This video is based on a book by Karen Armstrong. I read the book several years ago and I was extremely disappointed. Karn Armstrong approaches the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament, and Koran are all nothing more than human products. She disavows a personal God who intervenes in history and the lives of people. I think that Armstrong thought this because she failed to personally encounter God as a Catholic nun (read her introduction). I don't know why she did not meet God. I'm not qualified to judge her honesty or her experience, But I can testify that if we reach out to God we will find him. It seems like she was looking for an experience like those of the Catholic saints and the Biblical prophets instead of seeking her own unique experience.
I was reading through my Twitter stream and I came across a link to a video someone made in attempt to dismiss the Bible's teaching on the character and nature of God by attempting to show logical inconsistencies. The author uses the idea of a checklist which God uses to keep track of His purposes and goals. The author and I agree on what Christians believe about God. He does indeed have purposes and goals and He does interact with humanity throughout history. As unbeliever the author has the audacity to think he knows what the plan of God is and what God's purposes are. I think it's worth looking at his checklist and see if it is the same checklist we see in the Bible. I will make his checklist bullets blue and my comments will be in black. This will be in 2 parts. The second part will cover the video after 5 minutes and 6 seconds.
14. Declare that until further notice that the way only for these cognitive beings to rectify their sinful nature while on Earth is to perform ritual animal sacrifices and other acts of senseless violence. Additionally, when certain sins are committed by any one of your cognitive beings, demand that the surrounding community kill that being themselves. Check!
Why must there be blood sacrifice? The principle is substitution - life for life. Sin is a debt that can only be paid by blood because sin is truly that bad...that awful...that the only way sin can be atoned for is that someone has to die. Unfortunately the blood of animals is not enough for final and complete cleansing. To argue against the public execution of law breaker in ancient Israel is to come against capital punishment and the death penalty. Many folks today reject the death penalty, but just because you yourself don't see any crime worthy of death, doesn't mean that God sees the world that way.
15. In the mean time perform many epic miracles for all to see, and intervene often with your physical creations; stop the sun in the sky, part the Red Sea, turn rivers into blood and women into pillars of salt, give men superhuman strength, speak to the thousands with a booming voice from Heaven, etc. But, before these cognitive beings become advanced enough in the areas of science and communication that they could actually document, share, playback, and verify these epic miracles, make sure you stop performing them all together. Check!
God has not stopped performing miracles altogether. There have been several documented cases of miracles happening even today. I myself know of God healing power when He healed me of arthritis, not to mention other cases. What about holding reality together? As near as we can tell, there is no reason why reality retains the qualities it does have. If quantum mechanics is correct then there is some ultimate observer determining everything we measure and observe. It this isn't miraculous than I don't know the author's definition. Check that.
16. Decide at some point that the most pressing of your objective moral prescriptions are not as obvious to these cognitive beings as you once thought. Take this opportunity to chisel your top ten moral concerns into two tablets of stone and commission one of your cognitive beings to deliver these tablets to the masses. (Note to self: Roughly half of these moral concerns should center around pleasing you, praising you, and remaining loyal to you.) Check!
Check this. Obviously the Ten Commandments are not obvious because we break them all the time. Breaking one, breaks them all. Only 4 out of 10 of them center around our relationship with God. The other 6 deal with how we treat one another. Funny how the author tries to insinuate that God is cruel and selfish.
17. After several thousand years, impregnate one of these cognitive beings so that she gives birth to your son in physical form, who also happens to be you at the same time. Check!
"Impregnate" is pregnant with the meaning of sexual intercourse and God did not have sex with marry to conceive Jesus Christ. While the Bible does teach that Jesus is God, incarnated in human form, it's important to really understand what is being said because the author makes it sound like Christians are confused. The Trinity is not a confusion. God is one being...existing as three divine, co-equal, and co-eternal persons. It's confusing because today we treat "being" and "person" as the same thing but they are not. "Being" describes what an entity is, but "person(s)" describes who entities is/are. Also given our finiteness its hard to grasp how God could be one being but three persons since we think of ourselves as one being/one person. Why would an infinite being be bound to that? Simple. God isn't.
18. Allow this cognitive being who is your son but also you to grow up and make several revisions to you/your son’s original standards of morality. Then arrange for other cognitive beings to torture and kill you/your son. Authorize this sacrifice of yourself to yourself as a means of granting all other cognitive beings immunity to the consequences of their sinful nature, which you allowed them to be born with in the first place. Check!
Jesus made no revisions to the standards the Jews were already given. He only pointed out that thoughts are just as bad as the actions themselves and when asked what the greatest commandment is.
Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: "Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?" Jesus replied: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments." - Matthew 22:34-40
Jesus quoted Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18.
In addition, because Jesus is the perfect sacrifice for our sins, we no longer need to offer sacrifices and again God allowed us to be born in sin for reasons we don't fully understand yet. But God is making something awesome and beyond wonderful and we can't see it all yet.
19. Do not however, make this sacrifice free. Establish that none of these cognitive beings shall be eligible for the benefits of this sacrifice unless they actively believe that it happened. In other words, despite the quality of their intentions, any cognitive being henceforth who finds themselves unconvinced that these events actually took place is unwittingly designating themselves for the endless suffering of Hell. Check!
The author presupposes that in and of ourselves a human being is capable of living up to the standards of holiness and purity that God has set. The author thinks that it's unfair that good people could suffer for eternity in Hell and the only thing they failed to do was not to believe that Jesus is the only way to God. The author is wrong. No one is that good or that moral that they meet the standard. Because all have sinned and fallen short of the ideal, the only way to be reconciled back to God is by riding Jesus' coat-tails. On our own, apart from Jesus, everyone of us deserve to go to Hell. Check that.
20. That established, be sure to refrain from making it clear and knowable to the rest of the world that these events actually took place. Ensure that no cognitive being born after the first century has the luxury of witnessing your son (Who is also you) say or do anything to indicate that he was a living god. Again, make sure that all of this occurs before the advancements in science and technology are available to verify it for those who aren’t present. Check!
This is one of the reasons why the Resurrection is so important. Jesus died really and for true, however He did not stay dead. He is alive and anyone who desires to have a personal relationship with Him can have it. You can experience the same Jesus that they did in the first century because Jesus can live through you in a union even closer than the apostles and His followers enjoyed when they were with Jesus as ministered on earth. It's hard to explain to one who has never experienced. We can categorically say that if you make the attempt to reach out to Him, you will find Him and experience what I'm talking about. The author is wrong, you can witness the power of God today and know Jesus for yourself!
21. Arrange so that the only surviving record of these events will be authored anonymously, by non-eyewitnesses, translated to a language different from the one you/your son will speak, and written no earlier than thirty years after you/your son performs these miracles and makes these claims. However, do make sure that these records feature the precept that believing in something without evidence is morally superior to investigation and verification. Check!
Check this: I don't have time to go over textual criticism or explaining how we got the Bible, but I totally disagree with the author. In terms of ancient documents, any document recorded 30 years after the events it describes is like an eye blink of time and could have easily been an eyewitness as tradition holds. I think its arguing from silence saying that Jesus only spoke Aramaic. Recall that on a few occasions Jesus spoke to Gentiles and to Pilate. How do we know that He spoke only Aramaic to them and a good case could be made that Jesus could read Greek (the Septuagint, from which Jesus quoted, is the Greek translation of the Old Testament). In addition, just like today educated and intelligent people spoke multiple languages. I'm sure that He at least spoke Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, and Latin. Who would be more intelligent than Jesus - The Logos incarnate? I disagree that faith mean believing something without evidence. That's not the definition of Biblical Faith and if you read Luke and Acts, then you know the author says the he carefully researched and investigated the facts and wrote them down. Even if you disagree that the one who wrote them was Luke, you cannot deny the following passages:
Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. Therefore, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, it seemed good also to me to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught. - Luke 1:1-4
In my former book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and to teach until the day he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles he had chosen. After his suffering, he showed himself to these men and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive. He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God. - Acts 1:1-3
22. Be sure that after only a few decades the only accounts of these events in existence are copies of copies of copies of copies, which will be verifiably altered and added to in historically and theologically significant ways from generation to generation, sect to sect. Do not preserve the original copies of these accounts, do not protect them from revision, and do not set in place any mechanism for protecting them against being interpreted in hundreds upon hundreds of ways, most of which being heretical, and therefore punishable. Check!
Again, I don't have the time to go into textual criticism and how the Bible was transmitted, but I will recommend the King James Only Controversy by James White and his Debate with Bart Ehrman if you want to fully understand why the author is completely off base. God did preserve his Word - Both testaments whether you like the way he did it or not.
23. Do not bother to employ your omniscience in such a way as to discern which of these cognitive beings are truly rebelling, and which simply don’t know how to distinguish you from other versions of God which do not in fact exist, but which are attributed the same claims of exclusivity. Check!
God does know who is rebelling and who can't distinguish the truth. The thing is that we are accountable. No one will ever to be able to say to God, "I rejected Christ because I could not tell who was telling the truth." We all make choices and will have live with the consequences.
24. Do not make it clear to these beings that you’re even here. Allow for your very existence to remain an easily debatable, easily questionable, and easily doubtable proposition. Allow for billions and billions of souls to be unthinkably tortured for all of eternity regardless of their character, integrity, bravery, responsibility, or conduct, because they had not correctly assumed that the right set of propositions were true by the time their lives on Earth were over. Check!
It is clear to every honest person that God exists. People rationalize and contort and squirm but deep down we all know that there is a creator - one whom we are all ultimately accountable to. No one has a high enough character, brave enough, honest enough, responsible enough, or even remotely good enough to deserve heaven. We all deserve to go to hell.
The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. - Romans 1:18-20
So, wanna re-think that item on the check list? You should. No way would it be on it.
25. And finally, when all is said and done, demand that you be praised for this plan. Check!
I do think that this one is on the checklist. God demands our worship because He deserves it. If you don't believe that creating all of reality by speaking it out of nothing into existence and holding it together by His will is enough to worship and serve Him, then let's make it personal: every single breath you take - every thought you are allowed to think - everything good and decent about you - you owe Him. Still not enough to praise Him? Fine. One last point: God is not obligated to save anyone. He could have chosen to save everyone, no one, or some of us. He'd be perfectly in his rights to do either. He chose to save some of us when we did not now we needed to be saved, did not want to be saved and did not love Him. He takes our rebellious and sinful hearts and free us from sin and its consequences. He make it available to all who believe! If that is not worth praising Him for, then you have no idea how horrible of a condition you are really in.
I don't get it. If you are not aware there has been a huge hoopla since last week because Obama planned to address America's children broadcast to classrooms around the country. The speech was delivered Tuesday, September 8, 2009. It has been insane! People have said it was inappropriate for the President to address children in a speech without their parents knowing exactly what he will say. Apparently they were afraid that Obama would try to convince children (who can't vote nor direct public policy) that his agenda concerning health care reform and bailing out banks and industries contrary to the wishes and values of the offended parents. All Obama did in the speech was encourage our children to study hard and take responsibility for their education. Hardly controversial. It seems simply fear. Obama's opponents are so afraid of his ability to inspire people that they don't want children directly exposed to his ideas. Pathetic. The funny thing to me is that every President since FDR in the 1930's have used mass media to address all Americans including children. I'm also amazed about the parents who thought that keeping their children out of school will keep them from hearing the speech considering that the the speech is being carried all over television and the Internet. Here is an interview I found from CNN where Anderson Cooper really ripped into the Florida Republican Party Head Jim Greer over his remarks concerning President Obama
I was reading through my Twitter stream and I came across a link to a video someone made in attempt to dismiss the Bible's teaching on the character and nature of God by attempting to show logical inconsistencies. The author uses the idea of a checklist which God uses to delineate His purposes and goals. The author and I agree on what Christians believe about God. He does indeed have purposes and goals and He does interact with humanity throughout history. As unbeliever the author has the audacity to think he knows what the plan of God is and what God's purposes are. I think it's worth looking at his checklist and see if it is the same checklist we see in the Bible. This will be in 2 parts. The first part will cover the video up to 5 minutes and 6 seconds. I found a transcript of the video on the Internet
Christians, you believe that your god has orchestrated a divine plan for his creation, and that all events which either have taken place or will take place were foreseen by this god with infallible certainty, and taken into consideration for this plan. You believe that this plan is motivated heavily by God’s unwavering love for his creation, and his desire for us to lead healthy, ethical lives followed by an eternity of happiness alongside him in Heaven. You also believe that your god is perfect and sovereign, and as such you believe that as mere human beings we have no grounds to critique or question this plan, that any flaw or inadequacy we may find in the plan is attributable to our imperfections as sinful, arrogant, rebellious, finite beings. So, that in mind I want to take a moment to remind you of what this plan essentially is, because I think that you rarely afford yourself the opportunity to step back and appreciate it as a whole. So without further ado here it is; God’s perfect plan for his creation, the big checklist in the sky:
1. Decide to arrange for something other than yourself to exist. Check!
The Bible clearly agrees that nothing exists outside of the actions of God. Check!
2. Create a being by the name of Lucifer with full knowledge that this being will betray you, and ultimately cause an infinite amount of suffering unnecessarily. Check!
Um...Hold up! Yes, God had full knowledge of what Lucifer would do.
14 You were anointed as a guardian cherub, for so I ordained you. You were on the holy mount of God; you walked among the fiery stones.
15 You were blameless in your ways from the day you were created till wickedness was found in you.
16 Through your widespread trade you were filled with violence, and you sinned. So I drove you in disgrace from the mount of God, and I expelled you, O guardian cherub, from among the fiery stones.
Ezekiel 28:14-16
How do we know whether the suffering causing evil is unnecessary? How do we know that God does not fulfill His goals despite what evil occurs. God uses everything and in control of everything.
15 When Joseph's brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, "What if Joseph holds a grudge against us and pays us back for all the wrongs we did to him?" 16 So they sent word to Joseph, saying, "Your father left these instructions before he died: 17 'This is what you are to say to Joseph: I ask you to forgive your brothers the sins and the wrongs they committed in treating you so badly.' Now please forgive the sins of the servants of the God of your father." When their message came to him, Joseph wept.
18 His brothers then came and threw themselves down before him. "We are your slaves," they said.
19 But Joseph said to them, "Don't be afraid. Am I in the place of God? 20 You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives. 21 So then, don't be afraid. I will provide for you and your children." And he reassured them and spoke kindly to them.
Genesis 50:15-19
I'd reword it now: Create a being by the name of Lucifer with full knowledge that this being will betray you, and ultimately cause an infinite amount of suffering unnecessarily, but I will set him up for failure before he is even created. Check!
3. Allow an unfathomably horrific dimension of existence known as Hell to emerge, created by yourself or perhaps Lucifer, and allow that to continue existing. Do not override or prevent such a thing; it will come into play later. Check!
Um, How can you say when Hell was created? Something to be considered is what hell is for.
4. Create objective, unchanging moral prescriptions and base them upon whatever your nature happens to be, and then label any action or thought contrary to these standards as sin. Check!
God's objective moral prescriptions are as eternal as God Himself is. Therefore it would not be on the checklist. And By definition "sin" is opposite and contrary to God.
5. Be sure to include in these moral prescriptions edicts for social and psychological health, such as encouragement to beat ones children with a rod (Proverbs 23:13-14), permission to buy and sell slaves and will them as property to one’s children for life (Leviticus 25:44-46), requirement that women not be allowed to teach or have authority over men (Timothy 2:9-14), and of course the instruction to kill anyone who expresses interest in worshiping other gods (Deuteronomy 13:6-10). Check!
Proverbs 23:13-14 says:
13 Do not withhold discipline from a child; if you punish him with the rod, he will not die.
14 Punish him with the rod and save his soul from death.
We are now living the consequences of not doing this: a youth culture built on disrespecting authority. Parents and teachers afraid of their children.
Leviticus 25:44-46 says:
44 " 'Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. 45 You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property. 46 You can will them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly.
Slavery in ancient Israel is not the same as what we th8ink of when we discuss Slavery. It wasn't racial but economic and no where in the Bible is slavery condoned or talked about a good idea, just laws limiting what you can and cannot do. Recall that back then you could not declare bankruptcy or go on unemployment or get welfare. For some people the best you could do is to sell yourself into slavery.
So you can't check that thought...not on the checklist.
6. Design a physical universe with planets, animals, and vegetation all with the appearance of age. Be sure to include in your creation biological flaws, redundancies, and over complications that appear as if they were the product of blind accumulative processes; perhaps a urinary tract that runs straight through the prostate gland, or an unnecessary appendix prone to inflation and rupturing, or maybe a respiratory and digestive system forced to share the same pluming. Check!
I realize that this is a swipe against Intelligent Design and Creationism. This point shows a complete lack of thought and in arrogance asserts that we can come up with a better design than God's. We do not know for sure if all those "problems" being raised are really bad and we don't know if a lot of those "unnecessary" organs are truly not needed! We are still trying to figure out how our bodies truly works.
20But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? "Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, 'Why did you make me like this?' " 21Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use? - Romans 9:20-21
Not even close to being on the list!
7. Create a garden with a tree in it bearing fruit that when eaten provides knowledge of your objective moral standards. Then create two sentient, cognitive beings without knowledge or awareness of these standards and instruct them not to eat from the tree which would enlighten them. In other words arrange it so that only after they eat from the tree are they capable of understanding that doing so was a violation of objective moral standards. Check!
Adam and Eve did know and was aware of God's standard. Violating the objective morals of God boils down to one thing - Disobeying God. They knew better and they chose to outright disobeyed..damning themselves....and us. Not of God's checklist either.
8. Warn these cognitive beings that they will undoubtedly die if they eat from this tree, but don’t follow through if they do. Endow a reptile with vocal cords, lips, or some other means of speaking audibly to your cognitive beings, enabling it to make a convincing case to one of them for eating from the tree; do not prevent this or intervene. Check!
God told Adam that if ate of that tree he would surely die. Humanity was created in the image of God so that He was not designed to die. Had Adman never sinned, then neither would he had ever died. Death is the conclusion of sin - the inevitability of being a sinner. As for the talking serpent, how do you know it didn't happen? You believe in dinosaurs but never seen one alive either. God did not intervened - that's true. My question is that if God had not allowed it would you or I be here having this discussion? No way. God does have a plan and purposes for which we are discovering daily.
9. Now by this point make sure that your cognitive beings have been equipped for reproducing themselves and multiplying, and because one of them has sinned, arrange that every single one of their descendants until the end of time will be born with an inherent sinful nature, defaulting in a future of everlasting torment. Do not by any means allow each of them to be born with a clean slate and the capacity for living a sin free life if they desire, as you did with your first two prototypes. Check!
We are shaped in iniquity and full of sin. Could I personally exist without war, adultery, fornication, stealing, or even chattel slavery? I'm an African-American born in the United States so unless everything had not happened exactly the way it has not one of us would be here. None of us have a clean slate we sin because we want to sin. I agree that none of us can be sin-free because we are enslaved to sin and unable to free ourselves.
10. Endow these cognitive beings with a soul, which keeps their thoughts and feelings and other cognitive faculties in existence forever one way or another, and then allow the sinfulness of these beings to be incompatible with your presence and let Hell be the only other place they can go once they exit the physical world. Do not make any attempt to spare these souls the eternal torment of Hell, such as allowing souls to stop existing all together, or creating an additional realm for them to reside besides with you or in Hell. Check!
The author seems to not like hell. The thing thing is God has given us a way out. You don't have to go to hell if you don't want to. all we have to do is go to God on His terms not our own. Jesus is more than just an attempt to spare us hell, because it is through Him we get to be with God.
11. Over time allow these beings to populate the Earth you have created, knowing with infallible certainty of course that after so many generations they will disappoint you enough that you find it necessary to kill all of them in a global flood, and start all over from scratch. Check!
Again God had a purpose. Generations of people lived and generations of people died. And God had a purpose for their existence. The flood is included in that!
12. Now, when this happens (Again, right on schedule), make an exception for one small family of cognitive beings whom you deem righteous. Of course it goes without saying that your powers of omniscience allow to know, again, with infallible certainty that this family too will ultimately disappoint you in the same way as those you drowned, rendering the entire endeavor futile, but for now it’s best that you pretend not to know that. Check!
Yes, God knew that Noah's descendants would be just evil as the the people who died in the flood. The difference is that God has chosen to give us mercy. And it is His right to do whatever He wants to do.
13. Instruct this small disappointment of a family to populate the entire world all over again by way of incest. Check!
I'm sure the author would agree the theory of evolution and thereby would have to agree that close relatives would have procreate to pass on advantageous mutagenetic traits to the next generation. Therefore...check!
Stay tuned for my part 2 response! And here is the video in its entirety!
About a month ago, I posted the story of Lubna Ahmed al-Hussein who was arrested in Sudan and faced the possibility of being lashed 40 times for wearing pants in public! This story sent me into a state of shock. I could believe sharia laws in Sudan could be that harsh. Lubna Ahmed al-Hussein is a brave woman. I admire her stand and her conviction. I'm not sure if I would have been so quick to make waves had I been her. Given that she was arrested with 18 other women at the same time and few of them have stood with her shows how committed she is. I've recently heard today (er Monday) that she will be spared being whipped and she would instead be fined $200. However, Lubna refuses to pay the fine, will appeal and go to jail if she has to. As I had said: She's brave. It takes people like her if anything is going to change. On top of that it's got me wondering. I mean most people were more horrified by the prospect of her getting whipped than by the fact that sharia laws in Islam are so much stricter on women than on men.
Here are a couple of interactions James White had on British podcasts earlier this year. James White crossed swords with Roger and Faith Forester on Calvinism and the realitity of hell
Here is a video showing how far some people are willing to go to accept scientific evidence for the Big Bang - time/space bursting into existence out of nothing - and all the while ignoring that the universe was designed and created. Sad really. But this what you get when you ignore God!
Francis Crick is quoted on Apologetics 315 as follows:
"An honest man, armed with all the knowledge available to us now, could only state that in some sense, the origin of life appears at the moment to be almost a miracle, so many are the conditions which would have had to have been satisfied to get it going. But this should not be taken to imply that there are good reasons to believe that it could not have started on the earth by a perfectly reasonable sequence of fairly ordinary chemical reactions. The plain fact is that the time available was too long, the many microenvironments on the earth's surface too diverse, the various chemical possibilities too numerous and our own knowledge and imagination too feeble to allow us to be able to unravel exactly how it might or might not have happened such a long time ago, especially as we have no experimental evidence from that era to check our ideas against."
- Francis Crick
I've followed Brian and have added more context to Crick's comments. I like the quote...even the longer one. The thing I need to point out that the shorter quote does not endorse a belief in God or the Bible. I think the only thing that the longer quote does is point out the awesome wonder of the origin of life given what we know contrasted with what we do not know.
"Philosopher Bruce Little speaks on the argument from evil in this lecture entitled: Evil and the God Who Knows. If God is all-loving and all-powerful, why so much evil in the world? An important and helpful discussion of the issue and its facets. Original (with notes) at bethinking.
I agreed with much Dr. Little said. I just would have thought a little differently. In order to destroy evil - to get rid of it, God would have to get rid of every single human being who ever live now lives, and will ever live.
I have come across a YouTube four-part series of videos where Lee Strobel's convictions are challenged. I want to present multiple viewpoints on this blog. Mr. Strobel is a busy guy and he can't answer each and every crackpot challenge. So I'll take this one.
The author of the videos made the mistake of trying to explain Lee Strobel's conversion away as He only started seriously studying the Bible as a believer looking for proof. This is false. By his own testimony, that I have read with my own eyes and heard in person with my own ears, he began to study the Bible to disprove it! He was an atheist. The creator of this serious must not know Strobel well at all.
What else is wrong? The author attempts to knock down Lee Strobel's remark that archaeology supports the Bible by pointing out examples showing where the Bible conflicts with archaeology. He offers 3 major points
1. Daniel says that Belshazzar was Nebuchadnezzar's son, but he really was Nebuchadnezzar's grandson.
The author is ignorant of the oriental culture of the Babylonians and the Persians and the Jews. Grandsons and even Great Grandsons are often attributed to important fathers no matter how far the generations are apart. They also seem to skip details that some of us in modern western culture would have thought was important..ie the fact that Belshazzar was a co-regent with his father and that there had been 3 kings who reigned shortly after Nebuchadnezzar was not deemed important to include. No where in Daniel does it say that Belshazzar immediately followed Nebuchadnezzar. To imply or assume that is going beyond what the Bible does say. 2. Daniel says the Darius the Mede conquered Babylon when it really was Cyrus the Great.
Then Medes and Persians were one empire! Darius and Cyrus conquered Babylon together and Darius being about 62 at the time ruled for a brief time (about 2 yrs) and Cyrus took over the whole thing. source
3. The Bible say that Ninevah was so large that it took 3 days to cross the city but excavations show that the city is only 5 km across.
Look at the text in question - Jonah 3: 3
Jonah obeyed the word of the LORD and went to Nineveh. Now Nineveh was a very important city—a visit required three days.
Obviously the author of the video is using the KJV, but looking at the NIV is much clearer. It could be taken that it took 3 days to reach the city from where the fish dropped Jonah off. Ninevah is along way from the sea.
If the author was wrong about these three Biblical contradictions, what else could he be wrong about? As for the author's point that there is no evidence where there should be, I think it's only a matter of time. It took centuries to find the archaeological artifacts that we do have. I'm sure there is a lot more to find.
Then the author tries to knock down the thought that the Gospels that correlate. The problem he points out that:
1. Different number of women going to the tomb.
No Gospel disagrees with the other by saying so-and-so was not at the tomb when one of them says she was. None of the Gospels give the total number of women who went to the tomb therefore if it were more 5, then it perfectly concievable that different subsets were named.
2. Different number of angels
It's the same thing with number of angels. If one author offers more detail than another, why would you assume contradiction?
3. Location of the stone
None of the Gospels say that the women witnessed the stone being rolled away. There is no contradiction
Considering that Mary Magdalene saw Jesus in the same garden as the tomb just after dawn, I think it's safe to say that she saw him first. To charge contradiction with the two disciples on the way to Emmaus, you would have to say that the episode happened before Mary Magdalene and the other women went to the tomb and judging by the fact that people usually did not travel long distances in the dark of night, I'm certain Mary's encounter happened first.
5. Which disciples went to the tomb.
Does it really make sense to conclude that because Matthew did not record any disciples going to the tomb that there is contradiction with saying Peter went and saying Peter and John went. a contradiction would be to say no one went, Peter did not go, and John did not go. Neither Gospel says that. Where is the contradiction?
When the author talks about Jesus' end times prophecy alleges that Jesus failed to come back in the life time of the people who heard Him. The author has a problem. Jesus could not have been telling people that they would be alive when He comes back. Jesus said that no one knows the day or the hour of his return. He even said he did not know. He told parables illustrating that we have to live like He could come back at any second but not know when. Therefore to understand that Jesus has to return in the lifetime of the hearers means that there is a lack of understanding.
The alleged charge against Matthew saying the Jesus was riding 2 donkeys at the same time is either a lie or a misunderstanding. Jesus was riding a cold...the colt's mother was walking in front of Jesus and the colt. This is how they trained donkey that had never been ridden before.
As for the other alleged contradictions there are answers for them too if you bother to just look at the Bible in its context. For example the obligatory contradiction concerning Jesus' geneology in Matthew and Luke. to the Jewish culture, you don't list everyone in a geneology just the important ones (this is what Matthew did).
I have Doherty's book "Challenging the Verdict" against Strobel's "The Case for Christ". I agree read both. I think that the author of the video is wrong about the time line for the gospels. Not everyone agrees.
These videos do not represent truth and grossly misrepresent history and common sense. An example is the thought that Christianity is just like any other religion without interacting with all of Strobel's reasons for being convinced that it's not. Neither Islam nor Hinduism are based on a body of scripture that can be dated within 30 years of the events themselves. Not just the Gospels but the epistles as well.
Brian has again posted a great article on theistic arguments. This time, he defines the Fine-Tuning argument for the existence of God. I know Brian is right, a lot of deists try to argue that an omnipotent God, described in the Bible, is not necessary to explain fine-tuning. However, I believe that such a God would have to be omnipotent because how else could he control and direct every single particle and its energy in all of reality to make everything come out as it has so that life as we know it is possible? God must be omnipotent to do all of that.
Chad has posted a great post on his blog, Truthbomb Apologetics. It's a link to a blog called The Apologetic Front hosting a video discussing the Jehovah Witness church and their teaching that Jesus returned invisibly in 1914...yeah, I know, but some people still buy it. Check out the video below and visit Chad's Blog.
Brian has posted an interesting Lecture by Dr. Charles Thaxton. Thaxton's title is Darwin's Surprise: Why Darwin Wouldn't Write the Origin Were He Alive Today.
This is great lecture. I like the idea of looking at what data Darwin had available to him in the 1850's versus what we have now, namely the cell and DNA. Thraxton even discusses problems with his theory that was known in Darwin's own time. This is a must-listen and should be considered.
I can answer the question posed in the title of my post in one word: No. Many people think that Christians stole ideas from Zoroaster thereby mythologizing Jesus. There are several problems with this view. The first problem has to do with dating and with sources of information we have regarding Zoroaster himself. The second problem is that Zoroaster's life that we have documented does not parallel Jesus.
There are several opinions when Zoroaster lived and when the religion started. Some say 6000 BCE or 600 BCE. For the sake of argument lets take 600 BCE, arising from Persia. The earliest written records we have were written down between 6th-9th centuries C.E. Adherents (yes, there are still follower s of Zoroaster today) believe that Zoroaster himself lived 1500 - 1000 BCE. In other words, no one is really sure when Zoroaster lived. Therefore for the majority of the time the religion has been practices it's been based on oral stories before being written down. The time scale between the time Zoroaster actually lived and his stories written down is extremely large compared to Jesus and the New Testament, no matter how late you want to date any book in the New Testament. Of course myth and legend must have clear crept into Zoroastrianism during 2000 years. Not to mention it is far more likely Judaism influenced Zoroastrianism rather than the other way around since Judaism came first. In contrast we can date the creed from 1st Corinthians 15 to just a few years after Jesus' crucifixion that most historians agree really happen. And if you reject that argument you still have to admit that the creed found in 1st Corinthians 15 is from the 50's or 60's CE and that Christians had been teaching the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus since Christianity's earliest days, proving that the belief did not come from legend based on people who were not eyewitnesses.
1. Zoroaster was born of a virgin and "immaculate conception by a ray of divine reason."
Zoroaster's mom was married when she gave birth to him, and there's nothing suggesting she was celibate while married. The "ray of divine reason" was apparently a purely spiritual thing, and Zoroaster's body actually was created the usual way. 2. He was baptized in a river.
Zoroaster receives a revelation while on the banks of a river. That's the closest parallel to be found. 3. In his youth he astounded wise men with his wisdom.
Sort of. At age 7, he was put under the care of magi, who he frequently argued with. Later, the magi had him imprisoned, but he was freed after he made the legs grow back on a horse. 4. He was tempted in the wilderness by the devil.
There is a parallel in the Zoroaster story to Jesus' temptation, and, yes, it does apparently predate the Jesus story by a couple hundred years. However, Zoroaster's "temptation" wasn't by the "devil" (in Zoroastrian literature, Ahriman) and it may or may not have been in the wilderness (the texts don't say). Zoroaster is tempted by a demon, not by Ahriman himself. And his temptation doesn't involve turning stones to bread or leaping from towers, just dialogue between Zoroaster and the demon. 5. He began his ministry at age 30.
True, but the earliest reference to his being thirty is post-Christian. 6. Zoroaster baptized with water, fire, and "holy wind."
First of all, there's no reference to Zoroaster baptizing with any of these things. Second of all, there's no Biblical reference to Jesus baptizing with any of these things! Is the fact that neither of them do these things a parallel? 7. He cast out demons and restored the sight to a blind man.
There's no reference to Zoroaster casting out demons, and the earliest reference to his giving eyesight to the blind is from the 10th century A.D. 8. He taught about heaven and hell, and revealed mysteries, including resurrection, judgment, salvation and the apocalypse.
Zoroaster did teach about heaven and hell, and resurrection into a non-dying body. Judgment is done by other gods, but with Zoroaster pleading the case of those who are faithful to him, though, unlike with Christianity, the faithful are not automatically saved. Salvation is achieved by works alone, unlike Christianity. And the apocalypse Zoroaster spoke of was a flood of molten metal. Sounds like a pretty good comparison, huh? However, most of this is from post-Christian writings. Also, most of these subjects begin on the Bible's Old Testament, which predates the earliest Zoroastrian references by several hundred years. 9. He had a sacred cup or grail.
First of all, Zoroaster did not have a sacred cup or grail. Second of all, Jesus (at least according to the Bible) did not have a sacred cup or grail. The Christian "holy grail" is believed by some to be the cup Jesus drank from at the last supper, and others say it was a chalice that collected Jesus' blood at the crucifixion. But as far as its being 'sacred', the Bible makes no such claim. This is a medieval non-Biblical legend. 10. He was slain.
Ummm...okay. So were Caesar, Abraham Lincoln and John Dillinger. Is this supposed to be significant? Let's look at how Zoroaster was slain and see if there is any comparison to how Jesus was slain, shall we? One story has him murdered at the age of 77 by a wizard. Another has him killed in battle. Both of these stories date from the 15th century at the earliest. 11. His religion had a eucharist.
Since they believe in salvation by works alone, why would they have a eucharist? The closest thing they have to a eucharist is a ritual involving the haoma plant, but they don't claim the plant is Zoroaster's body or blood. Besides, the earliest reference to this ritual is post-Christian. 12. He was the "Word made flesh."
No reference to this, implicit or explicit. 13. Zoroaster's followers expect a "second coming" in the virgin-born Saoshyant or Savior, who is to come in 2341 CE and begin his ministry at age 30, ushering in a golden age.
First, there's nothing about his being thirty, or of the redeemer being Zoroaster himself. Even the religion disagrees with itself on exactly what's going to happen, though the date of 2341 CE is given (although how this date compares to Jesus, I have no idea). A pre-Christian text (around 400 B.C.) refers to a single redeemer who ushers in a golden age. Later post-Christian texts suggest there will be three redeemers conceived by virgins who bathe in a lake in which Zoroaster's sperm is being divinely preserved. One of these redeemers will eradicate death. Only the one pre-Christian reference could be considered valid, but that one mentions nothing about the return of Zoroaster himself or virgin birth.
Any honest person would have to agree that Zoroaster does not equal Jesus Christ. They are too different. Here are some more sources
Was Jesus Zoroaster or Buddah? - This ia good article however the author rejects Jesus and Christianity, however, great information on Buddha and Zoroaster.
Brian has posted a great lecture from Michael Green. I really enjoyed it. Michael Green talks about what Apologetics is and what the Gospel really is. I think anyone interested in Christianity and Apologetics should listen to it. It is given from the the European point-of-view and it is very interesting,
I'm excited. I really enjoy Gary Habermas and there is no more important part of Christianity than the Resurrection! Here is an audio interview in which Habermas discusses the historicity of Jesus' Resurrection.
It's a good debate. The thing is William Lane Craig was again awesome demonstrating that without God as ultimate authority on Morality, right and wrong have no meaning. What is to stop me from claiming whatever I want to do or say is right despite what your needs and desires if moraliy is relative? Nothing. As for DR. Torbjörn Tännsjö perfomance, three words come to mind: "Crash and Burn!"
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