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Friday, 07 November 2008

Does God exist?

(Note: The existance of God will always be a subject for debate. Know that this is simply what I have found, what I have written is up to your interpretation to agree or disagree. take from it what you will.) (I will include some science in this blog, but before you read it, you need to come to the realization that science does not have all the answers, even most scientists realize this).

Does God Exist?
Anthony Flew was one of the world's most famous influential atheistic philosopher, debator, and author for decades.
In 2004, he started changing his mind.

Can you go on living your entire short life in view of the stars, sun, moon, mountains, river, complexity of life, etc. and think these things came into being by nothing and from nothing? Some would say that the existence of the universe itself is proof that God exists. But i think it is important to take a deeper look.

Three options for the Existance of the Universe:
- It has always been (infinite universe)
- It created itself
- It was created by something/someone outside of itself

The idea of an Infinate Universe
An infinite universe would have to exist in every direction forever
The notion that the universe is infinate cannot be empirically justified in any way. It is a metaphysical proposition. This idea has been refuted by the majority of the scientific community, because of the fact that the universe is expanding. If the universe is expanding, the spacial dimensions themselves are expanding, thus we can say that at this very moment in time, the universe is finite. (of course this is up for discussion)

Has the universe existed infinately in the past. The answer to this is no, according to most scientists (including NASA). We do have the evidences of a background radiation echo (the "echo" of the big bang). The relative motion of the galaxies are also evidance that point to the idea that the universe came about at one point in time. This "big bang" has been thought of to be the point when all physical space, time, matter, and energy came into existance. Stephen Hawkings, agnostic astronomer from Cambridge - "Almost everyone believes that the universe, and time itself, had a beginning.
(random bible fact: the Bible agrees that the universe's existance began at a particular point in time, written 3,000 years before the scientific community made the conclusion)

Thus the idea that the universe has always been is refuted by the scientific community.
I'll also note that the second law of thermodynamics implies that the universe (if considered as a closed system) will go toward a state of disorder. If the universe existed infinately, we would have reached a state of total entropy by now.

Thus, we are left with two options: that the universe created itself, or that it was created by someone or something outside of itself.

The idea that the universe created itself
Many would say that philosophically this is impossible.
Before the universe came into existance there was no universe. Just thought I'd clear that up ;).
What was around before the universe came into being?. atheists will say "nothing". Nothing is the absence of physical matter, time, space, and energy. The only thing nothing can produce is nothing. Nothing is an infinate void, it would have no bounderies, thus eliminating the possibility of anything existing anywhere. Nothing is unable to create anything. we can even see this mathematically. If you tried to divide the number 5 over zero, as if trying to divide the number zero by 5, you cannot even get five portions of one zero, your calculator will say "error". To divide 5 out of zero, would be like trying to take 5 somethings out of nothing. It isn't possible. Nothing always just makes nothing, and nothing else. It is a scientific Fact: The Law of Conservation. It has been observed, repeated, and thus proven that nothing can come from nothing. If you were to observe a vacuum for hours, it would still be a vacuum. Before the universe existed, it would not have been around to do the creating. "Nothing" cannot see, smell, act, think, or create. You cannot even call nothing an "it".
Was it necessary for me to elaborate on this? No. I feel foolish for talking about "nothing" this whole time, "nothing" is also the absence of meaning.

Thus, both options one and two can be thrown out of the scientific and philosophical communities. and we are left with the third option:

The idea that the universe was created by someone or something outside of itself
God?

I mentioned early in this blog that you could say that the existence of the universe is proof itself to the fact of the existence of a God. Let me elaborate a bit.

Imagine that you are viewing a painting. It is a fine work of art. Do you need proof to establish the fact that the painter exists? Do you need to see the painter to believe that he or she exists? I'd say the painting would not be there if the painter did not exist. I'd also venture to say that we can say the same thing about the universe (the giant painting).

Does it take more faith to believe that the universe existed from nothing, or a God?

Life.. It's Complicating (Intelligent Design and the Complexity of Life)

Here's a funny story by Charlie Cambell that you might enjoy. warning, i'm getting the feeling that some people might feel a little annoyed by this due to its vagueness, Its just a random story about intelligent life:

"Let’s imagine for a few minutes that you have decided to go on a two week cruise to Tahiti. It seemed like a good idea but someone forgot to check the weather report. And much to your horror, the largest storm that the South Pacific has ever seen capsizes your cruise liner and sends you and the others out into the middle of the Pacific Ocean for a night.
You awake to find yourself shipwrecked on an island somewhere in the South Pacific. As you walk around the island with one of the other survivors, you begin to wonder if there might be any intelligent life there on the island that may be able to help you get home. As you’re walking along the shore you spot something lying there in the sand. Upon closer examination you discover what appears to be an arrowhead.
Question: After this discovery, what do you think the chances are that human life might exist on the island? Pretty good. It may not be the kind of intelligent life you are hoping for. It may be a tribe of headhunters!
Much to your surprise, the other person who survived the shipwreck with you, suggests that, “Perhaps over billions of years the wind and the waves and the rising and falling of the tides just happened to form a rock that looks like an arrowhead.”
Finding that hard to believe, you agree to remain open-minded and continue searching. Another mile down the beach, you discover what appears to be a canoe anchored up on the shoreline. Now you’re convinced that some sort of intelligent life must exist on the island! But just in time to dampen your enthusiasm, your new friend and fellow shipwreck survivor suggests that…
“Perhaps millions of years of storms and waves just shaped a pile of driftwood into what appears to be a well designed canoe-shaped boat. We need to be open-minded.”
Finding that statement even harder to believe than the comments about the arrowhead, you agree to continue searching. A hundred yards down the beach you encounter what appears to be writing in the sand. The letters spell out the simple phrase: “Beach Time!” You look over at your open-minded evolutionist friend only to hear him say:
“Perhaps the wind and the waves just formed that sequence of letters.”
Now, what would you say to this person who thinks that simple things like arrowheads, canoes and letters in the sand may have evolved?"

Many would suggest that the design behind life and life-forms is too complex to occur by chance. I am aware of the notion that: the universe is big, big enough for the chance that somewhere, somehow, something like earth can happen. I am not settled with this notion, however. How would you explain their fascinating beauty, design, and complex concepts behind everything? A design of the universe and our very lives as such that not even the smartest scientist has been able to figure out.
Lets take it into perspective.
Consider the Human body. You cannot deny that the Human Body is incredibly complex with its Nervous system, cardiovascular system, reproductive capability, skeletal system, muscle system, digestive system, ability to heal itself, and its ability to fight off diseases, (each aspect very complex in itself, it takes doctors with years and years of schooling to learn this stuff, and we still don't know all the answers to our bodies). 206 bones, 640 muscles, hearts that beat over 100,000 times a day. Mindless random process, pure chance, and random series of accidents?
If you could leave a barren mountain to be exposed by wind, rain, the forces of nature, chance, and a million years would you be able to observe something like Mt. Rushmore (which took 400 workers 14 years to create, and George and Abe can't even talk or smile at you), or even human life? (how much more intelligence would it take to create a living breathing human being? Not even we can do that. Consider how it takes great intelligence to create a Robot, and computer evolution has to be so dramatically manipulated that it can hardly even be called evolution)
I find it very logical to conclude that it takes intelligence/intelligent intervention to form such complexity. As big as the universe is, such undirected random acts (especially when a system is increasing in entropy) would produce this kind of complexity, beauty, and even our very own intelligence. The brain itself is a "machine more wonderful than any devised by humans" that it holds enough information to "fill some twenty million volumes" - agnostic astronomer Carl Sagan.
Thus, many evolutionists believe that this "machine more wonderful than any devised by humans" came into existance from nothing, and then evolved via mindless, random series of accidents? Does it take more faith to believe in this or a God?
lets look more at how remarkable we are:
"Consider the human eye. The eye is a ball with a lens on one side and a light sensitive retina made up of rods and cones inside the other. The lens itself has a sturdy protective covering called a cornea and sits over an iris designed to protect the eye from excessive light. The eye contains a fantastic watery substance that is replaced every four hours. Tear glands continuously flush the outside clean. An eyelid sweeps secretions over the cornea to keep it moist. Eyelashes protect it from dust. And extraordinarily fine tuned muscles are attached to the eye that move the eye and shape the lens for the function of focus." - Charlie Cambell
The eye is more complex and advanced than the world's greatest auto-focus camera, and the camera took millions of dollars and many years for researchers and developers to design and create. Do you believe something as complex as the eye came together by mindless process and random series of accidents?
Check out a quote from Charles Darwin concerning the eye:
On The Origin of Species (1859) - "To suppose that the eye, with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic aberration could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest possible regard." (p.217)
Okay we considered the eye, brain, etc. But what about something as small as a living cell? Measures less than a thousandth of an inch indiameter. Dr. Walter Bradley, respected scientist and author of The Mystery of Life's Origin - "A one-cell organism is more complicated than anything we've been able to recreate through supercomputers".
Linus Pauling, chemist and Nobel Prize winner - "Just one living cell in the human body is, more complex than New York city."
New York city? with 8 million residents, largest most complex city in the U.S. We're just talking about one cell here. Your body is comprised of more than thousands of different kinds of cells. A total of over 100 trillion AND your body makes millions of new ones ever second and they all work together.
It has taken mankind thousands of years to make an ipod nano, not even close to compare with the information storage capacity of DNA. Need a better view on that?: The amount of information that is stored in a pinhead's volume of DNA found in cells is the equivalent of 500 piles of books stretching from the Earth to the Moon. I'm not talking about random information and incoherent sequence of letters. I'm talkin about detailed complex information and instruction that tells cells how to function.
Where did the staggering amount of complex detailed information in a cell's DNA come from? Microsofts best computer program cannot write itself. A programmer is involved. I'd say the same holds true for DNA
you have one of two options to decide on:
1. that it came by pure chance, and random accidents
2. That somebody programmed the information into the DNA

“It now seems to me that the findings of more than fifty years of DNA research have provided materials for a new and enormously powerful argument to design….What I think the DNA material has done is show that intelligence must have been involved.” - Antony Flew (who up until 2004 was considered one of the world's most influential atheistic philosopher, author, and debator).
check out www.DissentFromDarwin.org
Need scientific proof for the existance of God? Is the idea of intellectual design unscientific? Isaac Newton, Johannes Kepler, Galileo Galilei, and Blaise Pascal beleived in God's existence.
Just considering the complexity I talked about (And I brushed up on only a few topics) I believe points to an intelligent designer.
If A God existed, wouldn't he have made himself known to us?
I'd say he already has. He gave us the ability to discover and think. God wants us to use our minds.
(Personally, I believe that Jesus Christ and the Bible are also ways God reveiled himself (check out my previous blog for more on this))

Consider Yourself
Athiests may suggest that we are just a process and a part of the universe and nothing more. Like electrons in their motions, not quite knowing their purpose and not quite important, but still doing their job as a part of the larger part of the universe.

I find it hard to accept the idea humans have equality to the rest of the universe.
Humans, unlike the rest of the universe (even animals), have the abilities to discover and engage in critical thinking and be intellectual. We are able to observe our surroundings and make judgements on them (not just instincts). We have the ability to understand concepts of morality, immorality, and justice. We can forgive, we can be inspired. We can invent. We can look at ourselves and change as people. We experience emotions where people would die for the sake of others. We create war, we make peace. We can create beauty, and art. We can master our bodies in olympic sports and performance dance. we have culture. etc. We can communicate and debate on deep levels. From everything we know to exist, we alone have the ability to understand what we do, the world, and the universe.
Humans are different. Humans are special. We cannot be compared to a rock or even a star, as some form of meaningless process.
I believe there is an intelligent, living, internal power, beyond the universe, that created the universe.

It takes an intelligent being to create an intelligent human being.

(this next part is my advice to atheists, if you feel like your already getting offended then you might not want to read the rest (my experience with some atheists is that they tend to get defensive and offended easily), even though there is honestly absolutely no offence intended. If you have read thus far, it shows that you are open minded to that degree and thats awesome. Read the rest or not, its your choice)

I encourage you to examine yourself as an atheist and your claim against the existance of God.
In order to make a claim that God does not exist, you would have to be omnicsient and omnipresent to be able to make the claim out of your own pool of knowledge. Only someone who can be in all places at the same time with a perfect knowledge of the universe can make that kind of a statement based on facts. You'd have to be God to legitimately say there is no God.

I encourage you to be a little more open minded.
Consider your knowledge. Think of prestegious libraries like the library of congress in Washington D.C. and all of their scholarly books.In comparison to all the possible knowledge there is to have, how much knowledge in percentage of that do you have? Most people would say only a fraction of a percent (myself included). Do you think that the logical possibility that God exists inside the very large percentage of knowledge and experience that you have not gone through?

I encourage you to reconsider your claim that God doesn't exist due to the presence of evil in the world
By what process do you distinguish evil from good? to say that "you just know, its innate" is not an acceptable answer. (ex: People in some cultures think human slaughter sacrifice is good, would they say its innate?). I want to stress the importance of finding how it is you can distinguish evil from good. Allow me to suggest that I personally have found that the only way you can do this is if you have an infinite reference point that is absolutely good. I'd say there's no way to point north or south without the absolute reference point of the compass needle. I'd venture to continue by suggesting that the infinite reference point between morality and immorality can only be found in the person of God, for He alone can exhaust the definition of "absolutely good".
If God does not exist, there are no moral absolutes, thus you have no right to judge something (or someone) as being evil. In a Godless world we may have a judicial system for the sake of our survival and to keep things from becoming chaotic, however, nothing about the chaos will be good or evil, immoral or moral, anything goes, your family may be killed in front of your very eyes and you wouldn't be able to claim that it is evil due to the claim that its "obvious" or "innate". If God does not exist there is no ultimate basis to judge crimes. See if you make a claim that God doesn't exist because evil exists, in actuality the reality of evil requires the existance of God, rather than disprove it.

Why isn't God dealing with all the evil in the world? God is dealing with it, just in a progressive way (read the bible for more on this).
If you wanted God to deal with all the evil in the world right now, how do you propose he do that? How does he end the evil and suffering? Well, he would have to put a stop to any act that causes any suffering whatsoever (adulterers, liars, etc.). Wouldn't that mean He would have to put a stop to you too? Have you ever, by your own actions, cause any suffering to anybody? Hurt somebodies feelings? The reality is that God has not destroyed evil because He would have to destroy us. By allowing it to continue, God is showing us mercy.

Why didn't God create humans in a way that they would never be immoral or sinful in any way, thus avoiding evil altogether?
If God did that, then we would not be humans. We would be robots who act in only programmed ways. He gave us the capacity and ability to make our own choices. See friends, I believe that God wants us to love him due to our own choices, not because he forces us to.
I dare you to think up a better way to deal with the problem of evil that does not destroy human freedom or cause God to violate His nature.

My views on the salvation of mankind:
If there is God, and if the bible holds true (See previous blog), then I encourage you to reconsider Christ's claims. For "while we were still sinners, Christ died for us", for the sake of humanity's salvation, to prove that God is a God of perfect unconditional love." Accept it or deny it. Indifference is to deny. you make the choice. As much as you may want to hate God, the truth is that he loves you, or he wouldn't have created you, and wouldn't have had the death of his perfect Son be the justice for your immorality if you would only accept it. (Don't be quick to misjudge Christianity, read my previous blogs)

Do you have enough faith to be an atheist?

Saturday, 25 October 2008

Is the bible credible?

Note: bible verses quoted here are from the NKJV which can be sometimes confusing to read. I'd suggest rereading them in NIV to perhaps understand them a little better.

the bible is the best selling book of all times. Its also the most translated and quoted.
I'm not saying that the Bible's popularity is evidence to its credibility. However, you can't deny that it is one of the most influential books of mankind. But why should anyone believe that the Bible is actually true? I think this is a legit type of question that intelligent and critical thinking person would ask.

How can we separate the bible from the 26 other religious books that people believed were divinely inspired? (ex: the Vedas, Bhagavad-Gita, Mahabharata, the Upanishads, the Qur'an, the book of mormon, the Tripitaka, etc.)

Fulfilled Prophecy
-None of the 26 other religious books contain any specific fulfilled prophecies.
-Hundreds of prophecies in the bible were fulfilled hundreds of years after they were written.
-The prophecies were also specific, not vague.
-Concerning Jesus Christ, there are over a hundred different specific prophecies in the Old Testament. All prophecies were fulfilled, literally.

A look at A few prophecies about Jesus Christ the Messiah:

- He'd be born of the seed of Abraham:
NKJV Genesis 22:18 - When God speaks to Abraham he says: "In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed because you have obeyed My voice" (At times the term "seed" refers to a large number of descendants like in Genesis 13:16, and at other times it refers to one unique descenant, the Coming One. Here it is a grand play on words: The seed was Isaac; and by extension the jewish nation; and the Seed was also Jesus.)

-He'd be of the tribe of Judah:
Genesis 49:10 - Jacob speaking to his sons said: "The sceptor shall not depart from Judah, Nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh comes." (The "sceptor" is an ornate staff or rod that is a symbol of royal authority. A "lawgiver" is the one who isseus statutes. With these words, Jacob predicted that a royal line would rise from Judah's descendents. "Shiloh" is an obscure word, probably meaning the one To Whom It Belongs. That is, until the One to whom all royal authority belongs comes, the tribe of Judah will always have a lawgiver in its ranks. Shiloh, like seed, is a name for the coming Messiah.)

The city in which he would be born into:
Micah 5:2 - "But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, Though you are little among the thousands of Judah, Yet out of you shall come forth to Me The One to be Ruler in Israel, Whose goings forth are from of old, From everlasting"
("Eprathah locates the village in a known region in Judah. This prophecy figures significantly in the New Testament story of Jesus birth in Bethlehem. It puts into better perspective the visit of the wise men to the Christ child, and how governments would be overturned to make it necessary for Mary while still pregnant to make the journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem. "goings forth": the birth of this Savoir King would be unlike the birth of any other, because he was preexistent. He is "from everlasting".)

He'd come while the temple was still standing:
Malachi 3:1 - "Behold, I send My messenger, And he will prepare the way before Me. And the Lord, whom you seek, Will suddenly come to His temple." ("prepare the way": Here is one of the great, explicit prophecies relating to the messianic age. In its specific detail, this verse resembles the prophecy of Micah 5:2 concerning the birthplace of the Messiah. Matthew and Mark identify the messenger of this verse as John the Baptist. "The Lord" refers here to Jesus Christ. There are three persons in view in this verse: The father (the Lord) speaks of sending a messenger (John the Baptist) who will prepare the way for the coming of the Lord (Jesus). "suddenly come into His temple": Both the righteous and the wicked will be surprised when the Messiah arrives. "Messenger of the covenant": This is a messianic title referring to the One who will initiate the New Covenant(Matt. 26:28))

He would be born of a virgin:
Isaiah 7:14 - "Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel."

He would perform miracles:
Isaiah 35:5,6 - "Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the dumb sing. For waters shall burst forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert. (This prophecy of healings was fulfilled in the physical and spiritual healings of Jesus (Matt 12:22, Luke 4:18, Luke 7:22)).

He'd be rejected by his own people:
Psalm 118:22 - "The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone." (The Savior is pictured as a discarded "stone" that is then reused as the most significant stone of all, the "chief cornerstone". This potent imigary depicts Jesus' rejection by many.

The precise time in history when he would die (483 years after the declaration to reconstruct the city of Jerusalem in 444bc):
note: warning, the following contains the analysis of numbers, which may sound a bit confusing.
Daniel 9:24-26 - "Seventy *weeks are determined for your people and for your holy city, to finish the transgression, to make an end of sins, to make reconciliation for iniquity, to bring an everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the Most Holy. Know therefore and undesrtand, that from the going forth of the command to restore and build Jerusalem until Messiah the Prince, there shall be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks; The *street shall be built again, and the *wall, even in troublesome times. And after the sixty-two weeks the Messiah shall be cut off, but not for Himself; and the people of the prince who is to come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end of it shall be with a flood and till the end of the war desolations are determined." ("Seventy weeks" may also be translated as seventy sevens. Many scholars agree that the "seventy sevens" are seven years, as the seventy years of captivity addressed in 9:2 implies. Lev. 25:8 speaks of seven sabbaths of years; Lev. 26:18 implies that Israel's punishment would be multiplied sevenfold. Therefore, a seventy "week" exile would be expected to last for seven times sevety years. 2 Chronicles 26:21 suggests that the captivity was to last long enough to make up for seventy omissions of the sabbatical year, which occured every seven years. This would amount to 490 years before God's people would experience perfect reconciliation with their God. One commonly held interpretation maintains that "the sixty-two weeks" can be added to the seven weeks of verse 25, resulting in a total of sixty-nine weeks, or 483 years. If these years are added to the date of the decree of Artaxerxes in Neh. 2, 445 b.c., with an adjustment to allow for the use of a 360 day year, the end of the sixty-nine weeks coincides with the date of the crucifixion of Jesus. "Messiah shall be cut off" may be a reference to the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. The phrase "cut off" means to destroy or to kill. The fact that jesus Christ died "not for Himself" but for the sins of the world may support the view that the Messiah in this verse refers to Jesus Himself. "The prince who is to come" may be a reference to the Anti christ. I must note that there are various interpretations to these verses, but these seem the most credible to me)

How he would die:
Psalm 22:16-18 - (a section in this old testament book called "The Suffering, Praise, and Posterity of the Messah"). "For dogs have surrounded Me; the congregation of the wicked has enclosed Me. They pierced* My hands and My feet; I can count all My bones. The look and stare at Me. They divide My garments among them, and for My clothing they cast lots. ("They pierced My hands and My feet" explicitly predicts the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus Christ. The words are merely a figure of speech for the terrifying experiences of David; but as a prophet, david spoke accurately of the sufferings of Jesus (acts 2:30). The soldiers at Jesus' crucifixion gambled for His "garments", in direct fulfilment of this text (Matt. 27:35).)
Isaiah 53 - (It is best to read the entire chapter to better understand, here are a few segments) ..."He is despised and rejected by men, a Man of sorrows and acquanted with grief. and we hid, as it were, our faces from Him; He was despised, and we did not esteem Him"..."He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities".
Zechariah 12:10 - ..."they will look on Me whome they pierced. yes, they will mourn for Him as one mourns for his only son, and grieve for Him as one grieves for a firstborn." ("Me whom they pierced": Jeus was pierced with a spear after His death on the Cross (John 19:34))

He will be raised from the dead:
Psalm 16:10 - "For You will not leave my soul in Sheol, nor will You allow Your Holy One to see corruption"
Acts 13: 35-37 - "Therefore He also says in another Psalm: 'You will not allow Your Holy One to see corruption' For David, after he had served his own generation by the will of God, fell asleep, was buried with his fathers, and saw curruption, but He whom God raised up saw no corruption." (Paul here argued that David could not have been speaking of himself in ps.16:10. When David died, his body returend to dust ust like everyone else's. David was speaking of the Messiah who would be raised from teh dead as the final proof of His divine Sonship)

He will be betrayed by a friend:
Psalm 41:9 - "Even my own familiar friend in whom I trusted, who ate my bread, has lifted up his heel against me" (The fulfillment of this verse in the experience of Jesus and Judas is remarkable. Not only did the two eat a meal together (Matt 26:21-25, Mark 14:18-21, Luke 22:21), but Jesus also called Judas a "friend" at the moment of betrayal (Matt. 26:50). Moreover Jesus quoted this verse, noting its fulfillment in Judas(John 13:18).)

He would enter Jerusalem on a donkey:
Zechariah 9:9 - "Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout, O daugher of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you; He is just and having salvation, lowly and riding on a donkey, a colt, the foal of a donkey." (This prophecy was fulfilled on the day of the Triumphal Entry, when Jesus rode into Jerusalem on the colt of a donkey (Matt. 21:2-7, John 12:12-15).)

etc. etc. there are many more to discuss but I want to move on.

"Maybe Christians added those fulfilled prophecies to the bible after Jesus lived" - skeptic
- The answer to this is strictly, no. There are hundreds of old testument manuscripts and copies of the Old Testament that predate Jesus by hundreds of years. The dead sea scrolls (hand written copies of the Old Testament except the book of Esther) were discovered.

"How do you know the dead sea scrolls predate Christ?" - skeptic
- Scholars were able to determine this by a examining the scrolls and the objects around them: the kind, type, and detail of the pottery and housed the manuscripts, the weave and pattern of the manuscript cloths, the form of the characters, the way in which the words were spelled, the coins found alongside the manuscripts. These were proven that the scrolls predated Christ beyond a shadow of a doubt.

"Maybe Jesus wasn't the Messiah, maybe he accidentaly fulfilled the prophecies or even deliberately set out to complete them during his lifetime" - skeptic
- Okay, honestly, think about it.
1. Who would deliberately set out to fullfill prophecies that would result in a short lived life and a long excruciatingly painful death on a cross? If they weren't the Messiah, I'd say nobody.
2. How does someone choose the lineage, time period, and city in which he is born?
"Peter Stoner, a mathematician, and Professor Emeritus of Science at Westmont College, in his book Science Speaks(Moody 1963) calculated the odds of a single man fulfilling just eightof the prophecies that Jesus fulfilled as the mathematicalimprobability of 1 in 10 to the 17th. That is a HUGE number. One in tento the seventeenth power. That's a one with seventeen zeros after it(100,000,000,000,000,000). If we had 100 quadrillion 1” x 1.5” tiles wecould cover every square inch of dry land on planet Earth. The factthat these prophecies and hundreds of others have been fulfilled, eventhough they were spoken hundreds and even thousands of years beforetheir fulfillment, is strong evidence that a God, who is all-knowingand all-powerful, orchestrated the Bible’s completion." - Charlie Cambell

Archeological Discoveries

No archeological discovery has ever controverted the bible. The bibles details records of various events, customs, persons, cities, nations, and geographical locations have been historically legit. In fact, detailed evaluation of the biblical descriptions has actually helped lead to discoveries. Thousands and thousands of discoveries have been made in what lots of archeologists call the "bible lands".

Discoveries that back up historical figures of the bible:
- Pontius Pilate -
The bible mentions this guy as the Roman governor of Judah. (Matt 27, Mark 15, Luke 23, John 18-19) He was the one who officially ordered Jesus to be sentenced to death by crucifixion. 1961, Archeologists found a limestone rock found in the ruins of an ancient roman theatre that read "Pontius Pilate, Prefect of Judea, has presented the Tiberium to the Ceasareans".

- Caiaphas -
People used to think this guy was a make believe character. He was a Jewish high priest at the time of Jesus' crucifixion (Matt 26, Luke 3, John 11, Acts 4). 1990, The Caiaphas family tomb was discovered accidentaly. In the tomb there were 12 limestone bone boxes that contained the remains of 63 people. The words "Joseph son of Caiaphas" were written on the outside of these boxes. The Jewish historian of the first century A.D, Josephus, actually wrote in his documents that the full name of the high priest who arrested Jesus was "Joseph son of Caiaphas" ("son of" referred to the family name).

- King David -
The bible's most beloved King of Israel. 1993, Discovery of a stone with an Aramic inscription referring to the house of David. 1994, 2 more fragments of this same stone were discovered also mentioning the house of David. 1995, Time magazine reported that this discovery dated to around 900bc (about a century after David's reign). The writing on the stone described a victory by a neighboring king over the Isrealites. Time magazine stated that "The skeptic's claim that King David never existed is now hard to defend".

Random Fact: Unfortunately (or rather should I say fortunately?), there are no archeological discoveries to the Book of Mormon. Nothing at all, which makes it look like nothing more than 19th century fiction written by Joseph Smith and most archeological experts shun the book.

Internal Consistency/Harmony

The bible is consistent, from Genesis to Revelation.

"Lots of books are 'internally consistent', that doesn't mean they have some divine origin" - skeptic

Factors that Separate the Bible to other Books (which gives you a better perspective as to why the bible's consistency in particular is incomprable to any other book which may have internal consistency)
1. The bible is not just one book, it is a compilation of 66 book. Harmony within a single book like the Qu-ran is easy, since it only contains the teachings of a single man. However the bible continas 39 Old Testament and 27 New Testament books.
2. The bible addresses life's most controvesial questions.
- How did the universe come into existance
- Is there a God
- If there is a God, who is he and what is he like?
- What is my purpose in life and why do we exist?
3. The bible was written by about 40 different authors that came from different educational and cultural backgrounds. (ex: Peter was a fisherman, Paul was a scholar, Daniel was a prime minister, Asaph was a musician, Matthew was a tax collector, David was a Shepherd before he became a king, and Luke was a historian and medical doctor.)
4. The bible was written over a period of 1500+ years (about 60+ generations).
5. The authors were separated by both time and geography. The bible was written in a variety of places (ex: Rome, Egypt, Italy, Isle of Patmos, Babylon). Even the atmosphere's in which the authors wrote were different. (ex: Jeremiah was in a dungeon, Luke wrote while travelling, Daniel wrote from a hillside and in a palace).
6. The bible was written in three different languages: Hebrew, Aramic, and Greek.

If anyone was to take all of these factors and combine them into one book, you'd most likely get a barf of chaotic scripture that condraticts itself everywhere and doesn't make much sense. However, the bible is a consistent, harmonious, and perfectly unified account of how God is seeking to reconcile sinners back to Himself through the person of His Son, Jesus Christ. This is amazing evidence to the bible. If you were to go and ask 10 of your smartest friends what they thought was the nature of the universe, the meaning of life, the origin of evil, the way of salvation, etc, your going to see that there are going to be a variety of contradicting opinions. And your friends wouldn't even be from different time periods and dramatically different lifestyles. The bibles internal consistency serves as evidence to its divine origin.

External Verification
Not only are there archeological discoveries that support the bible but there are also writings outside the bible that verify the accuracy of the people, places, and events. From these external sources, so for 80 people in the bible were proven to be actual historical figures and what 18 of them look like. Approximately 39 sources have been found to state 100 facts about Jesus' life.

One of those writers was Flavius Josephus, a well known 1st century Roman Historian. This guy talks about Herod the Great, Herod Antipas, Caiaphas, Pontius Pilate, John the Baptist, James "the brother of Jesus," Felix, Festus, and Jesus being all historical figures. Here's a quote from Josephus' writings taken from the Arabic text called the Antiquities: "At this time there was a wise man who was called Jesus. And his conduct was good, and (He) was known to be virtuous. And many people form among the Jews and the other nations became his disciples. Pilate condemned Him to be crucified to die. And those who had become his disciples did not abandon his discipleship. They reported that He had appeared to them three days after his crucifixion and that He was alive. Accordingly, he was perhaps the Messiah, concerning whom the prophetshave reported wonders. And the tribe of the Christians, so named afterhim, has not disappeared to this day." P.S. Josephus was not a Christian. A couple of examples of other writers that wrote about Jesus' life include Cornelius Tacitus (a Roman Historian, non-Christian) and Gaius Seutonius (Emperor Hadrian's chief secretary).
Athiests may argue that Jesus' never even existed by commiting attrocious fallacies and saying that they were making these things up. However, none of these writers could be put into those categories, especially since many of them were non-christian, which gave them no reason to make up Jesus.

But for fun, lets add another non-christian source:
The Talmud contains an arrest notice for Jesus (arrest notice, not something that actually happened to Jesus):
"He shall be stoned because he has practiced sorcery and lured Israel toapostasy. Anyone who can say anything in his favor, let him comeforward and plead on his behalf. Anyone who knows where he is, let himdeclare it to the Great Sanhedrin in Jerusalem."
- about this notice: stoning was the regular punishment for blasphemy, since many of the high-order Jews didn't believe him. It also says that he practiced sorcery, which is in fact a reference to the miracles he performed. Luke 11:14-20. - And He(Jesus) was casting out a demon, and it was mute. So it was, when the demon had gone out, that the mute spoke; and the multitudes marveled. But some of them said, "He casts out demons by Beelzebub, the ruler of the demons." Others, testing Him sought from Him a sign from heaven. But He knowing their thoughts, said to them: "Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and a house divided against a house falls. If Satan also is divided against himself, how will his kingdom stand? Because you say I cast out demons by Beelzebub. And if I cast out demons by Beelzebub, by whom do your sons cast them out? Therefore they will be your judges. BUt if I cast out demons with the finger of God, surely the kingdom of God has come upon you."

non-christian, non-Jew sources
Cornelius Tacitus was known to be one of the most reliable source historians in Rome during the first century.
During A.D. 64, Tacitus reports of a great fire in Rome that people blamed emperor Nero for. Nero didn't want the blame so he blamed the Christians for the fire. Tacitus explains who the Christians were: "Chrisus, the founer of the name had undergone the death penalty in the reign of Tiberius, by sentence of the procurator Pontius Pilatus".
The thing about Tacitus is that he wasn't trying to prove that Jesus Christ really lived. Tacitus actually didn't like Christians and thought of them as a "disease". If Jesus had never existed, Tacitus would have jumped on exposing that he didn't exist, the pathetic phantom on whom such cultists placed their trust. Skeptics have failed to discredit this passage. There have been manuscript analysis' and computer studies on this and nobody can find any reason to question its credibility.

Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus also regarded Christians badly and cited Christ (he spelled it "Christus and Chrestus" since e and i were interchangeable vowels.).

Pliny the younger. Roman governor of Bithynia. thought Christianity was a "wretched cult". He cites Christ 3 times, once referring to Christians "..who met on a fixed day to chant verses alternately among themselves in honor of Christ, as if to a god.."(quote from his Letter No.96). If Christ were a mythical character, he would be one of the first to state that.

Other sources are Theudas and Mara bar Serapion. Go ahead and research them, I'm done with this part, I've proved my point.

Skeptics should focus less on rejecting the obvious but rather focus on whether Jesus was just a man or something more, then there can actually be a reasonable debate.

Scientific Accuracy
The bible doesn't contain any scientific errors. Even though it was written over 2,000 years ago, before satellites and telescopes.
An example of scientific innacuracy: Qu'ran - 18:86 (Surah) - "When he reached the setting-place of the sun, he found it setting in a muddy spring.
Where in the bible does it talk about science and astronomy?
Concerning the SUN:
- It's circuit through space: Psalm 19:6 - "Its rising is from one end of heaven, and its circuit to the other end." - Heaven/heavens are words that are often used to describe outerspace due to its largeness. Here is an example where it does that.
Concerning the SHAPE OF THE EARTH:
everyone believed the earth was flat... not the bible: Isaiah 40:22 - "It is He who sits above the circle of the earth." The hebrew word for circle literally meant "sphere". btw, Isaiah was written 300 years before Aristotle suggested that the earth might be a sphere.
Job 26:10 - "He marks out the horizon on the face of the waters for a boundary between light and darkness."
Concerning the SUSPENSION OF THE EARTH:
Job 26:7 - "He [God] hangs the earth on nothing."
Hindus believed that the earth was held on the back of an elephant which was on the back of a turtle swimming an endless sea. Greeks believed the Atlas carried the earth on his shoulders. scientists didn't discover that the earth wasn't on anything at all till 1650.
Concerning the STARS:
Before the telescope was invented: 190-120 BC: Hipparchus (greek astronomer and mathematician) said there were exactly 1,026 stars. 1571-1630AD: Johannes Kepler (German astronomer) said there were 1,006 stars. Ptolemy said there were 1,056 stars.
1608: Galileo pointed his telescope to the heavans (outerspace) and he discovered that there were alot more stars than anybody had ever imagined.
Jeremiah 33:22 "I will make the descendants of David my servant and the Levites who minister before me as countless as the stars of the sky and as measureless as the sand on the seashore." NIV.
Dr. Mark Eastman: "Counting at a rate of ten stars pers second it would take over 100 trillion years. surely the host of heaven cannot be numbered!"

The question to ask is, how did these men who wrote these books know this astronomy? 2 Peter 1:21 says that "Holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit." God knows everything there is to know about the universe and made sure that what He wanted to be written, was written.

The Manuscript Evidence

"The bible has undergone corruption throughout time" - critic

A manuscript is a hand-written copy of an ancient document that predates the invention of the printing press in 1455. Hand written manuscripts haveallowed scholars and textual critics to go back and verify that theBible we have in our possession today is the same Bible that the earlychurch possessed 2,000 years ago. There isn't just one copy either. There are more than 24,000 ancient manuscript copies of the bible existing today. They exist in museums, libraries, and universities all around the world.

hypothetically speaking, lets say the manuscripts didn't survive:
well, the early church fathers and figures quoted the bible in their writings and notes more than 86,000 times, covering just about 99.86% of the bible.
Isaiah 40:8 “The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever.”
Matthew 24:35 “Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away.”

The Bible's Bluntness About it's Author's Failures
A reason to believe that the bible is an honest work. Unlike the author's of other religious works, the authors of the bible did not try to cast themselves in good light or make themselves look good. This is a unique feature to the bible. The author's would confess their failures and sins.
A few examples: (Gen. 9:21); Abraham, lying (on morethan one occasion) about Sarah being his wife (Gen. 12:13; 20:2);Moses’ outburst of anger, how he misrepresented God, and wasn’t evenallowed to enter into the promise land (Num. 20:10-11); Israel’srejection of God on numerous occasions (for example, see the book ofJudges); David’s adultery and subsequent murder of Uriah (2 Samuel 11);the disciple’s argument over which one of them was the greatest (Luke22:24); Peter’s denial of the Lord (Matt.26:72) and his fear of beingseen eating with Gentiles (Gal.2:11-12); the disciples falling asleepwhen Jesus asked them to pray (Mark 14:32-41); Paul, confession that hewas “a wretched man” (Rom 7:24) the “chief” of sinners (1 Tim.1:15);Paul and Barnabas argument over whether or not Mark should be allowedto travel with them (Acts 15:38-39)
The honesty of the author's add's light to the honesty of the rest of their work.

The Wllingness of Jesus' Disciples to Suffer
The Disciples wouldn't make up a story that would lead them toward their excruciatingly painful deaths, one by one. Such a passion could not have been conjured from a so called "hallucination", secondly, the likeliness of each of the disciples having the same hallucination would be... actually thats impossible. As possible as 11 people having the same dream. Another evidence that their work was honest, that they were living their work with such a passion and willingness to die for it. Here are some examples of their deaths (cited by Flavius Josephus, Eusebus, etc.):
Matthew: slain with a sword in Ethiopia
Mark: Cruelly dragged through the streets of Alexandria, Northern Egypt, where he died.
Luke: Hanged on an olive tree in Greece.
James: Beheaded in Jerusalem.
James the Less (Mark 15:40): thrown from a lofty pinnacle of the temple.
Philip: Hung up against a pillar at Heiropolis, in the province of Persia.
Bartholomew: Flayed alive.
Andrew: Bound to a cross, left to die.
Jude: Shot to death with arrows.
Matthias (Disciple that replaced Judas): Stoned, but the stoning wasn't enough to kill him so he was then beheaded.
Barnabas: Stoned to death.
Paul (aka former enemy of Christ): experienced a variety of tortures and persecutions, was eventually beheaded in Rome.
Peter: crucified in Rome.
Thomas (former skeptic of the ressurection, till he saw Jesus and touched his wounds): Run through the body with a lance at Coromandal, East Indies, for preaching the gospel.
The disciples testmony of Jesus Christ was sealed with their own blood. People may be willing to die for something that they think is true, but nobody willingly dies for something they know is a lie.If anybody knew whether or not Jesus was alive after His resurrection,it would have been the disciples. They were in a unique positionhistorically that allowed them to know whether what they were sayingwas true or not. They actually lived in Israel, at the time Jesus livedand was raised from the dead, or was not. They were there.

The bible's power to transform the lives of people and cultures for GOOD
The bible claims to be living and powerful (ex: Hebrews 4:12, Psalm 19:7-10). How does it back up that claims? Wherever its truth has been received*, it has had a transforming effect on the very lives of the people. I'm talkin about millions of people transforming from lives of drug addicts, alcoholics, prostitutes, transvestites, underground cage fighters, etc. etc. into godly people. The Bible has inspired people to build hospitals, start universities (most of the world’s greatest universities—e..g. Harvard, Yale, Princeton, were started by Christians for Christian purposes), launch humanitarian efforts to the poor, abolish slavery (William Wilberforce, an evangelical Christian and member of the British Parliament in the early 19th century, was the one largely responsible for the abolition of the slave trade), work for the equality of people among different races and women, investigate the universe scientifically, and further the development of great art and music.
"Jesus of Nazareth, without money and arms, conquered more millions than Alexander, Caesar, Mohammed, and Napoleon; without science and learning, He shed more light on things human and divine than all philosophers and scholars combined; without the eloquence of schools, He spoke such words of life as were never spoken before or since, and produced effects which lie beyond the reach of orator or poet; without writing a single line, He set more pens in motion, and furnished themes for more sermons, orations, discussions, learned volumes, works of art, and songs of praise than the whole army of great men of ancient and modern times.” - philip schaff.

Thus, we have Jesus Christ, who claimed that the bible was without error(John 17:17), historically reliable, divinely authoritative, scientifically accurate, infallible(John 10:35), and indestructible(Matt. 5:18).
After greatly considering everythin that was written in this blog, would you consider Jesus Christ's claims to be truth, or a lie?

Thursday, 23 October 2008

Research: the attack of the christian faith

Searching for truth amidst the confusion, one step at a time.
Claim: "The resurrection account was stolen from earlier sources"
"Attis, a Roman deity, was crucified, dead for three days, and then resurrected" - Zeitgeist
Apparently this mythological account is not true. The actual truth is that the story goes to say that Attis was a god that was unfaithful to his goddess lover and in a jealous rage she made him insane which made him castrate himself and flee to the forest where he died from bleeding too much. The myth talks of no account of a resurrection. The story of Attis' alleged ressurection only came about in 150 A.D. long after Jesus' time. There are no existing early texts that refer to the resurrection of Attis. If there was any influence, it was Christianity influencing this mythology and not vice versa.
There is only one known story before the time of christianity of god who survived death. It's the myth of the egyptian cult god, Osiris. The story goes to say that Osiris is cut into 14 peices that are scattered around Egypt. Those peices are reassembled and brought back to life by the goddess Isis. But in this case Osiris doesn't actually come back to "phsyical life" but instead becomes "Lord of the shadowy underworld". The account of Jesus and this story don't have a relation. The account of Jesus says that he gloriously rose from the dead and was seen by a multitude of people before his ascension into heaven. To say that the story of Osiris was used to make up the story of Jesus would be quite absurd.
If there were any possible stories of of dying and rising gods prior to Christianity, in the hypothetical sense, it still wouldn't legitimately serve as a backup to claim that the New Testament writers copied from them. It would be like saying that newspaper reports of space shuttle missions are influenced by Star Trek episodes, since the episodes precede the U.S. Space Shuttle program.
The conception that the god dies and is resurrected in order to lead his faithful to eternal life is represented in no Hellenistic mystery religion.
"Mithra, a mythological persian deity, was dead for three days and then resurrected" - Zeitgeist
No claim can be made that Mithra was a dying and rising God. The Encyclopedia Britannica says that Mithraism could not have influenced the Gospel writers, "There is little notice of the Persian god [Mithra] in the Roman world until the beginning of the 2nd century, but from the year AD 136 onward, there are hundreds of dedicatory inscriptions to Mithra. This renewal of interest is not easily explaied. The most plausible hypothesis seems to be that Roman Mithraism was practically a new creation, wrought by a relgious genious who may have lived as late as AD 100 and who gave the old traditional Persian ceremonies a new Platonic interpretation that enabled Mithraism to become acceptable to the Roman world" (2004). The four gospels were written well before the close of the first century. Since mithraism wasn't even known in the Roman world during the first century, then it is misguiding to say that the story of mithra influenced the Gospel writers. Besides, Mithraism had no concept of the death and resurrection of its god and no place for any concept of rebirth until well after the gospels were written. Mithraism is a military cult, and the early Christians were nonmilitary people. It wouldn't make sense for mithraism to appeal to Christians.
Peter, one of the apostles, wrote in the bible in 2 Peter 1:16-18, saying "We did not follow cleverly invented stories when we told you about the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. For He received honor and glory from God the Father when the voice came to Him from the Majestic Glory, saying ' This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.' We ourselves heard this voice that came from heaven when we were with Him on the sacred mountain."
"The account of the three kings and the December 25th date was stolen" - Zeitgeist
Nowhere in the bible does it mention three kings for the nativity story. They were not kings, but were magi (aka wise men). It is likely that this misconception is due to poorly researched hallmark cards during christmas time. Nowhere in the bible does it mention the date December 25th. The bible does not give any reference to any date in which Jesus was born. It wasn't till 336 A.D. that this date was decided on to be used to celebrate his birth.
"The account of the virgin birth was stolen" - Zeitgeist
Dionysus: the virgin birth of this pagan God is only attested several centuries after Christ. There is no evidence to assume that the actual story talks about a virgin birth for Dionysus. In the story: Zeus disguised himself as a human fell in love with a Princess named Semele, and she became pregnant. Hera, Zues' queen, was ejalous and arranged to have her burned to a crisp. Zues rescued the fetus and sewed him into his own thigh until Dionysius was born. This story talks nothing of a virgin birth.
Mithra: In the ancient stories of Mithra, it is told that he was not born of a virgin, but rather arose spontaneously from a rock in a cave. As Lee Strobel says, "Unless the rock is considered a virgin, this parallel of Jesus evaporates."
Krishna: the supposed incarnation of the hindu god Vishnu, was not born of a virgin. Krishna's mother already had seven sons before he was born.
When Matthew and Luke in the bible talk about the virgin birth, it was not a made up story borrowed from pagan religions. The virgin birth occured due to a fulfilled prophecy ,600-700 years before Jesus' birth, from the Old Testament: Isaiah 7:14.
Fallacies to Claiming that Christianity was Dependent on Mystery Religions, and points that must be understood:
False Cause: The fallacy that says just because two ideas exist side by side, one must have caused the other. Coincidence does not prove causal connection or dependence.
Exaggeration and Fabrication: Sometimes pagan religions are described in "biblical terms". Carelessness in language can imply false ideas to a particular story.
Chronology and False Assumption: Often times, there are authors who quote documents from 300 A.D. and say that they influenced Paul's writing. It cannot be assumed that because a cult had a certain belief or practice in the 3rd or 4th century after Christ, it therefore had the same belief or practice of the first century. There is a high possibility that such beliefs were just pagan attempts to counter the growing influence of Christianity by imitating it.
The background of the person: Paul wasn't in the position or the type of person to conclude
that he could have borrowed from pagan religions. In fact, his background makes such a statement very unlikely. Paul was a man who placed great emphasis on strict Judaism: He was a man that was circumsized on the eighth day after his birth, he was a descendent from the tribe of Benjamin (a highly regarded tribe by Jews because that line had produced the first king of Israel). A Hebrew of Hebrews and of the people of Israel. Before his conversion to Christianity, in regard to the law he was a pharisee. He was persecuting christians and found himself faultless in terms of legalistic righteousness before he became a Christian. (Phillipians 3:5). He was in a high position, in high regard, and was possibly the last person thought to ever convert to Christianity. It doesn't make sense that he would leave all of his high position behind for the sake of a made up story.
The exclusiveness of Christianity: Christianity is a faith that allows no syncretism, and as such would not include or tolerate pagan teachings, let alone plaigiarize from them. The pagan mystery cults, however, were very inclusive and these religions continued to evolve and change in the centuries to after Christ, often bent on attracting followers. The doctrines of the mystery religions were unstable. A mistake that scholars sometimes make is that they read into a cult several hundred centuries after its origin and make assumptions on the origin based on their doctrine at that time. The status of the mystery cults during 100A.D. differed from that of 300A.D.
History: The pagan cults were mysteries and essentially non-historical. They were dramas and pictures, the entire essence of the mystery religions are entirely different from Christianity since Paul considered Christ's death and resurrection to be a real historical event. The Christian affirmation that the death and resurrection of Christ happened to a historical person at a particular time and place has no parallel in any pagan mystery religion.
it is important to note that the original versions of the mystery religions had no parallel to the story and gospel of Jesus Christ. It was only during the rise and evolution of the mystery religions about a century after Christ that sprung up confusion.

a website that talks about this subject as well:
http://www.iclnet.org/pub/resources/text/cri/cri-jrnl/web/crj0169a.html

Friday, 03 October 2008

AnonymousConcern

My purpose on xanga is to remain anonymous while expressing my concern on the ideas in extra special blogs.

and.
I am very interested in theology, philosophy, and religion.
so lets discuss!