How do you explain the Bible?

The Iliad is great for comparing to the Bible.
They both have historical evidence to back them up (both archeological and documentary), they both contain supernatural events.

Can anyone objectively explain to me why the Bible is more reliable than the Iliad? Perhaps I could rekindle Ancient Greek theology based on the writings of Homer as sacred scripture?

 

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Mary Poppins is a good book too -

II Tim: 4-4
And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.


I Cor.1:19-
For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.
For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe.
Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men.
But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty; And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are:

 

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The Visitor did write: The thread is "How do you explain the Bible"

It would probably be a good guess that the reminder above was meant for me, as it came right after my posting of a couple of quotes that were not from scripture. However, I thought my preface to the quotes explained my sending them. I meant no harm, Mr. Visitor. Actually it seems to me that love and compassion are very compatible with Christ's teachings, but I do have to admit that nothing I quoted explained the Bible, in any way; which brings me to this question, what do you mean by "explain the Bible."

Are the scriptures you give supposed to explain the bible? If so, then I am confused, because there was no bible at the time those scriptures were written. Are you not proselyting; or should I say, trying to "explain" your religion . . . rather than trying to explain the Bible? I hate to see you do this, because doing this seems disrespectful somehow. Just my take, and I know that does not stand for much, but since you got my attention, I thought I would mention it.

PMT

 

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The Visitor did write: The thread is "How do you explain the Bible"
It would probably be a good guess that the reminder above was meant for me, as it came right after my posting of a couple of quotes that were not from scripture.
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No, it was only to justify posting something I had posted before....because I thought it might be relevant to the thread.

Are the scriptures you give supposed to explain the bible? If so, then I am confused, because there was no bible at the time those scriptures were written.
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Sure there wasn't. The entire bible is the revelation of Jesus Christ. Every verse is a peice of His life, How His Spirit lived out through people down through the ages and how God reacted and dealt with the people.
It was all for our example played out on the canvass of time... in types and shadows which as we get closer to the source, comes more into focus.


Are you not proselyting; or should I say, trying to "explain" your religion
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If it were a religion or some creed organized by men I would agree, one should not.
This is an event that's talking place, not someone's ideas.
What I have been saying should be the most important event in history, which the entire christian church world has been looking forward to, for the last 2000 years.
The trouble is they are missing it just as the scriptures said they would.
I have been talking about the second coming of Christ, and even if I had only been joking someone should have had some kind of responce to it.
But there is nothing, no interest left in the people of any kind, either they don't believe in God and wern't looking, or they believe some church sponcered idea of what "should" happen and won't look to see if what they've been told could be wrong.

It's like a scene out of an old Charlton Hesston movie the "Omega Man" only your still surrounded by people who are walking around,, who think thier alive.... but don't realize their dead. The blood of Christ is the cure...but they don't want it..
This life is only a shadow of the real thing.
This is exactly the way Jesus described the multitudes who rejected His first coming.
He told one of His followers who wanted to help out in a local funeral; "Let the dead, bury their dead" and also He said "If the blind lead the blind, won't they all fall into the ditch".
This is what happened to Noah, 120 years with no convert.
Christ last ministry was to the "total lost"
This is just what was said would happen.
"As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be at the coming of the son of man."

 

The Visitor wrote: “Sure there wasn't. The entire bible is the revelation of Jesus Christ. Every verse is a peice of His life, How His Spirit lived out through people down through the ages and how God reacted and dealt with the people. It was all for our example played out on the canvass of time... in types and shadows which as we get closer to the source, comes more into focus.”

I have no doubt in my mind but that you are sincere. So, let me start with that.

THE VISITOR: "If it were a religion or some creed organized by men I would agree, one should not. This is an event that's talking place, not someone's ideas. What I have been saying should be the most important event in history, which the entire christian church world has been looking forward to, for the last 2000 years. The trouble is they are missing it just as the scriptures said they would. I have been talking about the second coming of Christ, and even if I had only been joking someone should have had some kind of responce to it. But there is nothing, no interest left in the people of any kind, either they don't believe in God and wern't looking, or they believe some church sponcered idea of what 'should' happen."

There are many thoughts mixed in the above paragraph, and some frustration is evident. It is difficult when one is convinced that he has a good message, and presents it with good intentions, only to have it seemingly disrespected. But we realize—do we not, that how people react to us says more about them than it does about us.

To give some proof of this, just consider someone who has just fallen in love. That one now loves everybody, and will tolerate almost anything, even parents! But, let that love go sour, and look out world! This is really a good thing to remember, but even so, this does not leave you out of the picture, does it?

I can tell you, my dear friend, your approach seems overdone and pushy. I really do not want to be insulting, or discourage you in any way, I really mess up sometimes, I am not a know-it-all, nor have I ended my search for truth! Nonetheless, do you have any idea how insulting you might be?

Unlike Christ, we cannot read people’s hearts, and then those people use words to defend themselves just as you use words to try to get your message across. Now, if I were not already familiar with the bible, and with the beliefs of various denominations, I would not have any more idea than a goose what you are trying to say. The first few words would probably put me on guard. Therefore, in my mind, I would be hearing you say, “You are not okay, buddy, but I am going to fix you.”

If you actually said such a thing to someone, he might respond, “The hell you are!” So, would this mean that he has just rejected God Almighty? Not necessarily, but it could mean that he is rejecting the attitude he is reading into -what appears to be- a lashing with words. (This is just the way most people feel about being approached in such a manner.)

You indicate that the Church has failed. In many respects, I would completely agree. And yet, I may not agree with you in how she has failed. If I were a betting person, I would make a good wager that you and I see things quite differently, but this is okay with me, truly. Notwithstanding, I know this: whether it is Bible School or some secular college, we seem to come out of them feeling like we know what to do with the world, that is, until the world bites us in the butt a few times. Even more shattering is finding out how little the world cares about how smart we are.

As you seem to quote scriptures freely, one would assume that you are familiar with how to find things in the bible, but it does seem that you have a tendency to kind of run it all together. If someone is familiar and friendly with the scriptures, they can probably keep up with you, insofar as your general point, but to one who is not, it could be a real turn off. Man, do you not realize how some of that might sound to one who is unfamiliar with the scriptures, and especially if he -or she- has animosity toward Christianity and/or religion in general.

A tip: You might as well give up trying to convince anyone that you are not propagating a religion. The Buddhists also say theirs is not a religion. Although words are important, if they become too important you are going to experience a lot of sticky doors, with all that ‘religious jargon’ that you say is not religion. It sounds like it is, okay? You use terms peculiar to biblical notions, especially King James. Nothing wrong with that if you are talking to people like minded, but obviously you are not, and made the present audience your choice to expound you faith and feelings, which, no matter what you call it sounds like you are pushing religion.

It is always discouraging to be misunderstood, but you are not alone in this. I am convinced that being misunderstood is one thing that makes us think before we speak. What say you?

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All this does not necessarily mean that I am right, of course. Did cha’ get that?

Joy and peace. PMT

 

And the people rise and give around of applause to PMThorne as she just put the Rev.JimJones want to be on his place, and took him off that high pedestal he self proclaimed to be standing on. I applaud you PM Thorne, this guy is nothing more than another fundi with a whole lot of jargon to speak of his religious zeal, is kind of scarry!. I would really hate to see this kind of mind be leader of anything.

Godless.

 

I vote TheVistor be made U.S. Attorney General.

....oh wait....

 

To Godless: I hope your compliment means that I made some kind of sense. It was not my intention to be unkind, nor was I trying to "put him in his place," but to give him reason to understand why people may not be responding as he had hoped. I hope that came through. Anyway, you take care. PMT

 

I appreciate your thoughtful advice......I will try to apply it when I can.
I believe christians are to represent the Word, and I may put more emphasis on correct doctrine and not enough on the proper spirit.
It would be nice if we were born with a perfect balance of the two, but balance is a learning proccess.

 

Hey just as long as you don't do as your ansestor of this religion, you know the burning of women claiming they were witches, the inquisition years, the tourtures because of dianialbility of your god, yada,yada,yada, your an educated man, you know of the atrocities of the Christian faith right?.

Godless.

 

His ancestors, GODLESS? How do you know this? You really mean "our" ancestors, do you not? Your point is valid, but your choice of ancestors was prejudiced. Just thought I would mention this.

Until next time. Keep cool. PMT

 

To The Visitor:

Thank you for responding. I wish you well. We are all in a process, and all have much to learn. Then finally, we understand how little we know. As for comments and opinions, about the best I can do is to speak sincerely from my heart. Your last posting sounds as though this is what you want to do as well. I too had to learn that doctrine was far less important than love. God bless. PMT

 

PM, I've been an atheist since birth, my dad was an atheist, mom is more of a deist she does not follow any mainstream religious rhetoric, the choice of words may have been flawed, as I excluded all existing atheist of all time who have suffered, and still are discrimanated because or lack of religious devotion, Judeo Christians may be part of human legacy, however so is the quite unknown resistance of such dogma. Thus since I follow no religion and he advocates with such a zeal, Yea his ancestors have commited atrocities to man kind, and My ancestors have been the victims.

Godless.

 

Godless: I will try this again. Lost the first one. Okay, so you were using the word ancestors not meaning forefathers? If I had realized you were so intense, I would not have said "hey" about the term. I do not think that he is Catholic, however. Anyway, I did not mean to stir up old hurts. I hate to see you so angry. Will you forgive me?
PMT

 

PM I was not angered, I merely was making my point. JudeoChritian, covers a wide aspects of religions today, Catholics just been one of them, Christian, Babtists, Lutheran etc. He quotes the bible with such seal as if an atheist wouldn't have read one, or didn't understand it. The fact is a large majority of atheists study the bible, it is considered the best weapon to debunk religion, and the Christian mythology. However the visitor, likes to jump around to the Veda's as well, so he seems to use any form of mythological literature, to try and prove his god, or why he believes in god, gods, what have you. I as an atheist have studied limited religious following, mostly Judeo Christians and now with the adversity of what is going on in the world I've picked up some lit. from Muslims point of view. However I've dealt with Hinduism very little though it is just another mythological belief. He "the visitor" has not given any ref. of what his religious devotion is, he is just a mythological believer, a true fundi of all mythological ideas of ancient past, and this is shown in his writings. You on the other hand PM I do respect, though our views may differ, I don't see any evidence here that shows that you are promoting, your views of religious devotions with such a zeal, as he apparently does. "this is why I like you". you speak your mind and make polite comments on the views of others, I've been watching your conversations with Canute about spinoza, "I've never read any Spinoza", however I notice you don't resort to name calling, and outright flaming one another to disscuss issues. And that is what I respect about you. Better than I "male ego" you know, LOL. Anyhow keep your chin up and I was not mad or anything Ok!

Godless.

 

However the visitor, likes to jump around to the Veda's as well, so he seems to use any form of mythological literature, to try and prove his god, or why he believes in god, gods, what have you

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You seem to have been reading many of my posts, but that doesn't mean you tried to understand what I was saying.
I don't belong to a denomination - Catholic or Protestant....and have spoken in explicit and laborous detail of why I believe God is against organized religions.
I believe P.M. caught this from my posts.....by you did not.
You take all the "wrongs'" the Catholics and Protestants have done in the name of their religions and group all christians together as though they were our "ancestors" some how.
You don't realize that everything group that calls itself christian is not the same.
There is a large false group thats organized, denominated and compromised the Word of God for the sake of popularity and power, and has been persecuting the smaller true group to the point of death, nearly from the begining of the christian church 2000 years ago.
To read about this in more detail see this link -
http://www.nathan.co.za/resume.asp
It is called "A Resume of the Ages".

As for my references to the Veda, I was using it to back up something I alredy believe the bible states, in a conversation with someone who doesn't take the bible as an ultimate source of information as I do.
Not to add to the bible,or take away from it.
The Veda talks of a great destuction thousands of years ago, like a nuclear war.
I believe this is what happened too, and that the bible aludes to this.
In Noahs day, the world was balanced differently as far as physical make up.
The atmsophere was saturated with water vapor like a teranium, and there had never been rain, or clouds because the world was in perfect balance and had an perfect climate in which this water vapor....heated up in the day-time, fell at night as dew.
This is in the scriptures.
Something had to throw the earth out of this balance to cause the rain, and the tilt it has now (23 degrees), and the resulting seasons we have today in contrast to what was before the flood. This I belive was a atomic explosion large enough to move the world away from the sun slightly extending the days to make a year from 360 to 365 and 1/4, and leave it tilted, causing it to rain for 40 days.
When God says I will destoy the earth, He lets man do it.....then as now when it is to be burned by fire , also of man's doing.
The bible also said "As it was in the days of Noah, so would it be in this day.
In this day we have nuclear power that took one genius (einstein) and about 5 years of hard work during a war to come up with.
It would be preposterous to asume as our scientists do today that we are the only ones who have ever advanced this far.......most scientists are atheist, so anything they find that might prove the bible was right has to be explained as something else..
This makes complete sense to me. The bible says many things that people read over the top of and don't see, because they don't believe it is still accurate to the last punctuation mark...but it is so accurate, the exact way the words are placed together, reveal truth from comparisons.
The world before the flood was as advanced as we are today if not more so.
We couldn't even build the Great Pyramid with today's technology.
-And I don't believe in mythology either....but that doesn't say some of it won't agree with the bible from time to time. The bible is the source of all truth, and every religion usally has some truth in it so they are all bound to agree in some places.
.

 

Even though, it's mostly fiction, I can't help thinking that it does contain some sort of special energy and the same goes for all the great books of the classic religions.

A great number of spiritual, intelligent, people in meditation, have spent thousands of years working on and refining these works and reading between the lines there is great wisdom to be had if one can ignore the politics and just search for the remnants of truth.

When you are actually practising your religion and have faith, the bible can seem almost magical, in the way that it can supply the answers to your specific questions, just by asking it and opening it to any random page.

 

Something nocked the earth of its perfect axis?..

And that something you claim it was a "nuclear bomb" LOL. Well my friend the earth has been bonbarded by astroids many times, one was a world doomsday large enough to cause the earth perhaps to be nocked off its axis.

http://whyfiles.org/106asteroid/2.html

When a large asteroid impacts earth it's blow can be as powerfull as a nuclear bombs, the larger the rock the bigger the damage.

Quote: No, I don't belong to a denomination

Well then your a pissed off diest, who has such a zeal to demonstrate, the undemonstratable, to explain the unexplainable, of god.

I did venture when I was young, my mom was Catholic during my childhood, so she went through initiating the catholic rituals for the children so in essense I've had my "first communion" and all that kind of stuff, laters I was venturing with Christianity, because of friends who invited me to their church and what nots. After that I ventured to Babtism, I had had a nervous breakdown do to drugs and these people that visit for "recruting" for their church had invited me, so I became a born again. Thus I've had in intensive learning of the religious rituals by experience, I did not become an atheist over night, though my father was an atheist all of this time, I never got any advice, nor guidance about this from him, he claimed "it's better for you to find your own way" Thus I became an atheist, when realizing that some of these church people didn't know what the hell they are talking about. I.E. In the babtist church on a sunday, the invited "pastor" given surmon claimed a person can aquire AIDS from sitting on a toilet seat after an infected person had used it. This is were I drew conclusions that there was something wrong with this picture. I left organized religion, and picked up on other things like psychology, and philosophy, eventually a year latters I claimed my atheism, to the public.

Visitor that link you gave is mostly crap, not told with a secular mentality but that of an apolegist, or theist minded individual, I didn't bother to read it all I only read to here: (We further learned that these two vines would grow side by side until the end of the ages when both would come to maturity and both be harvested. The false vine would not overcome and destroy the true vine, but then, neither would the true vine be able to bring the false vine into a saving relationship with Jesus Christ.)

It's typical same old shiet, my way is best, your way is wrong, who is to say which is right?. None!! these are illusions, you pay here, you do damage here, here is heaven, here is hell, when you die, you simply die, there's no place like "heaven" nor a place called "hell" every experience of life is here. in existence, when you die you simply seise to exist. "I hate to live in a place of illusion, thinking of what's going to happen to me when I die, and worring of wether I'm doing it right, or not, for the sake of a creature to welcome me to it's kindom" This is not life, this is the illusion your not here to please an unseen no-one, and unknown force, you live foryourself, survival drives human beings, not illusions of "life after death" if it were true, doctors would not fight for life, they would just simply celebrate your death, many are driven to suicide because of the religioius rhetorical bull shiet, they want to escape life, they seek to end their suffering, without realizing that others will suffer thier loss. (I had a friend commit suicide). He was an alcoholic, homeless person who knew about constructing homes, a carpenter and very skilled as well, however he was not happy, been homeless, and hardly anyone helping he did not fight for life, he ended it about a year ago.

I don't mean to disrespect you personally, only the bull shiet you write about, don't take it the wrong way, I've give a good pice of my mind for anyone trying to stop you from writing what you do, in essense I'd fight that you may believe what you will, no one has a right to dictate what one should believe, however I will give my opinions on peoples religious views, faiths and what nots. And mainly that is what I do. Ok.

Godless.

 

GODLESS: What nice words. Thank you. Interesting that you are "peeking in" on Canute and me, in our lengthy discussions. I would never call him a bad name, or you either. PMT

 

A post by Tabl.

"When you are actually practising your religion and have faith, the bible can seem almost magical, in the way that it can supply the answers to your specific questions, just by asking it and opening it to any random page."

Only for those in a "feel good" frame of mind, I think. To open the Bible to a random page, is not studying. When one studies, he need not always open the Bible, because he will remember not only the comment, but the context.

Adios. Just thought I would add that thought. PMT