Brian even posted the audio on his blog.
Is What We Have Now What They Wrote Then? Audio and Video by Daniel B. Wallace - Apologetics 315
Personal blog that will cover my personal interests. I write about Christian Theology and Apologetics, politics, culture, science, and literature.
Richard Butrick has written an excellent article on the so-called "Golden Age of Islam," i.e. the mythical period in history when the Muslim world led humanity in science and mathematics, and Christians and Jews lived in an interfaith paradise under Muslim rule.
This seems like an interesting article on an interesting book. I think it brings up issues that I have never really seen anyone who thinks the Bible was written by ignorant morons seriously explains the points raised in this book. I think such things are evidence that God revealing information and technology to the Jewish people that was unavailable to their neighbors! Click threw to learn more!
Adam Jacobs, in his article “The Scientific Foreknowledge of the Jewish Sages,” published in Algemeiner, reviews the book by Haim Shore, Coincidences in the Bible and in Biblical Hebrew. Shore is a Professor of Engineering at Ben Gurion University, in Israel.
Maybe one of these days I will have to write a post to explain how Christians came to believe that the earth is only 6,000 old. Those who know the background of this date also know that this date is unreliable.
| Image via Wikipedia |
For if out of your own free will you might avoid sin and do that which pleases God, what need would you have of Christ?
| Cover via Amazon |
The so-called “Easter constitution” adopted in the post-Communist country last May was a major shakeup for Hungarian politics and an outrage to progressive EU ideology: the document not only supported marriage but declared that the unborn child deserves protection from the moment of conception, and even made special mention of Christianity as lying at the heart of the country’s identity. The document’s discussion of human rights also does not mention sexual orientation, another break from EU priorities.
The Hungarian daily Magyar Nemzet claimed this week that the EU would move to drop financial aid to Hungary unless officials there scratched the marriage definition and dropped criminal charges against former Socialist Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany, according to unnamed sources in Brussels. A spokesperson for the European commissioner for economic affairs called the allegation “nonsense,” according to the Wall Street Journal.
God gave us “moral order” which means that He is not subject to the moral order prescribed for humans and that moral order contains moral violence such as self-defense, capital punishment, etc.
In fact, without that moral order we would have no basis upon which to condemn violence (any basis beyond personal preferences that are plagiarizes from the Judeo-Christian moral order to begin with).
It boggles the mind when people claim, definitively, that they have refuted the bible. If they were to say: Here is a serious problem for those who affirm biblical inerrancy--well that would be one thing. But to claim to have demonstrated error--not just to have made a decent case for error--well that takes an especially small mind.
Such a mind is that of Richard Carrier.
Dr. Michael Behe
"The Modern Scientific Theory of Intelligent Design: Strengths and Limitations”
Dr. Stephen Barr
"Physics, the Nature of Time and Theology”
Dr. Jay W. Richards
"Signs of Design from Physics and Astronomy”
Dr. Edward Feser
“Natural Theology Must Be Grounded in the Philosophy of Nature, Not Natural Science”
Dr. Benjamin Wiker
“Can Science Demonstrate the Existence of God?”
Dr. Alvin Plantinga
"Science and Religion: Where the Conflict Really Lies”
This is only "much wisdom" because it's universal to the human experience and because any mention of God or Christ could be removed from what Stephen Colbert said without affecting the meaning in anyway.
In 1974, when Colbert was 10, his father, a doctor, and his brothers Peter and Paul, the two closest to him in age, died in a plane crash while flying to a prep school in New England. “There’s a common explanation that profound sadness leads to someone’s becoming a comedian, but I’m not sure that’s a proven equation in my case,” he told me. “I’m not bitter about what happened to me as a child, and my mother was instrumental in keeping me from being so.” He added, in a tone so humble and sincere that his character would never have used it: “She taught me to be grateful for my life regardless of what that entailed.Does the quote still make sense without what was said about God and Christ? Yes, but it doesn't ground the quote in anything. It doesn't answer why we should be grateful for life. And It misses the profound observation Colbert makes about what pain is and why should thank God for it. Without the part about God the point is lost - just like everything without God. How do you be grateful whatever happens? And to whom should you be grateful for? This is a good theodicy. The thing I recognize is that if you are truly grateful for whatever happens to you and around you then the so-called "problem of evil" is moot. So is suffering because you now see everything in its proper context. I invite everyone to examine their lives and ask "Am I grateful for what ever happens and to whom deserves my gratitude? How do you answer these without God? You cannot.
There's some wisdom here. From a big NYT profile of the TV host:In 1974, when Colbert was 10, his father, a doctor, and his brothers Peter and Paul, the two closest to him in age, died in a plane crash while flying to a prep school in New England. “There’s a common explanation that profound sadness leads to someone’s becoming a comedian, but I’m not sure that’s a proven equation in my case,” he told me. “I’m not bitter about what happened to me as a child, and my mother was instrumental in keeping me from being so.” He added, in a tone so humble and sincere that his character would never have used it: “She taught me to be grateful for my life regardless of what that entailed, and that’s directly related to the image of Christ on the cross and the example of sacrifice that he gave us. What she taught me is that the deliverance God offers you from pain is not no pain — it’s that the pain is actually a gift. What’s the option? God doesn’t really give you another choice.”
Yup, much Wisdom
A debate between Abdullah Kunde and Samuel Green. December 2011.
43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. - Matthew 5:43-45 (http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%205:43-45&version=NIV)
43 Ye have heard that it hath been said , Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. 44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; 45 That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust. - Matthew 5:43-45If you look at the word "love" as in "love your neighbor" and compare "love" as in "love your enemies" you see that they are coded as the same Strong's number demonstrating that Jesus did not mean to imply different kinds of love for neighbors and enemies. This is significant because Kione Greek is extremely more precise then English. If there was a desire to imply a different kind of love for friends and enemies, there is a Greek word that could have been used rather than "ajgapavw". "Ajgapavw" refers to a deep love that is so "other-centered" that you seek the good of the person who is the recipient of that love - whether or not they deserve it.. That is how God loves us - and in no way do we deserves it. We know that this is what Jesus is referring to because He points out that this is how God loves just and unjust people - the same - to the extent that all enjoy the sun that belongs to Him.
(http://www.biblestudytools.com/kjv/matthew/passage.aspx?q=matthew+5:43-45)
10 Not only that, but Rebekah’s children were conceived at the same time by our father Isaac. 11 Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad—in order that God’s purpose in election might stand: 12 not by works but by him who calls—she was told, “The older will serve the younger.” 13 Just as it is written: “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”
14 What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! 15 For he says to Moses,
“I will have mercy on whom I have mercy,
and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”
16 It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. 17 For Scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” 18 Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.
19 One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who is able to resist his will?” 20 But who are you, a human being, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” 21 Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use?
22 What if God, although choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath—prepared for destruction? 23 What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory— 24 even us, whom he also called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles? 25 As he says in Hosea:
“I will call them ‘my people’ who are not my people;
and I will call her ‘my loved one’ who is not my loved one,” - Romans 9:10-25
Here it is, the last podcast episode for 2011. This time I’m looking at “the “evil god challenge” as posed by Stephen Law in a fairly recent article by that name. Isn’t the evidence for a good God really no better or worse than the evidence that an evil god? In short, no. Here I explain why I think (as I suspect many may think) that the evil god challenges has major philosophical shortcomings, in spite of being an argument worthy of our attention.
When I listened to Dr Michael Brown interview Dr Craig Keener, one of Keener's books came up. Its a background commentary that gives historical context to the New Testament. I decided to see if I could find a digital version and there is one! It can be integrated with the Olive Tree Software platforms. I use Olive Tree on my Android devices so I was excited.