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Tuesday, March 10, 2009

The Question John Loftus Will Never Answer

John Loftus won’t answer my question.

What question? It started when he said things like this, found at http://www.theologyweb.com/campus/showpost.php?p=1963804&postcount=289

Why is it God cannot speak clearly? I have the answer. Not only is history a poor medium to communicate, but God doesn't exist.

He also offered this sort of sentiment at http://debunkingchristianity.blogspot.com/2006/11/slavery-and-bible.html where he whined:

Why didn’t the Christian God ever explicitly and clearly condemn slavery?

He acknowledges the well-documented answer that Biblical “slavery” was nothing like American slavery – it was, on fact, more like indentured servitude, as documented by Miller at http://www.christian-thinktank.com/qnoslave.html (an article Loftus has been repeatedly corrected with at TheologyWeb when he hauls up this “slavery” complaint again and again, and which he repeatedly refuses to answer). But still, Loftus the swishy-wisher will find some way to blame the Bible, gosh darn it, so he pulls this out of his speckled arse:

Even if this is true, the Bible was still used by Christians to justify the brutal slavery in the American South. Distinguished Princeton professor Charles Hodge defended American slavery in a forty page essay written in 1860, just prior to the civil war. Just read the debates over this issue in Willard M. Swartley, Slavery Sabbath War & Women (Herald Press, 1983), pp. 31-66. Then you’ll see just how unclear this issue really was to them. So again, why didn’t God tell his people, “Thou shalt not own, buy, sell, or trade slaves,” and say it as often as he needed to? Why was God not clear about this in the Bible?

So here’s Loftus’ complaint in a nutshell: The brutal form of American slavery would have been able to be avoided (or at least combated) if only God had been more “clear” in condemning (the specifically American form of) slavery. More broadly, clarity in the Bible would have bred obedience and provided a moral panacea. God’s to blame for our disobedience, because He didn’t make things clear.

What a goofy idea.

There are two responses to make to this, and the second involves the great Question Loftus Will Not Answer.

Despite the appeal to “how unclear” the issue was to Americans, it isn’t hard to see who held the winning hand. You can see a great collection of American anti-slavery material at http://www.classicapologetics.com/special/slaverevolt.html It doesn’t take long to see that those who were on the other side of the debate – using the Bible to defend American slavery – were piddling into the wind, manipulating texts, using special pleas, and ignoring whatever they found convenient to ignore. In contrast, anti-slavery materials, while of course not up to modern standards of data collection, show far more respect for text and context and make much better arguments. Critical comparison makes it clear who the winner is, and to that extent, the Loftus Gang is more like the pro-slave party inasmuch as they don’t respect text and context except when it suits them. The issue was actually very clear – but like Loftus and his intellectually bankrupt cronies, the pro-slavery crowd didn’t have the guts to concede defeat, and didn’t have the necessary answers to bolster their position.

Of course, for someone as ignorant as John Loftus, whose idea of “research” is to consult Wikipedia and the Skeptics’ Annotated Bible before going down to the local Pic and Save to shake the gumball machine, asking for a critical comparison of pro- vs. anti-slavery arguments is like asking Pedro the Performing Pig to reproduce the finest rendition possible of the Blue Danube Waltz.

The Question Loftus Will Not Answer: If the problem is that the Bible isn’t clear enough, what did John Loftus find so “unclear” about the seventh commandment? Thou shalt not commit adultery. What’s not clear about that? More to the point, what was so unclear about it that Loftus saw fit to violate it back when he was a professing believer? I have asked Loftus this question numerous times on Theologyweb. Not once have I ever gotten an answer. Note that the issue here is not Loftus’ adultery per se. This just happens to be the commandment that he has openly confessed to have violated. It could have been any other commandment, or any other moral stricture in the Bible. The real issue is that if his “clarity complaint” has any bite, he ought to have stayed out of that affair.

Of course, the reality, as we know, is that “clarity” is not the problem. The problem is in John Loftus’ bathroom mirror every morning.

Pity the poor mirror!

88 comments:

  1. See, what I love about the Bible is you can make it say just about anything, and you can condemn as heretics everyone who disagrees with you!

    Here's another interpretation: http://docsouth.unc.edu/church/string/string.html

    You write: "The Question Loftus Will Not Answer: If the problem is that the Bible isn’t clear enough, what did John Loftus find so “unclear” about the seventh commandment? "

    I wouldn't attempt to speak for Loftus, but generally speaking, people like him who commit adultery don't use the Bible to simply overlook their sins but to JUSTIFY, excuse and even support them as Stringfellow did with slavery (and as groups like Westboro do today).

    Now, if Loftus had said to his wife "Jesus WANTS me to cheat on you", you'd have an argument.

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  2. Okay ... change the 4th paragraph to read:

    I wouldn't attempt to speak for Loftus, but generally speaking, people like him who commit adultery don't use the Bible to JUSTIFY, excuse and even support their sins as Stringfellow did with slavery (and as groups like Westboro do today).

    You know what I mean ... ;-)

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  3. Pshaw...

    >>See, what I love about the Bible is you can make it say just about anything, and you can condemn as heretics everyone who disagrees with you!

    Only if you play games of decontextualized ignorance with it...which is an easy task mainly either for unschooled fundies like Haggard, and fundy apostates like Loftus... :)

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  4. Hey modman, are you ok? I imagine the gust of wind trailing behind the point that flew over your head must have hit pretty hard, so please post again and let us know if you're alright.

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  5. So if what Holding just posted is nothing more than a wind breeze, why do you feel the need to come on here and comment?

    I would hate to have to enforce strict commenting policies like Debunking Christianity, which doesn't really permit the tolerance of free speech (it does but you have to kiss Loftus' ass to get by on his watch while he can throw at you whatever he pleases). But I mean honestly man, offer something better in your responses.

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  6. modman691 nailed it when he stated that the bible can be used to support just about any position. This is evidenced by the fact that there are dozens, if not hundreds, of denominations of Christianity all interpreting the bible in different ways and all claiming that their way is the correct way.

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  7. Thousands of years of research, science, study; physics, chemistry, electronics, computing, mathematics... to what end? So that the Internet allows someone to make a blog to discuss someone else's sex life. What a sad, sad story...

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  8. I meant to imply that the point of the original post went over modman's head so fast that it must have created a huge gust of wind, since whether or not John simply ignored the bible or used it to "justify" his adultery is irrelevant to Holding's argument.

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  9. Wow Holding just oozes the love of christ doesn't he. Is he throwing the first stone here? Didn't his lord tell him to look at the planks in his own eyes first? Oh well i guess it is wrong for others to violate scriptures but it is ok for him.

    Gal 5:22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
    Gal 5:23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.

    I guess Holding doesn't have the spirit since he doesn't have the fruit of the spirit. You need to get saved boy! Repent!

    Anyhooooo

    Holding and his god, are idiots if they expect us to trust in a bunch of contradictory books, with unknown authors, of which we do not have the originals, which were put together by totally depraved sinners, which have been tampered with and corrupted, which were written decades after the facts, and expect us to believe these contained the pure, unadulterated word of god.

    Holding is either too stupid or too dishonest to admit the FACT that the bible is totally ambiguous and that christians can't agree on anything it says. All they can do is suppress and persecute and ostracize the people that interpret it differently in a failed attempt to cover up how utterly unclear and ridiculous the book is.

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  10. I don't think John has ever claimed that the 7th commandment is not clear. I think it's more that he chose not to obey it. Kind of like all the Christians that look at porn, treat others obnoxiously, or eat shellfish. They know it's wrong, but they choose to do it anyway. The difference with John is that he has admitted to his errors whereas Christians like Holding don't concede theirs, and they think this would make them appear better.

    But to some of us a person looks a lot better if he admits his flaws, and the person that doesn't admit his flaws actually looks worse.

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  11. I don't quite understand why John's adultery is an issue. He is making a categorically different argument than you are.

    His argument:

    i) if God wrote the Bible, and if slavery is wrong, then God ought to have said so clearly in the Bible. Since it isn't in the Bible, this is evidence against the first premise.

    Your argument:

    ii) God wrote in the Bible (clearly) that adultery is wrong. Yet John still committed adultery. Therefore...?

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  12. JP,

    Good job! Y'u-know I'm with you...This guy DeistDan is a treasuretrove of misinformation isn't he? Stuff like this:

    "Holding and his god, are idiots if they expect us to trust in a bunch of contradictory books, with unknown authors, of which we do not have the originals, which were put together by totally depraved sinners, which have been tampered with and corrupted, which were written decades after the facts, and expect us to believe these contained the pure, unadulterated word of god."

    That guy doesn't seem to understand that every FALLACIOUS point he THINKS he makes has been dealt with adequately for years and even more recently by Bauckham, Habermas, Licona, Wallace, sawyer and Koz to mention a few...

    Anyway, came over because John is rantin' about you on his site...thing is I like John, so don't hit 'em too hard hammer-LOL!

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  13. "See, what I love about the Bible is you can make it say just about anything, and you can condemn as heretics everyone who disagrees with you!"

    You do realize that you can make literally anything say whatever you want and call everyone else a whack job if you're willing to completely massacre the original context in which it was written, right?

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  14. Context? Let me get my Christianese-to-English dictionary out.

    "Context" n. - Secret decoder ring that only allows Christians to understand what the Bible really really means. See also "discernment" & "guided by the Holy Spirit".

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  15. Try:

    "Context, n.
    1. The part of a text or statement that surrounds a particular word or passage and determines its meaning.
    2. The circumstances in which an event occurs; a setting."

    You know, things that even the dumbest of morons know is important for the proper interpretation of any text, ancient or otherwise.

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  16. "Biblical “slavery” was nothing like American slavery – it was, on fact, more like indentured servitude"

    So why was your idiot God okay with indentured servitude? Why didn't the Sky Fairy prohibit that awful system?

    "See? Shrimp-Hating Magic Man didn't okay slavery; he okayed a form of hideous indentured servitude that was just a lot like slavery. He laid out rules for proper punishment and slaying of indentured servants, not slaves."

    Sorry, JPH - this is my first glance at this site, and if that's the quality of the thinking around here, I can't imagine a reason for coming back. Pathetic.

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  17. I don't know about anyone else, but I only have a problem with the right wing fundamentalists that maintain the bible says the earth is only six thousand years old and maintains the flood myth is reality, etc.

    Nothing could be more goofy in light of the discoveries of modern science.

    While the bible does lay out some moral principals, it is merely a snapshot of bronze age mideastern philosophy.

    It seems that Loftus has incurred the anger of the self righteous twits that have set up this blog and I have seen a much more reasoned communication from Loftus than I have seen here.

    You people cannot stand it when a Christian breaks the bonds of superstition and comes to the light of logic and reason.

    Such gnashing of teeth!

    So funny!

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  18. "Self-righteous"??? You have quite the nerve. Do you even know who John W. Loftus really is? You should back this statement up if you're going to publically reveal it for all to see. So I guess by whining that the "neighborhood" will never be the same again with JPH posting a few snippits here and there on a worldwide, public-based web service would be "reasonable communication", huh? And I also assume that banning those you determine as being "ignorant" and unintelligent also adds to rational discourse? Boy are you in a lost plane of existence.

    Let's see, so our subject John here has a triple Masters-degree dynamic as far as educational credentials go. So if ignoramuses are prohibited from posting, doesn't that include the majority of the general public, including his blog admirers? Do you have three masters under your belt, Froggie? If not, then why are you commenting here? What's your point to be made?

    I don't suffer from egotism. I don't have a bloated sense of self-pride. Come here and say whatever you want at your leisure, I don't care. You won't see me deleting posts that disagree with me, insult me or those whom wish to contribute here. You will also notice that I'm not into "banning" people for reasons of subjective realitivity. It probably wouldn't take very long for me to find a way of banning certain people I might not like that come on here, but I won't do it. Speak all you like. Compare my commenting policy to that of John's, and then come back and tell me honestly who you think is more open to "reasonable communication."

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  19. By the way Froggie, you said at the beginning of your comment that your only dispute lies with those that contend a Young-Earth based off of a literalist interpretation of the Bible. So why are you even bringing anything about "reasonable communication" up in the first place? Also, so far there is only one of us that believes in a Young-Earth, and it's not me. Even he is open to alternative possibilities, such as evolution (which I have no quarrels with accepting, whether for theological or scientific reasons).

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  20. Funny....Jesus said that lust=adultery.....

    J.P., you ever lusted? (I mean at a woman).

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  21. "Let's see, so our subject John here has a triple Masters-degree dynamic as far as educational credentials go. So if ignoramuses are prohibited from posting, doesn't that include the majority of the general public, including his blog admirers? Do you have three masters under your belt, Froggie? If not, then why are you commenting here? What's your point to be made?"

    That statement is verily dripping with pretentiousness. Do you often write about yourself in the third person? Or only when you are bragging about yourself?

    There are plenty of otherwise well educated people out here that believe all types of fairy tales.

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  22. "Do you have three masters under your belt, Froggie? If not, then why are you commenting here?"

    I didn't see the sign that said one must have three "masters degrees Dynamic" to post here. Can you point me to that?

    In my experience it is very rare indeed that a person that has three real masters degrees would open a conversation by stating that in the third person. That alone gives me a reason to doubt the veracity of that statement, especially, right after you rant about how smart you are you try to justify that by opening the next paragraph with, "I don't suffer from egotism," Very peculiar, that.

    Then we have this sophomoric sentence, "you said at the beginning of your comment that your only dispute lies with those that contend a Young-Earth based off of a literalist interpretation of the Bible."
    Based "off of" a.......
    That is terrible grammar. You must have meant based "on" a literalist....
    I just can't see a person with three masters in education ("dynamic," whatever that is supposed to mean) making such an eggregious error.

    Actually you come off more like a college freashman with a bone to pick. Just sayin'...

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  23. I will apologize. It seems that I became confused with the way the blognames and the quotes were handled.

    I thought truth be told was in fact JP Holding.

    so, there is bound to be some confusion in my comments. Sorry about that.

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  24. Anyway, I see that there is a place for "Followers" to sign up.
    Who in the heck would want to sign up to something as a "follower?"

    That is absurdedly pretentious.

    It makes you look like you are looking for people that will agree with everything you say.

    Good leaders never look for "followers." They look for future leaders.

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  25. What's the point of dragging out a personal failing he's obviously never been proud of into a discussion on slavery?

    You started with some interesting points.

    Why not stay on the subject? Of what use would "the Question John won't answer" be in addressing the same objections, if they are held by someone else, to whom such a question can't be directed?

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  26. In my experience it is very rare indeed that a person that has three real masters degrees would open a conversation by stating that in the third person. That alone gives me a reason to doubt the veracity of that statement, especially, right after you rant about how smart you are you try to justify that by opening the next paragraph with, "I don't suffer from egotism," Very peculiar, that.

    No..Froggie. I was referring to John, not me. You might want to take the time to go through his profile and check out what it says about himself. While you're at it, take the libery upon yourself to check out his Amazon.com reviews and his questionable behaviors on Theologyweb.com

    Anyway, I see that there is a place for "Followers" to sign up.
    Who in the heck would want to sign up to something as a "follower?"

    That is absurdedly pretentious.


    Hey Froggie, I suppose you didn't realize that Blogger has this whole new thing going on where any blog recently registered has a standard "Follower" feature do you?

    Therefore, your opinions of me being somehow "pretentious" are completely unwarranted. If you don't believe me, just go ahead and make another blog for yourself.

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  27. Okay, I'll try to clarify some more of what I am trying to communicate (yes I'm accustomed to having poor grammar when writing on blogs occasionally, it just happens to tie in with some of my general laziness;)):

    The point is that when you compare this blog with Loftus', you should take into consideration my policy for comments, and his. If you take a look at his "Commenting policy" (http://debunkingchristianity.blogspot.com/2006/02/our-policy-here.html) it says quite plainly: "...This also goes for ignorant comments. This is not a site for grade school level arguments. First finish High School, take a few college classes and then come back after doing so. If your post has been deleted then it was not intelligent and/or not worthy to leave here for one or more of the reasons I just stated. If your comments are deleted you only have yourself to blame...This Blog is an intelligent and friendly place to debate ideas in a mutually respectful environment." So what I argue here is simple. If John has these types of standards for comments by guests, then practically anyone without three masters on their resume' doesn't belong there. Furthermore, if this site is the greater of the two evils, as you might say it is, then why do you post here? But as far as I know it isn't, and I intend to keep it that way. I don't care who visits here. They can come on here whenever they like. That's my policy. Of course, visitors should keep in mind that this doesn't free them of potential criticism when they come on here to argue.

    Hopefully that clears up everything that was needed to be said here.

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  28. Dumbass Dan:

    Old news...Loftus has had his tail whipped on TWeb about this "be Christlike" crap before too. Come on by and we'll also give you the same beatin'. :D

    I'm in full, cold self-control when I ream you turkeys...too bad for you.

    Anyway, since you're so good at hurling elephants, here's one back at you:

    1) I have answers to ANY claim of "contradiction" you can come up with.

    2) The authorship of the NT Biblical books is more solid than it is for any secular work of the ancient world.

    3) We don't have originals for ANY ancient work, but only nimwits like you think this is a problem, and can't explain why.

    4) You wouldn't know how the canon was put together, since you think Dan Brown is a good source; much less could you criticize its composition intelligently.

    5) The textual tradition of the NT is far more secure than that of any secular document, with zero evidence of tampering or corruption; nothing but legitimate interpretive modifications to accommodate shifting language and cultural needs.

    6) The NT books were all written within 40 years of Jesus' lifetime.

    7) You couldn't argue with me ten seconds on any of these points.

    You say: "Holding is either too stupid or too dishonest to admit the FACT that the bible is totally ambiguous and that christians can't agree on anything it says.:"

    Oh really? Then what do YOU find ambiguous about the seventh commandment, Dumbass Dan?

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  29. TBT,
    Since I managed to mangle the identities of some of you in my first couple comments, I must begin anew.

    If you would have incorporated the feature whereby commentors may delete or edit their comments, I would have fixed my errors.

    Suffice to say that I find Loftus'recent post, "why I left Christianity," to be well thought out and honestly spoken, as opposed to JPH's most recent post where he acts like some teenage ingrate.

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  30. d says:

    "I don't quite understand why John's adultery is an issue. He is making a categorically different argument than you are."

    The issue is very clear. It isn't his adultery. It's his argument that clarity would prevent sin, and God is at fault for not providing clarity. His own behavior shows that clarity is NOT the problem.

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  31. google said: "So why was your idiot God okay with indentured servitude? Why didn't the Sky Fairy prohibit that awful system?"

    Oh, right on, moron. The system whereby many immigrants came to America is "awful". Just look at all the literature by freethinkers like Paine and Ingersoll condemning that awful system. Just look at how many great moral leaders like King railed against it.

    Uh...that was where, now?

    You have credit cards?

    Then you're an indentured servant. Congratulations!

    Abuses no doubt occurred as they do under any system -- but there is NOTHING that can be said about the basic system of indentured servitude that makes it "awful".

    Go learn some history. Start with a pop-up book, that's about your level.

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  32. Andrew-Stupid:

    You bet. I've lusted after Mrs. Holding for 18 years now. It's great!

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  33. J.P. congratulations on your blog!

    In answer to the first post, I find it ironic that Loftus contains to assert that history is a poor medium, and in fact says in his book that ALL historical events are open to doubt!

    Futher, memories are questionable.

    Given that, does he doubt the HOLOCAUST?

    And further, how is it that we are to believe his memories of his own "deconversion" experience?

    When I ask him these things, he alters and/or deletes my posts.

    He is certainly not the philososophical thinker he pretends to be. (And by the way, I am sick of his claim that he has the equivalent of a Ph.D. He has no such thing, unless he has a peer reviewed thesis waiting to be approved by his doctoral committe.)

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  34. And I am amazed that John's "deconverion" made such a stir.

    I mean, if he had been some outstanding Christian, that would be one thing, but he was just another minister who was lying to his congregation...and unfortunately they haven't all left the church, which is WHY the church has so many problems...and cheating on his wife, who was a "good woman".

    Frankly, we can thank God that Loftus, like Barker and Lobdell DID expose THEMSELVES...can you imagine the damage they could have done if they had stayed in?

    We have one in our area that resigned rather than face exposure.

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  35. And does he ever give a thought to the feelings of "Linda", the woman he had the affair with and he totally trashes and blames in his book?

    No one MADE him have sex with her, did they?

    Surely he most know that there are people who know who she it...how do you think it affects her to be featured in his "deconversion" story?

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  36. I need to point this out....

    Andrew: "J.P. congratulations on your blog!"

    I thank you, but it is not mine....it is owned, operated, managed, etc. completely by Truth Be Told. He's a fine fellow who's had a real problem with people like Acharya S and Loftus who tell a lot of lies. And he's not a Christian.

    TBT invited me to contribute, and I will do so once a month perhaps. Poor John is tearing his brain out over at DC right now, posting some of th same links he posted in his fake JP Holding blog a while back, because he thinks this is MY blog. It isn't. This is freelance work like I do for CMI and other people. John needs to go clean a carpet somewhere with all that foam running out of his mouth. :D

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  37. JPHolding writes: "I have answers to ANY claim of "contradiction" you can come up with."

    Can we define what would satisfy the definition of a REAL contradiction in Scripture first, instead of simply an apparent one?

    Here's a very small one:
    Two and twenty years old was Ahaziah when he began to reign.
    --II Kings 8:26

    Forty and two years old was Ahaziah when he began to reign.
    --II Chronicles 22:2


    Maybe 42 means 42 years from the founding of the Omri dynasty, as some suggest. If that's the case, I don't see how there could possibly be any contradiction since we can simply force into the text what we need to to make it fit.

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  38. Holy Porkchops! THAT is the best you can do??? And THAT is what you think the answer would be???

    I have a question: Which concrete waterfall did you stand under to receive that brain damage?

    That "answer" you gave is the kind that Harry "Obscene Phone" McCall would have given as a fundy. More serious scholarship appeals to the high probability of textual corruption. My answer, as recorded on my site:

    "Was Ahaziah forty-two (per 2 Chr. 22:2) or twenty-two when he ascended the throne? More likely 22, and 2 Chronicles has been hit by a copyist error. See our foundational essay on copyist errors for general background. In favor of the '22' reading in 2 Chronicles: The 2 Kings reading; some LXX and Syriac manuscripts, and that Chronicles calls Ahaziah Jehoram's 'youngest son' (22:1) and Jehoram passed away at age 40 (21:20)."

    I include a link to an essay at http://www.tektonics.org/af/copyisterrors.html detailing the probability of transcriptional errors, especially where numbers are concerned.

    As Loftus would say: SHEESH! You deserve a Screwball Award on TWeb for THAT effort.

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  39. JP, all that's fine, but you didn't answer my question.

    I'm just trying to get an idea of what you'd be looking for from us naysayers that would satisfy your definition of a "contradiction".

    Example: if you found "x", you'd have found a real contradiction in Scripture.

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  40. Slavery, Scripture: An explosive mix

    by John Blake

    Before the Civil War was fought on the battlefield, it was fought in America's pulpits. Southern ministers claimed Scripture sanctioned slavery. Abolitionists said it condemned the practice. The colossal political issue of mid-19thcentury America might have been the preservation of the Union, but it turned on a deeper question: What does the Bible say about slavery? Those positions form the basis for author (and Wheaton college professor) Mark Knoll's "The Civil War as a Theological Crisis" (University of North Carolina Press, $29.95). The "book that made the nation was destroying the nation," because the Bible could not provide a moral consensus on slavery, said Knoll, a professor at Wheaton College in Illinois. "The political standoff that led to war was matched by an interpretive standoff," Knoll writes. "No common meaning could be discovered in the Bible, which almost everyone in the United States professed to honor and which was, without a rival, the most widely read text of any kind in the whole country." Knoll, speaking by phone from his Wheaton office, said he was drawn to the subject because few writers had explored the theological conflict that preceded the Civil War. Deeply felt Christian beliefs drove participants and leaders on both sides. "This was far and away the most religiously engaged conflict in American history," Knoll said. "There's a strong religious dimension in the American Revolution... but nothing like that of the armies and populacein the Civil War." It may be difficult for people today to understand how Christians coulduse the Bible to support an institution as brutal as slavery, but Knoll said the power of the pro-slavery position was its theological simplicity. The Old Testament and New Testament were filled with passages that sanctioned slavery. In a nation where most people believed in the infallibility of Scripture, those passages settled the debate. "You had very serious people who said the Bible certainly supports slavery, and any attack on the slave system was therefore an attack on the Bible," Knoll said. The difficulty in the abolitionists' position was its nuance. They had to reject an inerrant approach to the Bible and appeal to the broad sweep of Scripture, which opposed the oppression of a group of people. Those arguments, however, never gained traction among ordinary people who were accustomed to treating the Bible as infallible, Knoll said. Knoll said he grew depressed while writing the book because unprecedented reverence for the Bible led not to peace but to the bloodiest war in history. "Once positions hardened," he said, "the Bible became a bullet rather than a book."

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  41. EXCERPT FROM “The Biblical Argument for Slavery” by Kevin Gile, The Evangelical Quarterly, Vol. 66, No. 1, 1994

    The Old School (Presbyterian) General Assembly report of 1845 concluded that slavery was based on “some of the plainest declarations of the Word of God.” Those who took this position were conservative evangelicals. Among their number were the best conservative theologians and exegetes of their day, including, Robert Dabney, James Thornwell and the great Charles Hodge of Princeton--fathers of twentieth century evangelicalism and of the modern expression of the doctrine of Biblical inerrancy. No one can really appreciate how certain these evangelicals were that the Bible endorsed slavery, or of the vehemence of their argumentation unless something from their writings is read.

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  42. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  43. 1) I have answers to ANY claim of "contradiction" you can come up with.

    Wow congratulations, having an answer is great, where you fail is having a correct answer. Here is one example...

    Mar 6:8 He charged them to take nothing for their journey except a staff--no bread, no bag, no money in their belts--

    Jesus tells them to take a staff

    Luk 9:3 And he said to them, "Take nothing for your journey, no staff, nor bag, nor bread, nor money; and do not have two tunics.

    Jesus tells them not to take a staff

    What do you got boy?

    2) The authorship of the NT Biblical books is more solid than it is for any secular work of the ancient world.

    Oh really, that is awesome you stupid fuck tard, too bad no one would dedicate their lives to following those books either. You think that is a good argument? "Well no one else has proof of authorship so who cares if we don't either" You truly are an abused red headed step child aren't ya? You got nothing except a few true believers saying what some other true believers told them about who wrote those books. It cannot even be confirmed whether the books they spoke of are the same books you pea brains use today.


    3) We don't have originals for ANY ancient work, but only nimwits like you think this is a problem, and can't explain why.

    Um, yes only nimwits actually want certainty before surrendering their lives to some imaginary friends who makes demands on what they say, what they do, who they associate with, who they can marry, and even what family members they can be nice too. Your heavenly control freak has some serious insecurity issues.

    4) You wouldn't know how the canon was put together, since you think Dan Brown is a good source; much less could you criticize its composition intelligently.

    Um, anyone who knows anything about "church history" knows they were a bunch of ignoramuses who fought and bickered over power and accused each other of tampering with and creating false writings. Yeah those people certainly deserve our trust.

    5) The textual tradition of the NT is far more secure than that of any secular document, with zero evidence of tampering or corruption; nothing but legitimate interpretive modifications to accommodate shifting language and cultural needs.

    You really are a brain dead degenerate tool aren't ya? Did that pearl of wisdom come from divine revelation? Try reading Bart Ehrman's Misquoting Jesus, or even his new book Jesus Interrupted, and he will make your desperate assertions look like the nonsense that it is. Ehrman is a true scholar, whose jock strap your not worthy to sniff (although i know you would love to.)

    6) The NT books were all written within 40 years of Jesus' lifetime.

    Maybe a couple, however plenty of time for those illiterates to add a bunch of fairy tales to their story. There is no good reason to believe the gospels were written by the people who's names are attached to them, but even if there was, psychology has shown eyewitness testimony is often unreliable. These illiterates had messianic expectations, and lived in an environment with apocalyptic fervor. So they interpreted the events in this primitive and superstitious worldview. Since they had committed their lives to this bozo they had to find an explanation, so they dug into their sacred texts and created explanations. This message spread to other illiterate, superstitious primitives and bing, there is christianity for ya.

    Didn't take long for some people with an intellectual capacity similar to yours, to believe joseph smith was a prophet of god who received some golden tablets from an angel containing the true word of god, which they gave their lives for. They believe joseph smith is sitting next to your buddy up on kolob right now. Your just as ignorant as they are.


    7) You couldn't argue with me ten seconds on any of these points.

    Wow there is that christ like humility shining through again. You sure make me wanna convert you light of the world you.

    ReplyDelete
  44. Holding:
    "The issue is very clear. It isn't his adultery. It's his argument that clarity would prevent sin, and God is at fault for not providing clarity. His own behavior shows that clarity is NOT the problem."

    I'm still amazed that no one has seemed to grasp this incredibly simple point.

    Seriously, how do you stay sane while dealing with these people, Holding? I'd go bonkers if I had to deal with them regularly.

    ReplyDelete
  45. Try reading Bart Ehrman's Misquoting Jesus, or even his new book Jesus Interrupted, and he will make your desperate assertions look like the nonsense that it is.

    For the record, DeistDan, just so JP doesn't have to go through this with you himself, he has reviewed the book Misquoting Jesus and knows of its contents. While Holding and I might disagree on our perceptions of Erhman's integrity, we both agree he is legitetimate in his field and doesn't inflate his status and pretend like he has everything figured out. As far as I know, he's much more reserved and civil than his fellow "scholars."

    I actually find Erhman's arguments to be rather fascinating, although I don't know him all that well and haven't read much, so I won't formulate a solid opinion just yet.

    ReplyDelete
  46. Truthbetold said,

    "For the record, DeistDan, just so JP doesn't have to go through this with you himself, he has reviewed the book Misquoting Jesus and knows of its contents."

    Then J.P. has again shown he cannot be taken seriously when he makes the following statement...

    5) The textual tradition of the NT is far more secure than that of any secular document, with zero evidence of tampering or corruption; nothing but legitimate interpretive modifications to accommodate shifting language and cultural needs.

    To say there is "zero evidence of tampering or corruption" after reading Ehrman's book shows J.P. he will say anything, including lying through his teeth, about his religion. What a truly pathetic cowardly liar he is.

    ReplyDelete
  47. The thing that is so disingenous about Ehrman, is that while doing everything he can to attack Christianity, he pretends like he is just trying to get people to "think".

    Nonsense. He has a clear agenda. In his most recent book, he pulls that stunt again, talking about how he asks his students a "provocative" question in their FINAL EXAM (and everyone knows that to a certain extent you have to give profs what they want if you want the top grades) and then prentending like he doesn't want to denigrate anyones "faith".

    And yet he then proceeds to make fun of some the answers to those "provocative" questions in a "sholarly" way.

    Ehrman spoke here in Lawrence, Kansas last year and I personally heard him ridiculing the Christian group who has arranged for him to speak, asking "why do these people keep listening to me?" is an amused way.

    Why indeed?

    He doesn't have the guts to come out and say he is an atheist, just an agnostic, because he thinks that would hurt his "scholarly objectivity".

    ReplyDelete
  48. Actually, I am hoping that Ehrman just gets his atheism out in the open. From what I have heard, that may be coming, and hopefully he will overreact one day and spill it out.

    We can be thankful that people like Barker, Loftus, and Lobdell came out in the open. Imagine the harm they could do if they had remained in the "fold".

    AS they admit, there are others who are still in the "fold" who don't believe...and yet at the same time they then pretend to wonder why their are hypocrites in the church.

    One of our goals, locally, is to "out them".

    After all, Loftus thinks people should be "honest" about their beliefs...although he does not know that the word means.

    ReplyDelete
  49. Says JPH: "Biblical slavery was, uh, just indentured servitude... and that's not so bad, 'cause indentured servitude is, er... like owning a credit card."

    BWAHAHAHA!!! Man, that is beautiful! Credit card!!!

    When Yahweh (a.k.a. The Kosher Xenu) told his people to make slaves of their neighbors, did the Israelites check their credit ratings first? When your Bestest Imaginary Friend Ever punished all the adults of Ninevah with slavery, was he offering them VISA or MasterCard?

    "You have credit cards?" BWAHAHA!!

    Ooh, this just in: "Jesus saves... with a 5% APR!"

    You say that indentured servitude isn't bad. All righty. Hey, JPH, want to be my indentured servant? What's that, hypocrite? It's OK for other people, but not for you? Why? Ah, because it is bad after all!

    That's right, Champ, now you're getting it. It's immoral and awful, and that's why it's ILLEGAL. It's BANNED under the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Once again, the subhuman cretin you pray to shows itself unable to rise anywhere close to modern moral standards.

    "No, wait!", you splutter. "Let me make up some excuses! When it says 'slavery', that's just a kind of work contract. When my slavery-hating God says we can purchase children and pass them along to our children as a permanent inheritance, He just means... uh, that we can offer *multi-generational employment opportunities*."

    "When my merciful Dear Leader says it's OK to sell a daughter into slavery, and that she can be sold back if she doesn't sexually please her owner... er, ah, it's all an allegory for *housekeeping work*, you know? And... uh, the part about how it's OK to murder your slaves with a rod, as long as they die slowly... errrr... it's a parable, reminding us to treat employees to a good Dutch back rub every now and then! My Pork-Hating Master thinks of *everything*!"

    "Oh, and those children of Ninevah, whose parents were made slaves? The ones that my Sooper Dooper Holy Book says were 'dashed in pieces' by my child-adoring Magic Daddy? Yes, that does sound awfully harsh... It's all allegory again, but I'll admit it, He did something really nasty to them. He stuck them with Discover and a $1500 credit limit!"

    JPH, I have no reason to suspect there's a Magic Superman, and if there were one, no cause for pretending to know his characteristics. The "God" you speak of, though, is a drooling, hypocritical, deranged, immoral maggot.

    "My God says a child can be enslaved, sold like livestock, raped if female, and murdered with impunity. It's all in black and white, clear as can be, in the inerrant Word of God. But hey, we could just label that filth 'indentured servitude' - and that's no worse than having to pay a VISA bill!"

    Good one, Genius. Bravo.

    ReplyDelete
  50. Modman,

    If you're too stupid to know what constitutes a contradiction, I can't help you...try basic logic.

    ReplyDelete
  51. Ed "I'm Talking and I Can't Shut Up" Dumbuttski:

    Apparently you can't actually work up the brain cells to critically compare the arguments of pro- vs. anti-slavery forces, so instead you do your usual schtick of lifting irrelevant quotes from nowhere. Know what "plainest interpretation" means, Edski? It means something dumb like a fundy like YOU would have come up with.

    A reader of mine sends you this blessing:

    ***

    Slavery, Scripture: An explosive mix

    by John Blake

    Before the Civil War was fought on the battlefield, it was fought in America's pulpits. Southern ministers claimed Scripture sanctioned slavery.

    Frederick Douglass has this to say regarding that:

    Address by Hon. Frederick Douglass, delivered in the Congregational Church, Washington, D.C., April 16, 1883: on the twenty-first anniversary of emancipation in the District of Columbia.

    http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?ammem/murray:@field(DOCID+@lit(lcrbmrpt0a04div2)):

    It has been fashionable of late years to denounce it as a product of Northern growth, a Yankee device for disturbing and disrupting the bonds of the Union, and the like, but the facts of history are all the other way. The Anti-Slavery side of the discussion has a Southern rather than a Northern origin.

    The first publication in assertion and vindication of any right of the Negro, of which I have any knowledge, was written more than two hundred years ago, by Rev. Morgan Godwin, a missionary of Virginia and Jamaica. This was only a plea for the right of the Negro to baptism and church membership. The last publication of any considerable note, of which I have any knowledge, is a recent article in the Popular Science Monthly, by Prof. Gilliam. The distance and difference between these two publications, in point of time, gives us a gauge by which we may in good degree measure the progress of the Negro. The book of Godwin was published in 1680, and the article of Gilliam was published in 1883. The space in time between the two is not greater than the space in morals and enlightenment. The ground taken in respect to the Negro, in the one, is low. The ground taken in respect to the possibilities of the Negro, in the other, is so high as to be somewhat startling, not only to the white man, but also to the black man himself.

    ... Here, to-night on the twenty-first anniversary of Emancipation in the District of Columbia, the capital of the grandest Republic of freedom on the earth, I kneel at the grave, amid the dust and shadows of bygone centuries, and offer my gratitude, and the gratitude of six millions of my race, to Morgan Godwin, as the grand pioneer of Garrison, Lundy, Goodell, Phillips, Henry Wilson, Gerrit Smith, Joshua R. Giddings, Abraham Lincoln, Thaddeus Stevens, and the illustrious host of great men who have since risen to plead the cause of the negro against those who would oppress him.

    Note also this:

    Life and Times of Frederick Douglass, written by himself: his early life as a slave, his escape from bondage, and his complete history to the present time, including his connection with the anti-slavery movement, his labors in Great Britain as well as in his own country, etc. / with an introduction by George L. Ruffin. Hartford, Conn.: Park, 1881, 1882 printing. 618 pp.

    http://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/douglasslife/douglass.html

    When I was about thirteen years old, and had succeeded in learning to read, every increase of knowledge, especially anything respecting the free states, was an additional weight to the almost intolerable burden of my thought--"I am a slave for life." To my bondage I could see no end. It was a terrible reality, and I shall never be able to tell how sadly that thought chafed my young spirit. Fortunately, or unfortunately, I had earned a little money in blacking boots for some gentlemen, with which I purchased of Mr. Knight, on Thames street, what was then a very popular school book, viz., "The Columbian Orator," for which I paid fifty cents. I was led to buy this book by hearing some little boys say they were going to learn some pieces out of it for the exhibition. This volume was indeed a rich treasure, and every opportunity afforded me, for a time, was spent in diligently perusing it. Among much other interesting matter, that which I read again and again with unflagging satisfaction was a short dialogue between a master and his slave. The slave is represented as having been recaptured in a second attempt to run away; and the master opens the dialogue with an upbraiding speech, charging the slave with ingratitude, and demanding to know what he has to say in his own defense. Thus upbraided and thus called upon to reply, the slave rejoins that he knows how little anything that he can say will avail, seeing that he is completely in the hands of his owner; and with noble resolution, calmly says, "I submit to my fate." Touched by the slave's answer, the master insists upon his further speaking, and recapitulates the many acts of kindness which he has performed toward the slave, and tells him he is permitted to speak for himself. Thus invited, the quondam slave made a spirited defense of himself, and thereafter the whole argument for and against slavery is brought out. The master was vanquished at every turn in the argument, and appreciating the fact he generously and meekly emancipates the slave, with his best wishes for his prosperity. It is unnecessary to say that a dialogue with such an origin and such an end, read by me when every nerve of my being was in revolt at my own condition as a slave, affected me most powerfully. I could not help feeling that the day might yet come, when the well-directed answers made by the slave to the master, in this instance, would find a counterpart in my own experience. This, however, was not all the fanaticism which I found in the Columbian Orator. I met there one of Sheridan's mighty speeches, on the subject of Catholic Emancipation, Lord Chatham's speech on the American War, and speeches by the great William Pitt, and by Fox. These were all choice documents to me, and I read them over and over again, with an interest ever increasing, because it was ever gaining in intelligence; for the more I read them the better I understood them. The reading of these speeches added much to my limited stock of language, and enabled me to give tongue to many interesting thoughts which had often flashed through my mind and died away for want of words in which to give them utterance. The mighty power and heart-searching directness of truth penetrating the heart of a slaveholder, compelling him to yield up his earthly interests to the claims of eternal justice, were finely illustrated in the dialogue, and from the speeches of Sheridan I got a bold and powerful denunciation of oppression and a most brilliant vindication of the rights of man. Here was indeed a noble acquisition. If I had ever wavered under the consideration that the Almighty, in some way, had ordained slavery and willed my enslavement for his own glory, I wavered no longer. I had now penetrated to the secret of all slavery and all oppression, and had ascertained their true foundation to be in the pride, the power, and the avarice of man.

    Edski again:

    Knoll: They had to reject an inerrant approach to the Bible and appeal to the broad sweep of Scripture, which opposed the oppression of a group of people.

    Not true. Henry Drisler addressed the matter admirably.

    Henry Drisler

    American classical scholar, Jay Professor of Greek Language and Literature, Columbia College. Of Drisler Encyclopedia Britannica notes, "He was ardently opposed to slavery, and brilliantly refuted The Bible View of Slavery, written by Bishop J. H. Hopkins of Vermont, in a Reply (1863), which meets the bishop on purely Biblical ground and displays the wide range of Dr. Drisler's scholarship."

    Bible View of Slavery Reconsidered, New York: C.S. Westcott & Co., Printers, 1863. 20, 14 pp.; 22 cm. A Review of Bible View of Slavery, by John H. Hopkins, D.D., Bishop of the Diocese of Vermont.

    http://www.classicapologetics.com/special/drisslv.pdf

    ***
    Edski again:

    EXCERPT FROM â€Ĺ“The Biblical Argument for Slavery” by Kevin Gile, The Evangelical Quarterly, Vol. 66, No. 1, 1994

    The Old School (Presbyterian) General Assembly report of 1845 concluded that slavery was based on â€Ĺ“some of the plainest declarations of the Word of God.”



    ***



    What Gile and Babinski left out:

    Source Book and Bibliographical Guide for American Church History - Google Books Result

    by Peter George Mode - 1921 - Religion - 735 pages

    http://books.google.com/books?id=3KJWAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA567&lpg=PA567&dq=%E2%80%9Csome+of+the+plainest+declarations+of+the+Word+of+God.%E2%80%9D&source=bl&ots=O_ETUVYtl-&sig=VLDs1DEMSVDfG79yihjNe9jATGQ&hl=en&ei=pHq4Sc_dDpmMsQPc97E_&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=1&ct=result

    XII. PRESBYTERIAN DELIVERANCES

    The Synod of New York and Philadelphia, May 28, 1787 The Synod taking into consideration the overture concerning slavery, transmitted by the committee of overtures last Saturday, came to the following judgment:

    The Synod of New York and Philadelphia do highly approve of the general principles in favour of universal liberty, that prevail in America, and the interest which many of the states have taken in promoting the abolition of slavery; yet, inasmuch as men introduced from a servile state to a participation of all the privileges of civil society, without a proper education, and without previous habits of industry, may be, in many respects, dangerous to the community, therefore they earnestly recommend it to all the members belonging to their communion, to give those persons who are at present held in servitude, such good education as to prepare them for the better enjoyment of freedom; and they moreover recommend that masters, wherever they find servants disposed to make a just improvement of the privilege, would give them a pcculium, or grant them sufficient time and sufficient means of procuring their own liberty at a moderate rate, that thereby, they may be brought into society with those habits of industry that may render them useful citizens; and, finally, they recommend it to all their people to use the most prudent measures, consistent with the interest and the state of civil society, in the counties where they live, to procure eventually the final abolition of slavery' in America.

    Text—Engles-: Records of tlie Presbyterian Church, p. 540.

    Resolution of Presbyterian General Assembly, 1818
    (adopted unanimously)

    The General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, having taken into consideration the subject of slavery, think proper to make known their sentiments upon it to the churches and people under their care. We consider the voluntary' enslaving of one part of the human race by another, as a gross violation of the most precious and sacred rights of human nature; as utterly inconsistent with the law of God, which requires us to love our neighbor as ourselves; and as totally irreconcilable with the spirit and principles of the Gospel of Christ, which enjoins that 'all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them.' Slavery creates a paradox in the moral system; it exhibits rational, accountable, and immortal beings in such circumstances as scarcely to leave them the power of moral action. It exhibits them as dependent upon the will of others, whether they shall receive religious instruction; whether they shall know and worship the true God; whether they shall enjoy the ordinances of the Gospel; whether they shall perform the duties and cherish the endearments of husbands and wives, parents and children, neighbors and friends; whether they shall preserve their chastity and purity, or regard the dictates of justice and humanity. Such are some of the consequences of slavery-consequences not imaginary-but which connect themselves with its very existence. '. .

    We rejoice that the Church to which we belong commenced as early as any other in this country the good work of endeavoring to put an end to slavery, and that in the same work many of its preachers have ever since been, and now are, among the most active, vigorous and efficient laborers. We do indeed tenderly sympathize with those portions of our Church and our country where the evil of slavery has been entailed upon them; where a great and the most virtuous part of the community abhor slavery, and wish its extermination as sincerely as any others; but where the number of slaves, their ignorance, and their vicious habits generally, render an immediate and universal emancipation inconsistent alike with the safety and happiness of the master and the slave. With those who are thus circumstanced, we repeat, we tenderly sympathize. At the same time, we earnestly exhort them to continue, and if possible, to increase their exertions to effect a total abolition of slavery. We exhort them to suffer no greater delay to take place in this most interesting concern than a regard to the public welfare truly and indispensably demands. . . .

    Having thus expressed our views of slavery, and of the duty indispensably incumbent on all Christians to labor for its complete extinction, . . .

    1. We recommend to all our people to patronize and encourage the society lately formed for colonizing in Africa, the land of their ancestors, the free people of color in our country. We hope that much good may result from the plans and efforts of this society. . , .

    2. We recommend to all the members of our religious denomination, not only to permit, but to facilitate and encourage the instruction of their slaves in the principles and duties of the Christian religion, by granting them the liberty to attend upon the preaching of the Gospel, when they have the opportunity; by favoring the instruction of them in Sabbath schools, wherever those schools can be formed, and by giving them all proper advantages for acquiring the knowledge of their duty both to Got! and man. . . .

    3. We enjoin it on all church sessions and Presbyteries under the care of this Assembly to discountenance, and as far as possible, to prevent all cruelty, of whatever kind, in the treatment of slaves: especially the cruelty of separating husband and wife, parents and children, and that which consists in selling slaves to those who will either themselves deprive these unhappy people of the blessings of the Gospel, or who will transport them to places where the Gospel is not proclaimed, or where it is forbidden to slaves to attend upon its institutions. The manifest violation or disregard of the injunction here given, in its true spirit and intention, ought to be considered as just ground lor the discipline and censures of the church. And if it shall ever happen that a Christian professor in our communion shall sell a slave, who is also in communion and good standing in our Church, contrary to his or her will and inclination, it ought immediately to claim the particular attention of the proper church judicatories; and unless there be such peculiar circumstances attending the case as can but seldom happen, it ought to be followed without delay by a suspension of the offender from all the privileges ol the church, till he repent and make all the reparation in his power to the injured party.

    Text—Robinson: The Testimony and Practice of Hit Presbyterian Church in Reference lo American Slavery, pp. 2.V29.

    Resolution of Presbyterian General Assembly, 1845

    ^adopted by vote of 168 to H3)

    The question which is now unhappily agitating and dividing other branches of the Church, and which is pressed upon the attention of the Assembly by one of the three classes of the memorialists just named, is. whether the holding of slaves is, under circumstances, a heinous sin. calling for the discipline of the Church.

    The Church of Christ is a spiritual body, whose jurisdiction extends only to the religious faith and moral conduct of her members. She cannot legislate where Christ 1ms not legislated, nor make terms of membership which he has not made. The question, therefore, which this Assembly is called upon to decide is this: Do the Scriptures teach that the holding of slaves, without regard to circumstances, is a sin, the renunciation of which should be made the condition of membership in the Church of Christ?

    It is impossible to answer this question in the affirmative without contradicting some of the plainest declarations of the word of God. That slavery existed in the days of Christ and his Apostles is an admitted fact. That they did not denounce the relation itself as sinful, as inconsistent with Christianity; that slave-holders were admitted to membership in the- Churches organized by the Apostles, that whilst they were required to treat their slaves with kindness and as rational, accountable, immortal beings, and, it Christians, as brethren in the Lord, they were not commanded to emancipate them; that slaves were required to be 'obedient to their masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, with singleness of heart as unto Christ.' are facts which meet the eye of every reader of the New Testament. This Assembly cannot, therefore denounce the holding of slaves as necessarily a heinous and scandalous sin, calculated to bring upon the Church the curse of God, without charging the Apostles of Christ with conniving at such sin, introducing into the Church such sinners, and thus bringing upon them the curse of the Almighty.

    In so saying, however, the Assembly are not to be understood as denying that there is evil connected with slavery. Much less do they approve those defective and oppressive laws by which, in some of the States, it is regulated. Nor would they by any means countenance the traffic in slaves for the sake of gain; the separation of husbands and wives, parents and children, for the sake of 'filthy lucre,' or for the convenience of the master; or cruel treatment of slaves in any respect. . .

    Nor is this, assembly to be understood as countenancing the idea that masters may regard their servants as mere property, and not as human beings, rational, accountable, immortal. The Scriptures prescribe not only the duties of servants, but also of masters, warning the latter to discharge those duties 'knowing that their Master is in heaven, neither is their respect of persons with him.'

    As to the extent of the evils involved in slavery, and the best methods of removing them, various opinions prevail, and neither the Scriptures nor our constitution authorise this body to prescribe any particular course to be pursued by the churches under our care. . .

    In view of the above stated principles and facts,

    Resolved, 1st, That the General Assembly of the Presbvterian Church in the United States was originally organized, and has since continued to be the bond of union in the Church, upon the conceded principle that the existence of domestic slaverv, under the circumstances in which it is found in the Southern portion of the country, is no bar to Christian communion.

    2d, That the petitions that ask the Assembly to make the Iwlding oj slaves in itself a matter of discipline, do virtually require this judicatory to dissolve itseH, and abandon the organization under which, by the Divine blessings, it has so long prospered. The tendency is evidently to separate the northern from the southern portion of the Church, a result which every good citizen must deplore as tending to the dissolution of the union of our beloved country, and which even- enlightened Christian will oppose as bringing about a minous and unnecessary schism between brethren who maintain a common faith.

    Text—Robinson: Testimony and Practice of the Presbyterian Church in Reference lo American Slavery, pp. 35-39.

    Resolution of the General Assembly New School, 1850

    Resolved, lit, That we deeply deplore the working of the whole system of American slavery, interwoven as it is with the policy of the slave-holding States, and with the social and domestic life of their citizens; and regarding it, as in former years we have explicitly stated, to be fraught with serious injury to the civil, political, intellectual, and moral interests of society, and leading to much sin, we declare it to be in all cases, where the laws of the State, the obligations of guardianship, and the demands of humanity, do not render it unavoidable, an offence in the proper sense of that term, as used in our Book of Discipline, chap. 1, sec. 3.

    2. Resolved, That while we regard all cases in which the holding of slaves is sinful, a matter for the exercise of such discipline as falls within the proper jurisdiction of the inferior church courts or sessions; yet, as our constitution declares, 'the exercise of discipline in such a manner as to edify the Church, requires not only much of the spirit of piety, but a'so much prudence and discretion,' and, therefore, 'it becomes the mlers of the Church to take into view all the circumstances which may give a different character to conduct, and render it more or less offensive, and which may of course require a very different mode of proceeding in similar cases, at different times, for the attainment of the same end.' Book of Dis. chap. 1, sec. 5.

    In this spirit we repeat our former testimonies; and while on the one hand we beseech the churches more immediately brought into contact with the evils of slaver,', to watch and guard most carefully against the admission and retention in their fellowship of unworthy members, if there are any, and to endeavor to preserve and promote their purity; on the other hand, we earnestly entreat that those who feel afflicted by the dreadful and atrocious evils of slavery, existing in the States where human beings are by law declared and held as chattels, and bought and sold as merchandise, would carefully guard against being embittered towards such of their brethren as may be surrounded, embarrassed, and often frustrated in their good desires and designs, by a stern force of law they cannot control; and that they would extend to them their prayers and sympathies, and fraternal co-operation for the prosperity of the Church, and the best interests of humanity.

    Text—Robinson: The Testimony and Practice of Ike Presbyterian Church in Reference to American Slatery, pp. 226-229.

    ReplyDelete
  52. Dumbass Dan says: "Jesus tells them to take a staff"

    YAWN -- http://www.tektonics.org/gk/halfstaffed.html

    Old....stale...stupid.

    Dumbass Dan, on authorship issues:

    "BURP"

    Unfortunately, Dan doesn't have anything like an epistemology for establishing the authorship of an ancient work, which is why this is all he has, along with goofiness like:

    "It cannot even be confirmed whether the books they spoke of are the same books you pea brains use today."

    Wow, that's so brilliant. I could say that just as readily of any ancient book, like the Annals of Tacitus...with just as much evidence. :D

    Who writes you arguments, Dumbass Dan? And how long have they been deceased?

    Dumbass Dan, on textual criticism:

    "BURP Magical Sky Fairy BURP"

    and not one word on textual criticism....can't imagine why not. :D

    Dumbass Dan, on the canon:

    "BURP"

    Huh. Nothing but unspecified charges of tampering and power plays. Yep. We ought to just throw away scholars like Dungan. Metzger, etc and read Dan Brown instead....duh ahhh....
    Dumbass Dan, on text criticism again:

    "BURP Ehrman's Misquoting Jesus BURP"

    I not only read that book, Dumbass Dan, I read its scholarly precursor, The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture, in which Ehrman himself says the very thing I did before about the only types of "corruption" there actually was. Oops. Too bad his scholarly works are over your head, huh? Try this:

    http://www.tektonics.org/books/ehrqurvw.html
    http://www.bible.org/page.php?page_id=4000

    Ehrman is above your head even in his popular works, though, so I'm sure Dan Wallace is like nuclear physics to you. BTW Jesus Interrupted is on my current reading list...and from what I have seen, it's already been refuted by the book I have going to press right now.

    Dumbass Dan, again on authorship:

    "BURP Fairy Tales BURP primitive savages BURP"

    Any actual evidence they added anything, Dumbass Dan?

    No?

    Oh, dear, you're still buying that misplaced rhetoric about eyewitness testimony? Grow up:

    http://www.christian-thinktank.com/loftus.html

    Dumbass Dan said:

    "Didn't take long for some people with an intellectual capacity similar to yours, to believe joseph smith was a prophet of god who received some golden tablets from an angel containing the true word of god..."

    Too bad there's no comparison:

    http://www.tektonics.org/lp/nowayjose.html

    Dumbass Dan said:

    "Wow there is that christ like humility shining through again. You sure make me wanna convert you light of the world you."

    We don't want deadweight like you, Dumbass Dan...all you'd end up doing is wasting time at Joyce Meyer events. Anyway -- thanks for proving that indeed, you can't hold a candle to me when it comes to arguments. :) Itr's clear your historical epistemology amounts to burping and passing gas at your betters.

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  53. Boogle said:

    "BWAHAHAHA!!! Man, that is beautiful! Credit card!!!"

    Beautiful and accurate, busboy...too bad you're too ignorant of the practice to provide an actual argument otherwise. But we KNEW that already. :D

    Boogle Boy says:

    "When Yahweh (a.k.a. The Kosher Xenu) told his people to make slaves of their neighbors, did the Israelites check their credit ratings first?"

    Absolutely. The "credit check" was done when the nations declared war on each other. Such wars were a challenge involving each nation's gods as well as their peoples. In essence, you made a boast that you and your gods could win -- that was the "credit offer" -- and the war itself was the "credit check". And if you lost the war, you had to pay your "debt".

    Sorry you're so stupid about ancient history and concepts of property and nationhood, but that's the way it goes!

    Boogye Boy says:

    "You say that indentured servitude isn't bad. All righty. Hey, JPH, want to be my indentured servant?"

    Actually, fool, if indeed it were a ticket to resettling in a much nicer place, in the social conditions under consideration, I would have no problem at all entering into such a contract with someone. How's that, Boogy?

    Boogie Boy:

    "It's immoral and awful, and that's why it's ILLEGAL. It's BANNED under the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights."

    O RLY? Baloney. The closest it gets to anything like is Article 4:

    "No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms."

    Unfortunately for you, this is hardly specific enough to be of any use, and it is far from clear that it has any application to voluntary servitude agreements, much less does it explain the moral basis for the article. Duh....try again! :D

    Boogie Boy whines some more about stuff that has been thoroughly answered by http://www.christian-thinktank.com/qnoslave.html so I won't waste any time on it. It's pretty clear who the drooling, hypocritical, deranged, immoral maggot here is. :D The guy who thinks he has the White Man's Burden to educate the poor savages in his enlightened moral code...pffft. Nice try. Go get some scholarship.

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  54. JP,

    These comments got me laughin' like crazy...Babinski offers comments without saying anything, Dannyboy doesn't know where the door is, not to mention all these other characters offer kindergarten supposed contradictions that have nothing to do with Jesus his deity or any substantive scriptural teachings...too FUNNY!

    Keep 'em on the ropes Ali!

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  55. Thanks, Harv! :) Plenty of material from these guys; too bad it's not quality enough to post as Screwball Awards though....

    BTW commenting while saying nothing has been par for Babblinski fer years....!

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  56. Hi J.P.

    I found this post through a comment on Nick Norelli's blog.

    I know, here you are fighting the brave fight against mocking trolls. But some of your claims seem ... excessive ... and it would be a shame for the atheists to be given the idea they're the only voice of reason or moderation (especially considering the type of language and verbal Molotovs they're lobbing around here).

    I think I'd like to challenge you on a couple of those points myself, like whether you have a satisfactory answer to any contradiction that would put down the legitimate discussion in 10 seconds or less, or whether all 27 of the NT books were written before the destruction of the Temple. (I'd argue based on internal evidence in GJohn and comparisons of it to the other gospels on the handling of prophecies that it, at least, was post-destruction.) Interested in an exchange of posts?

    Take care & God bless
    Anne / WF

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  57. Fisher, you can come see me at TWeb for such discussion....but be sure you read any material I have on those subjects first.

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  58. JP, do you want a discussion or not? You're really refusing to answer the question.

    Contradiction: "Inconsistency; discrepancy."
    Contradiction: "a statement or proposition that contradicts or denies another or itself and is logically incongruous."

    Give us poor dolts an example of something that you acknowledge would be a contradiction if found in the Bible.

    All you're doing is explaining the contradictions away. "Transcription errors" in an "inerrant Bible" and all that ... (which is itself not a contradiction, I suppose?)

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  59. mudhead said:

    "Give us poor dolts an example of something that you acknowledge would be a contradiction if found in the Bible."

    Gee, this is hard for you, isn't it?

    Do you know of a contradiction outside the Bible?

    If you find something like it inside, there you go! Duh ah....

    mudhead said:

    "All you're doing is explaining the contradictions away. 'Transcription errors' in an 'inerrant Bible' and all that ... (which is itself not a contradiction, I suppose?)"

    No, mudhen. Here you are criticizing inerrancy, and yet you have no idea what the doctrine is all about. I'll give you a hint: The Chicago Statement has nothing to do with deep-dish pizza. And the only people who hold to views like you describe have names like Ruckman and Riplinger.

    No -- I don't want a discussion with people who need to be educated from square one and are/have been too lazy to look into the issue. Go read some books on the doctrine and get back to us.

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  60. One more hint: I'll take you a little more seriously, mudhen....if you ask for a reading bibliography....then drop the topic until you've finished it.

    Nuff said.

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  61. Hm, you say to read your things, and I'm game. However, I'm fairly new to your site and the way Nick's comment was phrased that brought me here, this may not be your only site. If I wanted a quick preview of your arguments for why you believe GJohn is pre-destruction, do you have a link to your own personal favorite line of argument you've written on the subject?

    I'm convinced it's post-destruction, myself.

    Take care & God bless
    Anne / WF

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  62. Hm, you say to read your things, and I'm game. However, I'm fairly new to your site and the way Nick's comment was phrased that brought me here, this may not be your only site. If I wanted a quick preview of your arguments for why you believe GJohn is pre-destruction, do you have a link to your own personal favorite line of argument you've written on the subject?

    Hi Fisher, and welcome.

    A couple of years back me and a few fellow TWebbers came up with Debunking Crap, a Blogger parody of Debunking Christianity. Because the blog isn't getting much traffic anymore, and JP Holding has had to reveal his true identity for the sake of his own blog, and, because we got tired of parodying John's arguments without really answering them, I made this site you see before you. The "other sites" are not worth your time unless you'd be willing to go along with the "act" of things with a dose of sarcasm (believe it or not, such a site has actually gone over the heads of some of our atheist visitors).

    Example of Loftus' destructiveness are logged on Theologyweb.com. Here is one link you might want to check out: http://www.theologyweb.com/campus/showthread.php?t=97534

    If you want to look for a convenient source of this type of information, just go check out DJ's blog itself. You're bound to find something that relates to an interchangeably schizophrenic personality complex.

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  63. Oh I've run into my fair share of flame-war fighters. I just don't think pouring gasoline on the fire is very productive. I mean, not if the point is to bear witness to God's goodness in Christ.

    Take care & God bless
    Anne / WF

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  64. Oh I've run into my fair share of flame-war fighters. I just don't think pouring gasoline on the fire is very productive. I mean, not if the point is to bear witness to God's goodness in Christ.

    In all actuality, it's a way of escaping the censorship of John and his one-sided views he wants to enforce upon others. I allow both the pro and the anti-Loftus folk onto this blog to enjoy the freedom they wouldn't be able to get at DC. That's basically what it amounts too. Although if you'll notice, allot of DJ's crowd will come on here and just spout off anything that may come to mind. And that's usually where Holding steps in.

    Loftus' irritability issues are his own problem. Check out the next post above this one to take a looky at Loftus' motive for "debunking" the Christian faith. Loftus, claiming to be a former Christian himself, seems to go after the stereotypes of Christianity and believes that the Christian mindset should conform to his problems, and not the other way around. There's a much bigger picture here than a "flame-war" going on. It's an extensive exchange which ties in many different various factors.

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  65. I said...

    "It cannot even be confirmed whether the books they spoke of are the same books you pea brains use today."

    The douchenugget said...

    "Wow, that's so brilliant. I could say that just as readily of any ancient book, like the Annals of Tacitus...with just as much evidence. :D"

    Um does anyone claim the Annals of Tacitus are the inspired word of the living god, you fucking brainless asshat.

    Why do you keep comparing the lack of evidence for the authorship of your fairytales, to the lack of evidence for other ancient documents? Is anyone dedicating their lives to those books? Is anyone claiming those books are the inspired word of the living god?

    All your doing is showing what a degenerate, ignorant tool you are to dedicate your life to a book whose authorship you cannot confirm, whose god-inspired autographs don't even exist, whose stories contradict each other, and whose picture of the almighty makes him look only slightly less stupid that you do.

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  66. You are all taking John too seriously.

    He is an admitted liar...he lied to his wife, his family, his friends, his congregation, and we know he lies about other blogger.

    He deletes and alters posts, and continues to do so.

    And yet he really believes he is "honest John"...so in that sense he is mentally ill.

    He also has an almost uncontrollable anger probem according to people who know him, and it comes out on his blog.

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  67. Fisher:

    There's no such thing as a "quick preview" to depth subjects like the epistemology of authorship of ancient documents...this is like asking for a "quick way" to craft the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

    As came to mind this morning while walking Cocoa....there's no "Easy button" for scholarship.

    You will find a hub article at http://www.tektonics.org/ntdocdef/gospdefhub.html and sub-articles for each of the four gospels. My book has more details in it, but that will be sufficient to start.

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  68. Dumbass Dan whineth:

    "Um does anyone claim the Annals of Tacitus are the inspired word of the living god, you fucking brainless asshat."

    BURP! Red herring alert! BUUUUURP! :D

    The epistemology for authorial attribution don't change just because of inspiration, toadstool brain! You don't get to make up new rules just because you find it too hard to refute the arguments using the ones that all the scholars use! Duh ahhhhhh.....duh....duh ahhhhh....

    All you're showing is that you're no more brilliant than Peter Ruckman. New rules! The autographs have to exist! Bwaaah hah! Next rule: Luke has to stand on one foot while reciting his Gospel! Pfffft! Moron! :D

    When you can get beyond elephant hurling, let us know. Meanwhile here's more medication for you:

    http://www.tektonics.org/harmonize/lincoln01.html

    Dumbass Dan: Poster Boy for the Wikipedia Generation!

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  69. J. P Holding said...
    Gee, this is hard for you, isn't it?
    Do you know of a contradiction outside the Bible?
    If you find something like it inside, there you go! Duh ah....


    Hi Dr. Holding,
    Can you please give an example of two natural language/referential English sentences which are contradictory?

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  70. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  71. I'm not a doctor...not yet. But I play one on TV.

    I'm not in the habit of addressing such basics, but since you were polite, I'll make a concession.

    Here's a setup with two statements.

    1) John is at the JCPenney.
    2) John is not at the JC Penney.

    Taken at face value, you'd say these statements contradict. Simple enough. Maybe they do.

    But hold on a sec. What if statement 1 was made at 2 PM, and statement 2 was made at 4 PM?

    That's why the question, as posed, isn't a good one. You can't just go by things like "natural language." You have to dig deep into a variety of contexts before you can declare a contradiction exists between two statements -- even for simple situations like John's relationship to JCPenney.

    Resolving Biblical issues of this sort is no different. And I have yet to see any Skeptic informed enough to make judgments on these matters. They’re mostly frozen into Dennis McKinsey…and also have no idea what the doctrine of inerrancy really states. (It’s much less demanding – and also much less important – than is usually believed.)

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  72. I sent a link of this thread to Dr. Paul Copan so he could see for himself how Holding argues and how he treats others who disagree.

    Hi Paul! If I were you I wouldn't want to associate myself with the likes of Holding. I would personally keep an arms distance from him.

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  73. Hi JP

    I appreciate your posting the link; no doubt you're more familiar with the layout of your website than this stray poster.

    Anyway, there wasn't much material there making a concrete argument specifically for an early date for GJohn. I think the only substantive thing on an early date (rather than various arguments for a late date being dismissed for various causes) was a line on comparisons from GJohn to materials from Qumran.

    I'd advance the following line of arguments for GJohn's lateness (90's A.D.):

    * Some early Christian writers make a point of mentioning, along with John's authorship, that he survived into what we would now call the 90's A.D.
    * The way in which John approaches the non-mention of Jerusalem's destruction is enough different than the synoptics to suggest it was written from the other side of that event. Granted, John along with the others barely alludes to the destruction of the Temple. But John, in contrast to the others, also barely mentions the *prophecies* of the destruction of the Temple. The big, forward-looking climax of, say, Matthew and Mark is the upcoming destruction of the Temple, so that prophecy gets a lot of play in those gospels. In GJohn, not so. In GJohn, the big, forward-looking cliffhanger is no longer the upcoming destruction but the upcoming death of John and the question of whether Christ would return first. The possibility that there might be a major catastrophe befall Jerusalem between the date of writing and the end of the world isn't considered.
    * In Mark, we see the prophecies of the destruction of Jerusalem conflated with the prophecies of the end of the world and Jesus' return (the "preterist verses") as part of some indeterminate future. In John, we see the bare mention of the prophecy of the destruction of Jerusalem conflated with the prophecies of Jesus' death and resurrection, which are at that time in the fulfilled past. That suggests a post-destruction date.
    * When measuring the extent to which the gospels are saturated with Jewish concerns and Jewish language, the presumed earlier gospels (Matthew and Mark) rate highest on Jewish tag words; Luke rates third; John rates the lowest on the incidence of Jewish tag words. This is in keeping with the decreasing Jewish influence and relatively higher percentage of Gentiles in the church as Christianity became more of a global phenomenon, and fits better with later dates than with earlier dates.

    At any rate, I think I could "argue with you for more than 10 seconds" (though arguing with you isn't exactly my intention).

    Take care & God bless
    Anne / WF

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  74. Hi TruthBeTold

    I really doubt Loftus has exceeded what I've seen from other atheists. "Spaghetti Monster" yada yada, "you're morons because you believe in an Invisible Pink Unicorn" yada yada. (Personally, I think the "Straw Man" argument should be renamed the "Spaghetti Monster" argument in honor of its most common manifestation these days.) Or the classic "God raped Mary" argument, if they really want to push buttons. The point of that type of psychological warfare is that -- do you play chess? -- it's like a fork. They're offering a choice between accepting their lies or (they hope) becoming hypocrites in matching their nastiness.

    Always in search of door #3 ...

    Take care & God bless
    Anne / WF

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  75. JP writes: "You have to dig deep into a variety of contexts before you can declare a contradiction exists between two statements"

    True. However, I sometimes find it difficult to ascertain the truth between conflicting statements made two weeks ago. Two thousand years is a whole other kettle of fish. I would think the passage of time renders it a bit more difficult due to a lack of accessibility to the characters speaking and being unable to know their thoughts and intents behind a statement.

    However, you're talking to someone who believes only half of what he reads and hears, anyhow.

    Consistency and contradictions are not my biggest gripe with Scripture anyhow ... for all the lovely passages (and there are a few), I just can't reconcile the Loving-God/Tear-Yo-Arse-Up-Mean God thing

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  76. Fake Blog Loftus sez:

    "I sent a link of this thread to Dr. Paul Copan so he could see for himself how Holding argues and how he treats others who disagree."

    Why'd you do that? Did you need some help from him answering the question about what's unclear about the 7th commandment?

    Sheesh, you can't answer that one yourself?

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  77. John W. Loftus said...
    I sent a link of this thread to Dr. Paul Copan so he could see for himself how Holding argues and how he treats others who disagree.

    John's back with more of his melodramatic whining and blind-eyed hypocricy.

    This isn't a matter of disagreeing John, if you were able to discern this, which seems you haven't. I don't think I need to go through the ABC's of what these back and forth comments are about if you don't have the brains to recognize what they are in the first place.

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  78. Fisher sez:

    "Anyway, there wasn't much material there making a concrete argument specifically for an early date for GJohn."

    That's because the burden is on those who argue for a late date.

    As far as your arguments, they're not very good at all.

    1) The mere fact that John survived into the 90s does not designate the date of his writing a particular document at any given date, pre or post 70. This is a non sequitur.

    2) There is no "difference" in the way John appraoches the non-mention of the Temple, and you did not explain what this alleged "difference" is. That John also barely mentions the prophecies is interesting but irrelevant. If anything it only adds to a case for a pre-70 date and would support JAT Robinson's idea that John was the first Gospel written (which I can take or leave).

    3) Your interpretation of Mark re "conflation" is confused and does not represent any prterist view I am aware of. It may make sense if you mean "end of the age" and not "end of the world". But that was not "indeterminate" but prophecied within a generation.

    In turn, your assertion re "conflation" in Joghn makes no sense and reflects no passage I know of, unless you define "conflate" so broadly that it becomes meaningless. How about some exegesis to back that up?

    Finally, even if these readings of Mark and John are correct, they do not lead to the conclusion that John reflects a post-destruction date. This is another non-sequitur.

    4) Your rating of John re Jewish "tag words" also reflects no finding I know of, save perhaps something reflecting outdated ideas from the likes of Bultmann. Since you gave this claim no substance, I can't comment further. That said, even if true, it would only reflect that John was written for a Gentile group in particular, and it is yet another non sequitur to go further any draw conclusions based on the WHOLE church (universal) viz a viz a Gentile population. When Paul wrote to Corinth c. 50 AD that church has a "higher percentage of Gentiles" than the church in Jerusalem or Antioch did. So now you want to date 1 Cor. past 70? Nice try. Another non sequitur.

    You sez: "At any rate, I think I could "argue with you for more than 10 seconds"

    I'll grant you 15 seconds, if only because the construction of non sequiturs takes a while. These were very poor arguments.

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  79. modman sez:

    "I would think the passage of time renders it a bit more difficult due to a lack of accessibility to the characters speaking and being unable to know their thoughts and intents behind a statement."

    If you don't do the scholarly legwork...you won't get that accessibility. Have you done it yet?

    Sez further:

    "I just can't reconcile the Loving-God/Tear-Yo-Arse-Up-Mean God thing"

    It would depend which ones you mean, but getting a correct definition of agape would be a start.

    http://www.tektonics.org/whatis/whatlove.html

    Agape does mean tearing an arse when necessary to prevent a greater evil. The best model for agape is not Mother Theresa, but Joe Clark.

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  80. Again Holding provides no reason to believe that the gospels are written by either eyewitnesses or people that spoke directly with eyewitnesses. All he does is cry "well these other ancient books don't have proof, so why do I need proof?"

    Boy I can just see that spirit of truth at work in this xian. Wow very impressive reasoning there. My turds can put together a better argument than that.

    All you have is some true believers saying some other true believers who knew some other true believers spoke with a few true believers that knew the original true believers who were illiterate superstitious morons. You got nothing more than catholics thinking they saw mary, you got nothing more than the president of graceland saying elvis appeared to him.

    You are left holding shit. You fucking cock storage unit.

    You god inspired some books with perfect divine revelation, but was too fucking stupid to preserve them. Nor is he fucking competent enough to have the inspired authors write their names on them. What kind of dumb fucking god is this?

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  81. J. P Holding said...
    You can't just go by things like "natural language."


    The Bible is natural language.
    All verbal/textual human language is either natural or formal.

    I'm not in the habit of addressing such basics, but since you were polite, I'll make a concession.
    the question, as posed, isn't a good one.


    The question exposed your 'basic' knowledge that contradiction in natural language, given definitional ambiguity, vagueness (see sorites), and perpetual inadequacy of finite context, is almost impossible, outside of explicit self-referential sentences. Even formal language requires shared acceptance of axioms as 'context'.

    You know the game. You could simply state that, instead of
    Gee, this is hard for you, isn't it?
    Do you know of a contradiction outside the Bible?
    If you find something like it inside, there you go! Duh ah....

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  82. Hey DeistDan, you're getting a little redundant with the profanity. Think you could tone it down a wee bit and still make your points, whatever they are?

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  83. Dumbass Dan whineth:

    "Again Holding provides no reason to believe that the gospels are written by either eyewitnesses or people that spoke directly with eyewitnesses."

    I provide all THAT in my articles, Dumbass Dan. It's now YOUR job (heh heh) to respond.

    But I already know you won't, because you have absolutely nothing in the way of an epistemology for ascertaining the authorship of an ancient documeht. Hint: Using common slang for excrement and male genetalia is...NOT such an argument! But it IS the most intelligent response YOU can make!

    And sez:

    "My turds can put together a better argument than that."

    Well, now we know where your arguments come from, at any rate!

    And sez"

    "All you have is some true believers saying some other true believers who knew some other true believers spoke with a few true believers that knew the original true believers who were...BURP"

    Oh wow! Thanks! An argument against Tacitus authoring the Annals!

    "All you have is some biased Romans saying some other biased Romans who knew some other biased Romans spoke with a few biased Romans that knew the original biased Romans who were...BURP"

    Skeptical scholarship at work! Gotta love the way Dumbass Dan dispenses with the external attestation test that's been used by scholars for eons! :D

    The names are ON 26 of the 27 books, Dan. And you don't need a name for the 27th being that it is all didactic....go look that up for your vocab word for the day. Maybe you can use it as a profanity some day!

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  84. JLK sayeth:

    "The Bible is natural language. All verbal/textual human language is either natural or formal."

    That's nice. Just goes to prove my point that collapsing the issue down to those terms is too simplistic.

    "The question exposed your 'basic' knowledge that contradiction in natural language, given definitional ambiguity, vagueness (see sorites), and perpetual inadequacy of finite context, is almost impossible..."

    Uh....right. That was MY point from the start, except that I would add, "almost impossible if you choose to read like a fundamentalist."

    Don't sprain your elbow patting yourself on the back...you just showed you weren't aware of what was going on.

    "outside of explicit self-referential sentences"

    Typical low-context society drivel. It doesn't need to be "explicit"; you just need to be better educated.

    "You know the game. You could simply state that, instead of"

    Not at all. You only get simple statements like that after you've showed you've earned the right.

    You just lost it. :)

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  85. I'm now closing my comments here on this thread; 85 is enough, and it is clear that no one here as anything in the way of a real argument, much less can they help John answer the question of what's unclear about the 7th commandment.

    Any further comments made will be answered on TWeb at

    http://www.theologyweb.com/campus/showthread.php?t=107009

    or just posted in the monthly Screwball threads...where some of Dan's latest does belong, actually! :D

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  86. Hi J.P.

    I expect you've been around long enough that you're familiar with the idea of "supporting points". Some of the things you are calling "non-sequiturs" would be correctly understood as support points: the fact that John survived into the 90's is a supporting point for why it's plausible that John could have written in the 90's, etc.

    Also, you might want to consider that a biography of Jesus (i.e. one of the gospels) is a situation where there really ought to be a high preponderance of Jewish tag words. That's one of the most distinguishing features where you can objectively tell apart the quality of, say, the canonical gospels v. the quality of, say, the Gnostic gospels: here is a topic (life of Jesus) in which we *ought* to see a high incidence of Jewish context words. There's a demonstrable decrease in Jewish context words the further from original date and/or original culture the gospel is, based on Matthew, Mark, Luke in traditional order. This is in step with the known historical trend that a higher percentage of Christians were Gentiles the later the church continued. John being the lowest incidence among the gospels, while still being a life of the Jewish Messiah, would fit in a "late" position in the visible trend among the canonical gospels of "the later the traditional date of the Gospel, the lower the Jewish context". Since there's a reason why a biography of Jesus _should_ have a high incidence of Jewish tag words but no reason why, say, a letter to Corinthians should have a high incidence of Jewish tag words, the argument you made from 1 Corinthians would be inapplicable to a discussion of the gospels even if the assertion proved true. So the low incidence of Jewish context-words in GJohn is another _supporting point_ which leans towards a later date rather than an earlier one for John.

    By the way, since we don't have any documented date for the authorship of GJohn, all of the arguments either way are based on supporting points / preponderance of evidence until you get into the 100's and start having quotations of it that establish a latest possible date.

    I doubt your comment-box is the right place to reproduce several pieces of research on the prophecies that John conflated v. those Mark conflated, relative scores for Jewish context, and things of that nature, but links to more substantial write-ups are available if you're interested in reviewing the details rather than dismissing them based on your unfamiliarity with them.

    http://weekendfisher.blogspot.com/2008/08/gnostic-gospels-and-canonical-gospels.html

    http://weekendfisher.blogspot.com/2008/06/word-clouds-of-bible-introduction.html (and sub-articles there)

    http://weekendfisher.blogspot.com/2009/01/new-prophesies-and-dates-of-gospels.html (which is a summary of earlier posts, previous ones building up to that conclusion are listed below)

    http://weekendfisher.blogspot.com/2009/01/new-prophesies-towards-full-analysis.html

    http://weekendfisher.blogspot.com/2008/12/gospel-of-mark-and-new-prophesies.html

    http://weekendfisher.blogspot.com/2008/12/gospel-of-matthew-and-new-prophesies.html

    http://weekendfisher.blogspot.com/2008/12/writings-of-luke-and-new-prophesies.html

    http://weekendfisher.blogspot.com/2008/12/gospel-of-john-and-new-prophesies.html

    -- That should do for starters.

    Re: your comments on Bultmann. At times he was off in left field; at other times he was *way* off in left field. I enjoyed Moltmann's send-ups of him. They were tastefully done but thorough, and Moltmann beat him with his own words and assumptions.

    However, I'm not at all sure that this is a forum where there's any interest in a discussion of sources and evidence. The comments on this blog seems to be more of a mud-pit wrestling forum than a place to look for an open-minded and reasoning conversation. I just wanted to mention for sake of atheists here that there are Christians who have other views and are willing to take more than 10 seconds with them, who would like a substantive and respectful conversation if they're looking for that rather than a mud-slinging contest. The text for the 'post a comment' box says it all "democracy and freedom of speech are the two best weapons" ... not the two best building-blocks. Hm. A forum where speech is a weapon becomes suitable only for flame-wars.

    Take care & God bless
    Anne / WF

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  87. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  88. The reason I am name calling is because that is the form of argumentation that you prefer. Again you reply that the Annals of Tacitus have no certain way to be verified as authentic, thus we should not hold the gospels to a different standard.

    To which I replied

    1. Nobody dedicates every aspect of their life to the Annals of Tacitus, and neither does anyone try to convince others to dedicate their lives to it. If they did people would laugh them to scorn just as I do to you and your ancient texts.

    2. When you claim that your ancient texts were inspired by the almighty god of the universe, it becomes held to a higher standard since most books do not make such outlandish claims. Your ancient holy books do not give the appearance of being unique or having divine origins because...

    A. We do not have the originals, and since your god inspired the original writings it only makes sense that he would preserve them

    B. What we do have are manuscripts decades after the fact, in a language not spoken by jesus or his jewish disciples

    C. These manuscripts not only contain theological differences, and differences in perspective/content, but also variances/tampering among specific books. For example in Luke's gospel, after visiting jerusalem joseph and mary left behind jesus on their way to nazareth, when they went back to get him the text says either "your father and i were looking for you" in some manuscripts or "joseph and i were looking for you" in others. The scribes changed the text in certain manuscripts to fit their theological agenda.

    These are the facts, that any honest person can verify and acknowledge. Since i know you are not honest, and do not care about facts i simply join you in some flame throwing for good old fashioned fun.

    However it becomes more fun when your the one who claims to have god living in you, and you are a disciple of jesus christ. Now in your name calling you are violating the tenets of your own religion, which you shamelessly attempt to justify.

    Tenets like speaking the truth in love, humility, peace, gentleness, and all the other fruits of the spirit you so obviously lack.

    Eph 4:31 Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.

    You will never be taken seriously when you do this, so i don't take you seriously either. You do not even practice what christians preach.

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