
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Frank Zindler, editor of American Atheist Magazine, has asserted that Nazareth did not exist in the first century. His arguments include the following:
http://www.nairaland.com/120059/myth-nazareth-did-historical-jesus

 

1- You have to prove Matthew and John didn't write their gospels..
2- who said snooty priests led the mob? They were mostly ordinary decent citizens who were outraged because Smith had 35 wives including a 14-year-old girl, and because Mormons call Christians "fools".
3- Mohammed married a little girl too, and muslims call Christians "liars".
You can like Smith and Moh if you want, but I prefer that carpenter bloke from Nazareth..

 

1. Not the way proof works. The group making the positive claim have the burden of proof. It is on Christians to prove Matthew and John actually wrote those Gospels. Until they do, their claims can be dismissed out of hand.

2. There were at least two local priests among the mob that killed Smith.

3. So then you admit that religious leaders can and do write lies in books and that that logic can be applied just as equally to the Gospels?

 

You and your atheist chums are funny guys mate, between you you've called the Bible-writers "liars", "conmen" and now "thieves"!
I've told you all before, control your demons of suspicion and mistrust, don't let them control you..

WIKI- Paranoid personality disorder
is a psychiatric diagnosis characterised by a pervasive and long-standing suspiciousness and generalized mistrust of others,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paranoid_personality_disorder

 

When Smith got killed every guy in American was banging fourteen girls or younger if they could get their hands on one.

 

1- No mate, it's up to you consp-theorists to prove your outrageoas claims. You'll be telling us next that man never walked on the moon and that the US Govt did 9/11..
2- Prove it was priests who returned fire when Smith started shooting..
3- Why on earth would the early Christians want to invent Jesus and get themselves killed? That's a question atheists have never been able to answer..

 

People love dying for causes, especially for religious and patriotic causes because it makes them feel special. The treat for the Christians was that they would gain eternal life for getting killed for their faith. It was just a big death cult.