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Originally posted by googlefudgeWhy can't there be an allegory that is also literally true? Or do you have another name for that, perhaps a parable? Can't a parable be literally true, yet also refer to a spiritual truth? Oh! That's right! I forgot that you are spiritually blind. Never mind.
Well then you are between a rock and a hard place.
If you can't allow anything in the bible to be allegory then you are stuck claiming
it's all literally true in which case you have to explain why your 'literally true' bible
breaks the known laws of physics and makes claims that are contradictory and untrue.
And you also have to deal with the mor ...[text shortened]... er the
question of how you tell which bits are allegory and which bits are literally true.
The Instructor
Originally posted by RJHindsAnd you are spiritually broken, a broken down vestige of what used to be a human being before your self induced lobotomy.
Why can't there be an allegory that is also literally true? Or do you have another name for that, perhaps a parable? Can't a parable be literally true, yet also refer to a spiritual truth? Oh! That's right! I forgot that you are spiritually blind. Never mind.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBUkRFOYst4
The Instructor
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Originally posted by googlefudgeIt is a simple matter really. To many people Jesus Christ is believable.
If you don't think the premise of the question [is reasonable] then you don't have to accept it.
But you should explain WHY you don't accept the premise of the question.
Theists do exactly the same thing, by for example asking questions that appear
to box the atheist into a corner as long as you don't realise that the question
makes assumptions s is the first time you have encountered someone who doesn't
share those assumptions.
If you just ran up to me and said "somebody walked on water" as an isolated event having nothing to do with anything else, I would probably neither believe it or see much usefulness to me from it.
Taking in the total life and words of Jesus in the New Testament is, for many, taking in Someone who is believable.
Added TO this is that He taught and many confirm that He is available to be known. For sure an unusual Person, yet a believable one.
Originally posted by sonshipPREPAREDThe trouble in these debates is that the skeptic gets roped in with the crazy people who want to believe that Jonah was literally inside a whale for 3 days. It is they who are missing the point, not the skeptics.
I like to start from the point of "What did it actually SAY?"
[b]"And Jehovah prepared a great fish to swallow Jonah up, ...[text shortened]... an prevail and preserve a man in extreme calamity and even from death itself.
once you go "he did it by magic", there really isn't much else to discuss.
Originally posted by googlefudgehow do you tell with science? you find evidence to either support it or dismiss it. until then it is unproven and , shocker!, should be taken by faith alone.
Well then you are between a rock and a hard place.
If you can't allow anything in the bible to be allegory then you are stuck claiming
it's all literally true in which case you have to explain why your 'literally true' bible
breaks the known laws of physics and makes claims that are contradictory and untrue.
And you also have to deal with the mor ...[text shortened]... er the
question of how you tell which bits are allegory and which bits are literally true.
Originally posted by ZahlanziGood point. God might have prepared a hugh whale shark just for the purpose of swallowing Jonah to convince him he would be better off going and preaching like the Lord told him.
PREPARED
once you go "he did it by magic", there really isn't much else to discuss.
The Instructor
Originally posted by googlefudgeOkay. You assert that a person can be both an agnostic and an atheist at the same time.
Name one and I will demonstrate differently.
It is a contradiction. And unless you want to redefine words on your own self appointed authority there is no other reason for anyone to believe you except something like "faith" in you.
An agnostic says " I don't know if there is a God/s or not."
An atheist says " I believe no God/s exists. PERIOD "
Choose which you'd like to be.
Originally posted by sonshipYou don't seem to have taken into account, positive vs negative or implicit vs explicit atheism here?!
Okay. You assert that a person can be both an agnostic and an atheist at the same time.
It is a contradiction. And unless you want to redefine words on your own self appointed authority there is no other reason for anyone to believe you except something like "faith" in you.
An agnostic says " I don't know if there is a God/s or not."
An atheist says " I believe no God/s exists. PERIOD "
Choose which you'd like to be.