Guess Who?

Who is this passage talking about:



He grew up before him like a tender shoot,
and like a root out of dry ground.
He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him,
nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.

He was despised and rejected by men,
a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering.
Like one from whom men hide their faces
he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

Surely he took up our infirmities
and carried our sorrows,
yet we considered him stricken by God,
smitten by him, and afflicted.

But he was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was upon him,
and by his wounds we are healed.

We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to his own way;
and the LORD has laid on him
the iniquity of us all.

He was oppressed and afflicted,
yet he did not open his mouth;
he was led like a lamb to the slaughter,
and as a sheep before her shearers is silent,
so he did not open his mouth.

By oppression and judgment he was taken away.
And who can speak of his descendants?
For he was cut off from the land of the living;
for the transgression of my people he was stricken.

He was assigned a grave with the wicked,
and with the rich in his death,
though he had done no violence,
nor was any deceit in his mouth.

Yet it was the LORD's will to crush him and cause him to suffer,
and though the LORD makes his life a guilt offering,
he will see his offspring and prolong his days,
and the will of the LORD will prosper in his hand.

After the suffering of his soul,
he will see the light of life and be satisfied;
by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many,
and he will bear their iniquities.

Therefore I will give him a portion among the great,
and he will divide the spoils with the strong,
because he poured out his life unto death,
and was numbered with the transgressors.
For he bore the sin of many,
and made intercession for the transgressors.

Who is this? Who is the Passage Referring to? Moses Muhammad Jesus Krishna view results

Where is it? Is the above quoted from the Old Testament and New Testament? Old Testament New Testament view results

Mathematics and Theology - the Age of the Earth

Most science books who accept macro evolution teach that the earth is something like 4-5 Billion years old. Scientist typically arrive at this number using geologic dating of rocks and fossils on earth. Did you know that physics actually has a calculation that requires no more than simple algebra to arrive at a similar number for the age of the earth. The calculation depends on comparing on the relative concentration of Uranium isotopes in the earth's crust. The isotopes we used in my sophomore Physics class were U₂₃₈ and U₂₃₅. Both of these flavors or Uranium are radioactive. U₂₃₅ is used in simple nuclear weapons like the bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima in 1945. U₂₃₈ is used in our nuclear reactors. If we know about how many atoms of Uranium 235 and 238 are in the earth crust today and we know the half-life of both Isotopes then we should be able to figure out how old the earth is. The half-life of radioactive material is defined as the amount of time it takes for 1/2 of the material to decay into another kind of element. The equation we use to define the number of atoms (N) after time t, where is the half-life and N_i is the initial number of atoms:





So let's apply this idea for ration of U₂₃₅ to U₂₃₈. Remember that:


N_U235 is the number of U₂₃₅ atoms currently.
N_U238 is the number of U₂₃₈ atoms currently.
N_iU235 is the number of U₂₃₅ atoms initially.
N_iU238 is the number of U₂₃₈ atoms initially.
_U235 is the half-life of U₂₃₅ atoms. = years
_U238 is the half-life of U₂₃₈ atoms. = years




When I first got this problem in a problem set back in school I tripped out because they told me what the current ratio of U₂₃₅ to U₂₃₈ is: 0.0072516316. And I also had the numbers for the half-life. I knew I wanted to find t - the time it took for both isotopes to decay to the current ratio. So I tripped out. Got scared because I didn't know how much of each uranium isotope was in the earth's crust at the time the earth formed until I realized that I was supposed to assume that the earth had the same amount of each kind of Uranium in the beginning! what this means is that N_iU235 = 0.0072516316 N_iU238 and that means that you don't need to know the initial amounts of Uranium because those numbers cancel out - old algebra trick. When I plugged in all the numbers and solved the equation for t, I got 4 and half billion years back then.















Using the numbers I found off Wikipedia which slightly differ from the numbers I used in college and the scientific calculator add-on for Firefox I now get


years or years


4.18 Billion is close to 4.5 Billion (four-and-a-half) that I'm certain that I did the calculation accurately. Thank God!

A lot of people look at that and go...see the earth is as old as macro evolution shows that it should be. End of story. But this calculation depends on several assumptions that I never got proof that we should assume. I was just taught that the following assumptions were reasonable.

a. That the amounts of U₂₃₅ and U₂₃₈ were equal when the earth first formed. I mean other than it makes the math work out, I don't see why we need to assume that.
b. That half-life of U₂₃₅ and U₂₃₈ have always been constant. This one I'm willing to let them have as reasonable.
c. How did they determine that the ratio of U₂₃₅ to U₂₃₈ is 0.0072516316 in the earth's crust? How do we know it's the correct estimate?

I think that assumption "b" is reasonable, but "a" and "c" happen to seem convenient and I will need to do more research to really decide if they are reasonable. The best I can say is that it makes the math work out. When I was in school, I took their word for it and no proof was offered. Now, I think I would like to find out how they came up with their assumptions.

Mathematics and Theology - the Resurection

I remember often in my pre-college education, while sitting in mathematics courses, wondering what was the use of spending all that time wading through theoretical mathematics. Of course during college and through my professional career I have learned that theoretical mathematics becomes practical very quickly. Who knew? A good example is that it becomes useful even in the field of apologetics and there isn't any need to get real deeper than algebra. William Lane Craig argued for the resurrection of Jesus again Bart Ehrman very effectively using the probablistic calculus. You can read his argument in it's entirety on one of my previous posts and a you can watch the video here. I really like the argument he used.

Let X equal the probability that Jesus supernaturally was raised from the dead.
Let Y equal the probability that there are naturalistic explanations for what happened to explain the historical facts that although Jesus was crucified, that the tomb was empty 3 days later and people claimed to have seen him alive later, following religion based on His teachings and person.

The total probability that Christianity is correct can be mathematically represented as the following equation.

P(X,Y) = X /(X + Y)

Dr. William Lane Craig then pointed out that as Y becomes smaller and smaller, the probability function becomes closer and closer to being equal to 1. A probability of 1 means that its a certainty and most definitely true. Craig in the debate argued that the Biblical conclusion is most probable because it most adequately answers:

a. Why the Tomb was empty?
b. Why did Jesus' brothers and disciples start claiming Jesus was alive again and that He is God when before the Crucifixion and the aftermath his brothers didn't believe at all and his closest followers lost faith?

Ehrman tried to argue that there are other explanations without appealing to the idea that Jesus was supernaturally raised from the dead. He failed. Craig quoted the above mathematics from a leading mathematician, Richard Swineberg from Oxford University, and even more amazing gave the exact place for more research because X and Y can actually be numerically evaluated. The name of the book is The Resurrection of God Incarnate. If you plug in the numbers you get a number: 0.97; in math and physics a probability of 0.97 means more than likely. It means that it's a proven conclusion! Look at Ehrman's reaction. Research it for yourself!

Siku is back!

I have just heard that Siku has published a manga called Manga Jesus Volume 1. I have not read it yet, But I can't read it yet. I read the previous Manga Bible. I loved it. I wrote a post about it a long time ago: http://mmcelhaney.blogspot.com/2008/08/manga-bible-review.html and I can't wait to read the book. Here is a video from National Geographic.




Here is an interview from NPR