Mayor Pete Attacks Trump's Faith...

[carpedm9587]

I hereby prophesy this shall come back to bitest thee.

We shall see


ETA: Actually, there is a good possibility that will happen. So many of the things I post are taken differently than intended, I'm sure some post of mine will eventually be interpreted as "you just made an argument about what the bible says" and any clarification on my part will be rejected. That's pretty much what happens.

[carpedm9587]

Neither do I. Not is that what I said.

So, out of curiosity, why did you feel a need to point that out?

[Cow Poke]

...I see people making assumptions they have not supported.

Yes, Tassman most definitely made a statement (assumption?) he has not supported, and, apparently, is incapable of doing so.

Look at my post again without malice.

So, interesting point ---

A) the issue of Tassman's unproven claim Buttigieg himself claimed to be a "practicing Christian" is not a "what the Bible says" issue.

I was simply pointing out that there are actually two different issues going on. That was one of the issues, and it's not a "what the Bible says" issue. (which is why I said "the issue of Tassman's unproven claim Buttigieg himself claimed to be a "practicing Christian" is not a "what the Bible says" issue".

Then there's a second issue...

2) the issue of whether or not Buttigieg actually IS a "practicing Christian" very much involves "what the Bible says".

You tended, in this thread, to dabble in both.

Your argument by weblink article went all into "what the Bible says".

[Cow Poke]

So, out of curiosity, why did you feel a need to point that out?

Because I realized there are actually two different issues. See my previous post.

[carpedm9587]

Yes, Tassman most definitely made a statement (assumption?) he has not supported, and, apparently, is incapable of doing so.

Look at my post again without malice.

I am always amazed at how quickly people here jump to assuming the person on the other side of the screen is posting out of malice.

I was simply pointing out that there are actually two different issues going on. That was one of the issues, and it's not a "what the Bible says" issue. (which is why I said "the issue of Tassman's unproven claim Buttigieg himself claimed to be a "practicing Christian" is not a "what the Bible says" issue".

Then there's a second issue...

Your argument by weblink article went all into "what the Bible says".

No. Again, that is what you folks made it about, but it is not what I was saying. At no point did I suggest, "this is what the bible says and what it means." I suggested, "this is a passage Buttigieg might be considering, how he might be interpreting it, and why it might explain his actions." What the passage actually means and what the "correct interpretation" is was never part of my post.

It's basically the difference between,

"Maybe John is basing his position on his interpretation of the 2nd Amendment?"

versus

"The 2nd Amendment was intended to mean blah, blah, blah..."

[carpedm9587]

Because I realized there are actually two different issues. See my previous post.

Then it might have been clearer if you had started with "I think there are two different issues here..." rather than "Interesting point..." (which I desisted from pointing out was singular and then you proceeded to list two points... )

[JimL]

But the bible says, "If a snake bites before it is charmed, the charmer receives no fee. -Ecclesiastes 10:11"

But the bible says, thou shalt not, and yet you do, so I guess you're not a christian.

[Adrift]

You will note that the vast majority of my posts are in the Civic 101 forum. I returned to TWeb after Trump was elected because I was looking for places where I could engage with conservative thinkers and Trump supporters. It was my way of trying to get "out of my bubble" and listen to the arguments of the other side. Religion/faith had relatively little to do with it. In the process, the futility of engaging with those who hold a position "because the bible says so" became clear, and I generally eschew those discussions, for the reasons cited. I am more interested in the political and general social issues. Once someone defends a position with "because the bible says so," there is usually no point in further engagement. As long as the bible is the basis, the conversation necessarily degenerates into "what does the bible mean" and how to interpret passages and which passages take precedence over which other passages. It's simply not an interest of mine, or a conversation I find useful.

I don't buy it. There are thousands of political forums, far more than than there are Christian forums, with all variety of views. This is a Theology forum first and foremost. It's in the freakin name. It's owned by Christians, and most of the posters are Christian, and most of the threads in Civics have something to do with the Christian worldview of the posters. Their Christian worldview is more often than not, based on their view of scripture. You KNOW that. If you didn't want to engage with people whose worldview was informed by their reading of scripture then you came back to the wrong forum. And, as an aside, I don't think I've ever heard anyone start or end a discussion with "because the bible says so." Very few people here are that black and white fundamentalist in their thinking. Most people here spend great amounts of time reading their Bibles in light of deep theological and philosophical deliberation. They don't simply say, "I believe it because they Bible says it." They ask "why do I believe what I believe," or "why is this in my Bible, what was God's ultimate intention or goal here?"

With the level of condescension that flies around here, I would think that would fit right in.

Why would anyone in their right mind continue to post in a place that they don't feel welcome? If the condescension at TWeb is really as bad as you're making it out to be, why come back every single day? That's madness.

But you are right. I was being flip. I apologize. The basic point is, there's nothing much for me to say in response to those kinds of statements.

Then don't say anything. You don't have to reply to every post. You realize that, right? You really don't have to reply back every time someone replies to you. If you truly think that Bible-based moralism, or Bible-based views are beneath you, or have nothing to do with you, then either leave, or stop telling people things like "I don't do 'but the bible says' arguments." No one cares if you don't do "bible says" arguments. This is a Christian forum, you're going to hear the occasional Bible verse reference.

Adrift, you have (I'm sure) seen my exchanges with Seer on my meta-views concerning morality. I find morality to be subjective/relative and rooted in what we value. The person who "values god" and then further presumes "the bible is the inerrant word of god" has a moral framework that is essentially impregnable. So long as "the bible says so," there are very few moral arguments that will convince this person to examine a moral position and approach it differently than they already do. There are basically two possibilities.

1) Convince them that "valuing god" is not a very good choice. I rate that "highly unlikely."
B) Convince them that the bible is NOT the inerrant word of this god. I rate that "highly unlikely"
III) Convince them that they are interpreting the bible incorrectly. That gets everyone caught up in the word dance, and justifying why this passage actually means that. And that discussion is being had on collection of books that has hundreds of translations, for which we have no originals, for which we know relatively little about authorship, written 2000-3500 years ago in a different culture, and many of the books written well after the events they purport to record. I rate that "essentially impossible." We have a U.S. Constitution. By comparison, we have the original documents, we know who wrote them AND have a body of surrounding work that they also wrote, not to mention writings from those that influenced them, it was written about 250 years ago in this culture (albeit it has morphed significantly since then), and it was written in response to current issues of the day. Despite all those advantages, there is STILL wide disagreement on "what it means" and "what was intended." Coming to agreement on the bible is, IMO, an exercise in futility. Even Christians cannot agree on that, or there wouldn't be some 2500 sects (and counting).

I find my position to be fairly rational. I understand you disagree.

This is a such load of baloney, and I'm tired of seeing you repeat it.

1.) If you don't want to have arguments with Christians who believe that scripture is divinely inspired then head towards the door. This is not the forum format for you.

2.) seer knocks your arguments clean out of the park before he even picks up a Bible. He is constantly 3 moves ahead of you in just about every argument I've seen him engage you in. You lock into one bit of his argument, and can't ever seem to understand why he doesn't see your tree for the forest.

3.) I've been on this forum for a long time. Christians here have the occasional disagreement on scripture, but generally speaking we seem to agree on the broad strokes. Disagreement can usually be settled by going to New and Old Testament scholars and seeing how they parse the Hebrew and Greek.

4.) We know quite a bit about the authorship of the Bible, and the customs and culture of the people who wrote it, and the audience it was directed towards. True we don't have the original autographs, but even highly skeptical scholars like Bart Ehrman admits that what we do have is relatively close to the originals, and that little if anything would change in matters of doctrine. Furthermore, especially concerning the New Testament, experts are agreed that the original autographs are incredibly close to the events they purport to record compared to contemporaneous writings. Some passages coming within 5 years or less after the event (the 1st Corinthian 15 creed for example). This is all Theology 101. Stuff you would have likely learned had you actually attended seminary. Stuff that you should have learned before your return visit here.

5.) I come from a cult that argued that Christianity was false, and you could know that this was true because of all of the warring denominations out there. Imagine my shock when, after leaving that cult and studying Christianity, I came to the realization that all of these denominational divides weren't nearly as wide or widespread as I had been taught. The World Christian Encyclopedia where everyone gets their denominational count from, points out that in fact there are 6 major ecclesiastico-cultural blocs, divided into 300 major ecclesiastical traditions, with distinct denominational splits from there. The vast majority of Christians are on the same page, and moreso, the vast majority of Biblical scholars are unified in a number of major areas and disciplines.

Your position is not fairly rational. It's absurd. If you're being honest, and you really don't have anything to say to Christians who speak from the perspective of scripture, and are not just defaulting to the refrain "I don't do 'but the bible says' arguments" because you know it'll take work, then, again, this is not the forum for you. Go some place where you think the people are less condescending, and where you won't have to deal with pesky Bible-believing Christians all of the time.

[carpedm9587]

But the bible says, thou shalt not, and yet you do, so I guess you're not a christian.

[Adrift]

We shall see


ETA: Actually, there is a good possibility that will happen. So many of the things I post are taken differently than intended, I'm sure some post of mine will eventually be interpreted as "you just made an argument about what the bible says" and any clarification on my part will be rejected. That's pretty much what happens.

That happens because you're a terrible communicator, or because you intentionally change what you originally meant when trapped in your own logic. The rest of us are able to read one another just fine. Heck, we can read most of the skeptics just fine as well (barring shunyadragon of course. No one knows what he's talking about most the time, including himself).

[carpedm9587]

I don't buy it.

To be blunt, Adrift, that is not my concern.

There are thousands of political forums, far more than than there are Christian forums, with all variety of views. This is a Theology forum first and foremost. It's in the freakin name. It's owned by Christians, and most of the posters are Christian, and most of the threads in Civics have something to do with the Christian worldview of the posters. Their Christian worldview is more often than not, based on their view of scripture. You KNOW that. If you didn't want to engage with people whose worldview was informed by their reading of scripture then you came back to the wrong forum.

That may be true. The fact is, it was the forum I was familiar with due to my previous exposure here, and the first place I thought of when I asked myself, "where could I get one-on-one with right-leaning, conservative types, many of whom will probably be Trump defenders? So it's where I decided to come. Whether or not you believe that, again, not under my control and not my concern.

And, as an aside, I don't think I've ever heard anyone start or end a discussion with "because the bible says so." Very few people are that black and white fundamentalist in their thinking. Most people here spend great amounts of time reading their Bibles in light of deep theological and philosophical deliberation. They don't simply say, "I believe it because they Bible says it." They ask "why do I believe what I believe," or "why is this in my Bible, what was God's ultimate intention or goal here?"

I suggest you go back through the various threads and review. When I WAS engaging in moral discussions, that was pretty much the bottom line. When pushed to confront contradictions, the go-to-response was (paraphrasing) "we are bible-believing Christians and that's what the bible says." It's what made me realize the futility of discussing specific moral topics, generally. And it's why I typically disengage with a discussion when that becomes the justification for the position. However, many discussions have been about racism, the nature of morality, logic, privilege, Trump, the 2nd amendment, and other topics that have not ended up in "the bible says." Those are the ones I am generally interested in.

Why would anyone in their right mind continue to post in a place that they don't feel welcome? If the condescension at TWeb is really as bad as you're making it out to be, why come back every single day? That's madness.

Well, my simplest answer to that is, "practice." Despite the many accusations about my not being "self-reflective," I actually am. Being here for the past many months has taught me a number of lessons about myself that I consider valuable. For example, I tend to get REALLY defensive when people say things about me that are not true, or misrepresent the position I have put forward. Although I mentally believe, "what a person says about me or to me doesn't change who I am, and says more about who they are," the fact is I have not internalized that on a more emotional/psychological level. I still react. If the solution to getting fit is exercising the muscles, then I submit that the solution to getting good at "letting go" is to find a venue where that skill can be practiced. I doubt too many would argue with the observation that this is a good place to develop that skill. I still consider myself a "90 pound weakling" in that particular skill set, but I find I am steadily getting better. And I am also finding it is also reflecting IRL. It's a good thing.

As they say - no pain no gain!

Then don't say anything. You don't have to reply to every post. You realize that, right?

First - see above. Second, I actually don't respond to every post. The major exception could possibly be discussions with Seer.

You really don't have to reply back every time someone replies to you. If you truly think that Bible-based moralism, or Bible-based views are beneath you, or have nothing to do with you, then either leave, or stop telling people things like "I don't do 'but the bible says' arguments." No one cares if you don't do "bible says" arguments. This is a Christian forum, you're going to hear the occasional Bible verse reference.

I respond with "I don't do "the bible says" discussions when I am in a discussion with someone and they respond to one of my posts with something that is of the form, "the bible says." I don't just jump into a discussion with "I don't do 'the bible says discussions.' "

This is a such load of baloney, and I'm tired of seeing you repeat it.

Then, to paraphrase a wise man, "you don't have to read every post. You know that, right?

Adrift - if you find my posts tedious or disingenuous or insulting, then just stop reading them. I'll never know, and no feelings will be harmed.

1.) If you don't want to have arguments with Christians who believe that scripture is divinely inspired then head towards the door. This is not the forum format for you.

I don't argue about whether or not the bible is divinely inspired - so no problem.

2.) seer knocks your arguments clean out of the park before he even picks up a Bible. He is constantly 3 moves ahead of you in just about every argument I've seen him engage you in. You lock into one bit of his argument, and can't ever seem to understand why he doesn't see your tree for the forest.

Then we disagree. I find Seer's arguments to be badly, logically flawed. It's one thing to be bible-based. That is a matter of belief. But if you are going to apply logic, you should get it right and now the fundamentals of logic. Seer keeps tripping over them, and then ignoring it when he is caught doing so. He works carefully to make sure he is the one asking the questions, and dodges the questions asked in return on a regular basis. Conversations with him are interesting, that I will admit. And he is tenacious, no doubt. But his quality of argumentation is not as strong as it could be.

3.) I've been on this forum for a long time. Christians here have the occasional disagreement on scripture, but generally speaking we seem to agree on the broad strokes. Disagreement can usually be settled by going to New and Old Testament scholars and seeing how they parse the Hebrew and Greek.

I'm not sure why you felt you needed to say this in this context, so I'll leave it to you.

4.) We know quite a bit about the authorship of the Bible, and the customs and culture of the people who wrote it, and the audience it was directed towards. True we don't have the original autographs, but even highly skeptical scholars like Bart Ehrman admits that what we do have is relatively close to the originals, and that little if anything would change in matters of doctrine. Furthermore, especially concerning the New Testament, experts are agreed that the original autographs are incredibly close to the events they purport to record compared to contemporaneous writings. Some passages coming within 5 years or less after the event (the 1st Corinthian 15 creed for example). This is all Theology 101. Stuff you would have likely learned had you actually attended seminary. Stuff that you should have learned before your return visit here.

Adrift, there are some facts about the authors that are simply inescapable. Most of the books of the bible we have no idea who the actual author was. Most of the books of the bible we have no body of other literature reliably known to be written by that author. The oldest scraps of the OT we have date to centuries after the originals were written. Any change that was inserted between the original author ad the first few copies would have propagated widely and would be indistinguishable from the original writing. The claim "they are identical to" or even "they are very close to" the original works is "best guess" at best. The NT is different. for the Gospels and Acts, the writings post-date the events they record by decades. What we have is not reliably a record of "what happened" so much as it is a testament of how the extant community, at the time of their writing, was relating about "what happened." In other words, they tell us the theology of this post-Jesus community as it existed 30-60 years after the death of Jesus of Nazareth. The letters are, of course, concurrent with the community in which or for which they were written, but they are largely written by second-generation Christians, so again tell us the theology of the leaders and community at the time of their writing. And again we have no extant manuscripts. IIRC, the first full NT we have dates from the 4th century and is a translation from the original language. The oldest fragment we have is still from the second century and is a credit-card sized fragment. On this, people pile belief upon belief and make claims to virtually inerrant "knowledge" that simply cannot be supported by the reality.

I understand the history and the draw that the bible has, and the mindset that sees it as the "inerrant word of god" (for those who believe it to be such). It is not a belief I can share, or find supportable by the available information.

5.) I come from a cult that argued that Christianity was false, and you could know that this was true because of all of the warring denominations out there. Imagine my shock when, after leaving that cult and studying Christianity, I came to the realization that all of these denominational divides weren't nearly as wide or widespread as I had been taught. The World Christian Encyclopedia where everyone gets their denominational count from, points out that in fact there are 6 major ecclesiastico-cultural blocs, divided into 300 major ecclesiastical traditions, with distinct denominational splits from there. The vast majority of Christians are on the same page, and moreso, the vast majority of Biblical scholars are unified in a number of major areas and disciplines.

Although I have mentioned over 2500 sects (and counting), I don't believe I ever suggested that the divide between these sects was "wide." As with most things in life, I suspect if you could quantitatively measure the "divide" you would find a classic bell curve. They all ultimately source to the same root, so there is likely a significant cohesion among the majority. The cohesion will become looser and looser as you move out to 3 and 4 and 5 and 6 sigmas, with the expected reduction in number of sects that occupy that space on the continuum. But the fact that there are SO many sects and the number continues to climb as communities encounter issues (social, theological, doctrinal, moral, etc.) they cannot internally resolve is informative to me. I have said before: religions tend to separation. The longer a religion has existed, the more it separates (although they don't all do it at the same rate). The reunification of religions/sects once divided is comparatively rare. Science tends to unity. In science, dissent and discord tends to occur when a new idea is first proposed. Then, as the concept is tested and more and more teams can reproduce the effects or use the principle to predict outcomes, the position becomes more widely accepted and embraced. There are always holdouts, of course, but generally it tends to unity. I have come to believe that the reason for this dynamic is that religions are not based in reality - they are rooted in a supreme being that simply doesn't exist. Science, on the other hand, is rooted in reality - it explores and assesses the reality all around us.

Your position is not fairly rational. It's absurd. If you're being honest, and you really don't have anything to say to Christians who speak from the perspective of scripture, and are not just defaulting to the refrain "I don't do 'but the bible says' arguments" because you know it'll take work, then, again, this is not the forum for you. Go some place where you think the people are less condescending, and where you won't have to deal with pesky Bible-believing Christians all of the time.

I absolute agree that I have nothing to say to the Christians who speak from the perspective of scripture. That is why I say, "I don't do 'the bible says' arguments." For me, the bible is a collection of ancient texts. As with all ancient texts, they tell us, with reasonable certainty, about the culture in which they were written, and the beliefs of the authors. They are marvelous secondary (and sometimes primary) sources for confirming historical events reported in other ways (i.e., architecture, other writings, etc.). They provide insights into the evolution of the early church. They are also critical to understanding the evolution of human societies for the last 1700 years - since Christianity became the default religion of the Roman Empire and Christianity (in general) took it's place as the most influential religion in the history of humanity.

As for going elsewhere - if I am asked to leave by the owners of this site, I will honor that request, of course. Otherwise, I'll probably stick around. I have to admit, I usually enjoy your posts and discussions with you, but you seem to be on a bit of a tear with respect to me these days. I'm not sure what triggered that, and I hope a return to the previous ability to dialogue is in the offing. If not... well... not sure what else to say.

[Tassman]

Tassman finally got it right and admitted that Buttigieg isn't a "REAL Christian!"

The sarcasm escapes you. The context makes it clear that Buttigieg "isn't a REAL Christian" according to you. This has been my argument from the start,

[Adrift]

To be blunt, Adrift, that is not my concern.

I think it is, or else you wouldn't have bothered to reply.

That may be true. The fact is, it was the forum I was familiar with due to my previous exposure here, and the first place I thought of when I asked myself, "where could I get one-on-one with right-leaning, conservative types, many of whom will probably be Trump defenders? So it's where I decided to come. Whether or not you believe that, again, not under my control and not my concern.

I don't believe you. And yes, I am not under your control, and no, I don't believe that you're not concerned. People don't waste time typing up replies to posts they're not concerned about.

I suggest you go back through the various threads and review. When I WAS engaging in moral discussions, that was pretty much the bottom line. When pushed to confront contradictions, the go-to-response was (paraphrasing) "we are bible-believing Christians and that's what the bible says." It's what made me realize the futility of discussing specific moral topics, generally. And it's why I typically disengage with a discussion when that becomes the justification for the position. However, many discussions have been about racism, the nature of morality, logic, privilege, Trump, the 2nd amendment, and other topics that have not ended up in "the bible says." Those are the ones I am generally interested in.

I have reviewed the threads. You often don't know what is actually being argued because your eyes are so set on the trees you don't see the forest. seer, for instance, will often grant you that his moral position is "I believe it because the Bible says it" only to move the discussion forward. The reason he does that is because you are so fixated on overstating your case that he wants to see if you'll move past your strawmen so that he can get you back on the main points of contention. He does this often with you, and for whatever reason, you just don't see it. A little digging into his claims reveal that there's far more going on into his actual thinking processes concerning morality and the bible than the strict "I believe it because I'm a zombie Christian" than you seem to think. I pointed that out in this post here, but apparently you missed it once again.

Well, my simplest answer to that is, "practice." Despite the many accusations about my not being "self-reflective," I actually am. Being here for the past many months has taught me a number of lessons about myself that I consider valuable. For example, I tend to get REALLY defensive when people say things about me that are not true, or misrepresent the position I have put forward. Although I mentally believe, "what a person says about me or to me doesn't change who I am, and says more about who they are," the fact is I have not internalized that on a more emotional/psychological level. I still react. If the solution to getting fit is exercising the muscles, then I submit that the solution to getting good at "letting go" is to find a venue where that skill can be practiced. I doubt too many would argue with the observation that this is a good place to develop that skill. I still consider myself a "90 pound weakling" in that particular skill set, but I find I am steadily getting better. And I am also finding it is also reflecting IRL. It's a good thing.

As they say - no pain no gain!

So...why do you complain if you're actually getting something out of all of the abuse you say you suffer through? Why not suffer the slings and arrows silently? After all, they're for your own good, right? No one here likes hearing you whine about it constantly. It makes you out to be the 90 pound weakling you consider yourself to be.

Then, to paraphrase a wise man, "you don't have to read every post. You know that, right?

Adrift - if you find my posts tedious or disingenuous or insulting, then just stop reading them. I'll never know, and no feelings will be harmed.

I honestly don't reply to you that often. Often, you reply to me when I'm talking to someone else (as you did here). Unlike you, I have quite a bit in common with the posters here. Certainly not politically, but we share a common faith, so I have good reason to read the posts on this forum, and share my Bible-believing faith with my fellow sisters and brothers in Christ. If it gets to the point that I find your posts a big enough nuisance, I have no problem ignoring them (I ignore the vast majority of your posts anyways), but I don't mind stepping in pointing out your passive-aggressiveness, and out and out false claims from time to time.

I don't argue about whether or not the bible is divinely inspired - so no problem.

But you do argue with Christians who believe that the Bible is divinely inspired, so, as we saw here in your reply to Sparko, it is a problem.

Then we disagree. I find Seer's arguments to be badly, logically flawed.

You find them badly logically flawed because you're often not seeing his broad strokes. Granted, that's sometimes on him for purposely skipping past what he thinks is obvious, but more often than not, his arguments are not logically flawed.

Adrift, there are some facts about the authors that are simply inescapable. Most of the books of the bible we have no idea who the actual author was. Most of the books of the bible we have no body of other literature reliably known to be written by that author.

Wrong. Most of the books of the Bible we have great knowledge of who the author is. We may not know all of their names (which has never been of great import in ancient historical writings), but we often know where they're from, what sort of education they likely had, what period they're writing in, who their audience is, etc. You're speaking out of ignorance because this is an area outside of your expertise. Pick up the works of noted Biblical scholars like John Walton, Michael Heiser, Richard Hess, Richard Elliott Friedman, Geza Vermes, Raymond Brown, NT Wright, Richard Bauckham, and the social-context scholars like David deSilva, Jerome Neyrey, and Bruce Malina.

The oldest scraps of the OT we have date to centuries after the originals were written.

So what? We have the LXX, the Peshitta, and the Masoretic which largely agree with the DSS. And the earliest preserved text we have, the Silver Scroll of Ketef Hinnom that dates to as early as the 7th century confirms a number of Biblical passages. Our fragments for the New Testament are even earlier. We have fragments of John that likely date to the early 2nd century. Also, scholars have known for years that earlier doesn't always translate to more accurate. When later texts from very disparate origins agree, we can count on them having very similar origins.

Any change that was inserted between the original author ad the first few copies would have propagated widely and would be indistinguishable from the original writing. The claim "they are identical to" or even "they are very close to" the original works is "best guess" at best.

This is where text critical scholarship steps in and evaluates early from late. Scholars have this down to a science at this point, and are working on far more than simply a "best guess." Again, I recommend you read the scholars I cited above. If you don't like reading, listen to Old Testament scholar, Dr. Heiser's Naked Bible podcast. He steps through whole books of the Bible and offers links to resources and peer-reviewed papers on the study and analysis of the Old Testament texts. He will literally pull apart a passage bit by bit so you can see the stages of development (if any exist to begin with).

The NT is different. for the Gospels and Acts, the writings post-date the events they record by decades.

You type that as though that's a bad thing. In the ancient world that is absolutely outstanding! We have barely any writings that close to the date of the events in the ancient world. It just doesn't exist. Yet, we (as a society, and certainly scholars of all stripes) believe all sorts of things about the ancient world that we have far less manuscript evidence for, or that we do have manuscript evidence for, but that date hundreds if not thousands of years later. When you type stuff like this, everyone can see your hand and can call your bluff. You're making a terrible internet skeptic mistake of thinking that material written decades after an event is a bad thing. It'd be hysterical if it weren't so common.

What we have is not reliably a record of "what happened" so much as it is a testament of how the extant community, at the time of their writing, was relating about "what happened." In other words, they tell us the theology of this post-Jesus community as it existed 30-60 years after the death of Jesus of Nazareth. The letters are, of course, concurrent with the community in which or for which they were written, but they are largely written by second-generation Christians, so again tell us the theology of the leaders and community at the time of their writing.

Well yes, and no. Yes, the books of the New Testament are generally geared towards the community that they're being written to. That's true of any historical source. Even today. If you were writing a biography on President Reagan today, you'd likely frame quite a bit with what's happening right now in the 21st century. It wouldn't mean your biography is necessarily wrong, but that it's geared towards a 21st century audience, and not an audience living through the Cold War. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that. No, the New Testament was not largely written by second-generation Christians. Second-generation Christians would be people like Polycarp, Clement of Rome, and Ignatius of Antioch. The New Testament is largely contemporaneous with the 1st generation of Christians.

And again we have no extant manuscripts. IIRC, the first full NT we have dates from the 4th century and is a translation from the original language. The oldest fragment we have is still from the second century and is a credit-card sized fragment. On this, people pile belief upon belief and make claims to virtually inerrant "knowledge" that simply cannot be supported by the reality.

Name an extant autograph manuscript from the ancient world outside of someone's grocery list. We have earlier extant manuscripts of the New Testament than we have for any other book in the ancient world. No one (certainly no one on this forum) makes a claim "to virtually inerrant 'knowledge.'" I don't even know what that means. For someone who claims to have been a devout Christian, you have some really weird ideas about Christians. Some Christians believe that the original autographs of the books/letters of the Bible are inerrant. And by inerrancy they typically mean something like that found in the Chicago Statement on Inerrancy. Not every Christian believes the Bible is inerrant, however. Plenty of people on this very forum do not hold that position. Outside of weirdo King James-Onlyists, no one believes that the 2nd century fragments or the largely complete Codex Vaticanus dating to 300-305 is inerrant. Furthermore, we have other sources outside of these fragments. We have thousands of quotes from the Bible in the writings of early Jewish, Christian, and pagan sources. Again, historians have repeatedly stated over the years that early does not always equal better. Early is sometimes wrong when it turns out that the earliest variant is largely inconsistent with later texts that originate from disparate sources and places.

I understand the history and the draw that the bible has, and the mindset that sees it as the "inerrant word of god" (for those who believe it to be such). It is not a belief I can share, or find supportable by the available information.

It doesn't sound like you understand the history or the mindset that sees the "inerrant word of god" at all.

Although I have mentioned over 2500 sects (and counting), I don't believe I ever suggested that the divide between these sects was "wide." As with most things in life, I suspect if you could quantitatively measure the "divide" you would find a classic bell curve. They all ultimately source to the same root, so there is likely a significant cohesion among the majority. The cohesion will become looser and looser as you move out to 3 and 4 and 5 and 6 sigmas, with the expected reduction in number of sects that occupy that space on the continuum. But the fact that there are SO many sects and the number continues to climb as communities encounter issues (social, theological, doctrinal, moral, etc.) they cannot internally resolve is informative to me. I have said before: religions tend to separation. The longer a religion has existed, the more it separates (although they don't all do it at the same rate). The reunification of religions/sects once divided is comparatively rare. Science tends to unity. In science, dissent and discord tends to occur when a new idea is first proposed. Then, as the concept is tested and more and more teams can reproduce the effects or use the principle to predict outcomes, the position becomes more widely accepted and embraced. There are always holdouts, of course, but generally it tends to unity. I have come to believe that the reason for this dynamic is that religions are not based in reality - they are rooted in a supreme being that simply doesn't exist. Science, on the other hand, is rooted in reality - it explores and assesses the reality all around us.

There was no need to talk of 2500 sects if you agree that there is significant cohesion. Furthermore, what you seem to think is a weakness, I find to be a strength. In Essentials Unity, In Non-Essentials Liberty, In All Things Charity is a great way for Christianity to spread throughout the world, and speak to people on levels they can understand and relate to. It'll be great when Christ returns and all his followers will return to a single fold, but in the meantime, I think it's phenomenal that I have choice. And comparing Christian diversity with the sciences is completely left-field. What does cohesion in the sciences have to do with anything? First of all, your view of the sciences is ridiculously naive. The sciences are absolutely brimming with diversity and disharmony. Ego and disputes. Nothing would happen at all in the sciences if everyone was constantly on the same page. It's only because people strongly and heavily disagree with one another that the sciences advance at all. Furthermore, you're talking as though science was the only avenue to truth, which is plainly not the case. Some of our greatest philosophers, literary critics, economists, and social scientists disagree radically from one another, and yet, we largely agree that they have something important to say about the areas they have expertise in.

I absolute agree that I have nothing to say to the Christians who speak from the perspective of scripture. That is why I say, "I don't do 'the bible says' arguments." For me, the bible is a collection of ancient texts. As with all ancient texts, they tell us, with reasonable certainty, about the culture in which they were written, and the beliefs of the authors. They are marvelous secondary (and sometimes primary) sources for confirming historical events reported in other ways (i.e., architecture, other writings, etc.). They provide insights into the evolution of the early church. They are also critical to understanding the evolution of human societies for the last 1700 years - since Christianity became the default religion of the Roman Empire and Christianity (in general) took it's place as the most influential religion in the history of humanity.

As for going elsewhere - if I am asked to leave by the owners of this site, I will honor that request, of course. Otherwise, I'll probably stick around. I have to admit, I usually enjoy your posts and discussions with you, but you seem to be on a bit of a tear with respect to me these days. I'm not sure what triggered that, and I hope a return to the previous ability to dialogue is in the offing. If not... well... not sure what else to say.

I don't care if you stay on the forum or not, but it make zero sense to stay on a forum where you feel you're constantly being victimized, and where you are debating people who have aligned their worldview with something that you refuse to engage. That's very strange. Normal people don't do that.

And, I'm sorry, while I once enjoyed discussions with you, I really don't think I have since your return. I don't think you're an evil or bad person. I don't think you're dumb. But I think you're very confused. I think you come off more passive-aggressive, and condescending than you think, and as I stated in a previous post, I think you retreat into contradictory arguments when faced with the absurdity of your own logic. As I say above, I typically ignore your posts, because they're just so...I don't know...out there, but every now and then I think it's good to expose your words for what they are. There's a bit of a bully in you that plays the victim in order to get away with it, and I think that's what gets me triggered.

[Cow Poke]

I am always amazed at how quickly people here jump to assuming the person on the other side of the screen is posting out of malice.

I was just pulling your chain. I know you're posting out of confusion.

[Cow Poke]

Then it might have been clearer if you had started with "I think there are two different issues here..." rather than "Interesting point..." (which I desisted from pointing out was singular and then you proceeded to list two points... )

I was actually pointing out that you made me think about something, but you got your panties in a twist and went full bore psycho raging lunatic......


yeah, just messing with you.