>12 They left the Desert of Sin and camped at Dophkah. 13 They left Dophkah and camped at Alush. 14 They left Alush and camped at Rephidim, where there was no water for the people to drink. 15 They left Rephidim and camped in the Desert of Sinai. 16 They left the Desert of Sinai and camped at Kibroth Hattaavah. 17 They left Kibroth Hattaavah and camped at Hazeroth. 18 They left Hazeroth and camped at Rithmah. 19 They left Rithmah and camped at Rimmon Perez. 20 They left Rimmon Perez and camped at Libnah. 21 They left Libnah and camped at Rissah. 22 They left Rissah and camped at Kehelathah. 23 They left Kehelathah and camped at Mount Shepher. 24 They left Mount Shepher and camped at Haradah. 25 They left Haradah and camped at Makheloth. 26 They left Makheloth and camped at Tahath. 27 They left Tahath and camped at Terah. 28 They left Terah and camped at Mithkah. 29 They left Mithkah and camped at Hashmonah.
Wow, God really knows how to tell a story, doesn't he?
Lucas Price
Also, what does God have against defenseless, unintelligent animals?
>26 “ ‘On the fifth day offer nine bulls, two rams and fourteen male lambs a year old, all without defect. 27 With the bulls, rams and lambs, offer their grain offerings and drink offerings according to the number specified. 28 Include one male goat as a sin offering, in addition to the regular burnt offering with its grain offering and drink offering. 29 “ ‘On the sixth day offer eight bulls, two rams and fourteen male lambs a year old, all without defect. 30 With the bulls, rams and lambs, offer their grain offerings and drink offerings acco
Liam Robinson
I've thought about this too. Like, God talks to his chosen one, gives him the ten commandments and then proceeds to instruct him on how to decorate the altars for him, when to eat bread and how to kill animals for sacrifice? Couldn't he have stated some kind of truth about the universe that only he knows? Or at least given a verifiable fact like "the Earth revolves around the Sun" or "everything is made out of very small particles"? That would surely have made a solid argument for his existence and power. To be honest there is nothing in the whole Bible that a human couldn't have written.
Tyler Edwards
Well given that there were those in the ancient world that suggested both that the earth revolves around the sun, and that everything is made out of smaller particles, then even those ideas wouldn't be a solid argument for god if found in the bible.
Luis Fisher
>That would surely have made a solid argument for his existence and power. So unleashing several calamities on Egypt, parting a sea, making bread appear by magic, and creating a wall of fire isn't proof? If God told them the world was made of small particles why is that more impressive than what he has already done? >verifiable fact The thing is at the time with their methods of inquiry and technology a statement like the world is made of small particles isn't verifiable and it wasn't until Copernicus that we had demonstrable proof that the earth orbited the sun. Are you seriously saying that if God told some people something that would only be verified over three thousand years after he said it that it would be more impressive than parting an ocean to let them walk through?
>To be honest there is nothing in the whole Bible that a human couldn't have written It's almost like Christians have believed for their entire history that the bible was written by people.
Lincoln Perez
lmao why do athiests think god wrote the bible
Camden Stewart
>So unleashing several calamities on Egypt, parting a sea, making bread appear by magic, and creating a wall of fire isn't proof? strange how god only cares to reveal his existence to a very small group of people
>It's almost like Christians have believed for their entire history that the bible was written by people. this is false. christians believe the bible was divinely inspired, god could've gave the authors of the bible knowledge they had no way of knowing and immediately and eternally falsified atheism
Jeremiah Scott
>the word of god >not authored by god
Aaron Perez
>strange how god only cares to reveal his existence to a very small group of people Only if you assume that God would think or do anything in the way a human would. There are literally books within the bible saying that this is not so.
>christians believe the bible was divinely inspired Yes, they believe that God inspired people to write it. So they believed that people wrote it so you saying that people writing it being false is a false claim.
>god could've gave the authors of the bible knowledge they had no way of knowing and immediately and eternally falsified atheism Which defeats the purpose of allowing humans to have free will, also this I addressed this in my first point.
Hunter Ross
>Only if you assume that God would think or do anything in the way a human would it makes no difference how human-like or alien god is to people. given that god has set up a system where people who don't accept him go to hell, the fact that knowledge of god's existence isn't readily available needs to be accounted for.
>So they believed that people wrote it so you saying that people writing it being false is a false claim. this is just semantics. i could also say that my pen is writing my words and be speaking correctly, but that is clearly not the same sense of the word "writing" as when i say "i wrote something" (which refers to authorship). given that the bible is the word of god, god is the only author is the only real author(in a non-trivial sense of the word author)
>Which defeats the purpose of allowing humans to have free will knowledge doesn't violate free will.
Dominic Butler
>it makes no difference how human-like or alien god is to people >the fact that knowledge of god's existence isn't readily available needs to be accounted for In Job God confronts Job for attempting to box God into mans limited understanding. Just because it is something that can be accounted for doesn't mean humans can account for it and it doesn't mean that God needs to account it. If a servant receives a command that he does not understand the purpose of and the master refuses to elaborate and that the matter is something that the servant could not possible discern on their own there is no contradiction. There is a reason, that doesn't mean that humans are able to understand it or that God needs to divulge the information. I am not a Christian, I just don't believe that if He were to exist he wouldn't need to be accountable to humans.
>this is just semantics No it isn't. Christians did not believe that God controlled the people who wrote they bible, they wrote it themselves. Him 'inspiring' then does not mean he whispered words into their ears that they copied down. Regardless of how ridiculous you find that notion you don't get to decide what Christians believe and they do not believe that God wrote the bible and they do believe that the bible was written by men.
Samuel Lopez
saying that there is a reason but you just don't know it doesn't address the problem, it's just saying learn to live with it. can you come up with a possible explanation for why a benevolent and able god didn't make knowledge of his existence known despite how important that information is? (perhaps the single most important piece of information)
>Him 'inspiring' then does not mean he whispered words into their ears that they copied down god 'inspiring' people (what does it mean?) instead of dictating to them doesn't make a difference for purposes of what knowledge they had available.
you're saying that it makes sense that the bible doesn't contain knowledge unavailable to humans because the bible was written by humans, and i'm saying that this is false because under the christian view those humans were just god's instruments(or inspired, same thing), so no matter how extraordinary the content of the bible are, it would still make sense because god is the ultimately the author, and given that, it almost seems like god was deliberately holding off on using his abilities. god could've easily falsified the idea that the bible is man made, leaving atheism no room to exist.
Leo Perry
just to clarify, i'm not trying to impose some kind of obligation on you to explain why knowledge of god's existence isn't readily available despite how important it is. if you're fine with not knowing then it's not a problem for you. what i am saying is that you can't dismiss it when an atheist(or anyone) brings it up, because this is something that has bothered a lot of theists when they struggled with their faith, and for them, it IS important to account for this.
Joseph Peterson
My main gripe with your position is you are telling Christians what the contents of their beliefs are. As I said I am not a Christian, I'm only trying to set forth what they do believe. What they believe does not have to make sense. Someone could believe 2+2=5. I'm only pointing what it is they do believe.
>saying that there is a reason but you just don't know it doesn't address the problem, it's just saying learn to live with it >it's just saying learn to live with it This isn't even an epistemological question anymore which is what we are talking about. You are asking a moral question. Just because X happens does not mean that man necessarily can know why or that he has some right to know. This is a sound position. Regardless of how you feel about it morally it has no effect of the epistemological aspect.
>instead of dictating to them doesn't make a difference for purposes of what knowledge they had available. This is what I was talking about before in regards to you telling Christians what they believe. Again regardless of whether or not it makes sense it doesn't change what they believe. God did not write the bible, humans did. We aren't arguing about what is true, we are arguing about what they believe and they do not believe God wrote the bible.
>if you're fine with not knowing then it's not a problem for you. what i am saying is that you can't dismiss it when an atheist(or anyone) brings it up, If you are an atheist engaged with a debate against a Christian that is one thing. We are not doing that. I'm not trying to set up a Christian position that would make sense to an atheist. I am trying to show what Christians believe. We are both working within a Christian framework here even though neither of us are Christian. I agree with everything you have said. I think that Christianity has, even assuming that their God exists massive problems with the logic of their beliefs but that doesn't change what those beliefs are. And that is where we are in disagreement.
Leo Allen
i'm going by what i know from talking with christians, if someone identified as christian yet held different beliefs i would be perfectly willing to concede that what i say isn't applicable to them, and i wouldn't try to argue they aren't "true christians" because they don't fit my presuppositions. that said i'm having difficulty understanding how i'm mischaracterizing christianity when i say that god is the author(but not physical writer) of the bible. unless i've been living under a rock christians unanimously believe that the bible is the word of god, if i were to ask one why does the bible has it's current contents instead of different contents they would reply along the lines of "because that reflects god's will and nature" the whole reason christians study the bible is predicated on its divine contents.
i don't know what your objection is anymore. are you saying i was wrong to say that it's false to say that christians believe the bible was written by people?
>This isn't even an epistemological question it wasn't put as an epistemic problem, it's part of a cumulative case for god's implausibility.
Zachary Green
Catholic here the Bible is not the literal word of God as it was written by man. Rather it is an account of what occured as well as mans interprutation of the word of God, very few parts of the Bible are the actual word of God barring specific examples like the ten commandments.
When we say people were inspired by God such as the Four Evangelist we mean that God inspired them to write not what to write
Caleb Allen
I think we need to make an important distinction between what all educated Christians have believed over the last two thousand years and the rabble. Most Christians throughout history could not read or write and attended services in a language they did not understand. It would be impossible for all the contents of their belief to be non-heretical, something explored in Eco's The Name of the Rose. What I am talking about is Christian doctrine and the contents of belief of people educated in Christian theology. If you are an American I don't doubt that if you have these conversations with random people your experience will be very different. Perhaps we are talking about two different things. I am talking about Christian orthodoxy and maybe you are talking about an American (sorry for the assumption) layman's idea about what Christianity is.
>are you saying i was wrong to say that it's false to say that christians believe the bible was written by people? So in light of what I just said it is for the vast majority of branches of Christianity that the bible was written by people and not by God.
>it wasn't put as an epistemic problem, it's part of a cumulative case for god's implausibility. You are preaching to the choir. I'm not trying to defend the plausibility of God. If you think that the rationale behind God's actions are amoral or immoral is not important because Christians do not think so. Again, I'm not defending the Christian position, only positing what it is. Going back to my 2+2=5 example, the equivalent of what you are doing is trying to use math to explain why it's wrong. It is right, it is wrong but it doesn't change the fact that it is orthodox to believe it. You seem to be arguing that Christians don't believe X because you have an argument against it. It's like saying flat eathers don't believe the earth is flat because it has been proved that it isn't.
Adam Davis
>It is right, it is wrong Edit: It should read You are right, it is wrong.
Gavin Johnson
>Catholic here >very few parts of the Bible are the actual word of God
Classic.
Carter Morgan
>Takes qoute out of context >Ignores actual point
Classic
Adam Williams
it's just like morrowind
Nathaniel Gutierrez
None of the Church Fathers believed what you wrote-- that God made the Evangelists want to write and didn't influence what they wrote.
Ian Richardson
It doesn't matter what the Church Fathers believed to a Catholic because what they believed is not orthodox anymore. Current Christian orthodoxy among all branches of the religion except for the most radical or outlying support what that user said. Isaac Newton's mechanical understanding of the universe does not work with quantum mechanics but we don't say quantum mechanics is not true because of it.
Anthony Garcia
it looks like i wasn't too far off when i said i might be living under a rock. there's only about 2% christian population where i live so my view of popular christianity was shaped almost entirely by internet conversations, which is probably even worse than talking to random american christians.
i find it odd that the christian orthodoxy states that the bible was written by people and not by god because first this is a departure from orthodox judaism, which states that tanakh books were written by people in a prophetic state induced by the holy spirit. second this seems to undermines the bible's historicity, and third it makes exegesis almost pointless, because the record of god and jesus's words went through the filter of fallible humans, so there are no guarantees that the exact verbiage was preserved. fourth it undermines the validity of genesis's creation story because there were no humans around to record it.
Samuel Parker
>It doesn't matter what the Church Fathers believed to a Catholic because what they believed is not orthodox anymore.
that's why my first reply was "classic". The few Latins that hold true to the faith handed down to us are coming over to Orthodoxy.
Aquinas was bad enough, but these people are clown world Aquinas
John Jones
That is far too witty for Veeky Forums. You belong somewhere better than here.
James Jenkins
>So unleashing several calamities on Egypt, parting a sea, making bread appear by magic, and creating a wall of fire isn't proof? No, it's not if all we have is some goatfucker's word that it happened lol. Funny how that kind of shit never happens anymore.
Ian Murphy
>reading comprehension being this bad
Blake Gutierrez
>which states that tanakh books were written by people in a prophetic state induced by the holy spirit As I was saying before don't expect their orthodoxy to stand up to examination. Christians also have a really strange relationship to Judaism.
