Re: Godel Goofed? Nope.

[Roy and/or Janet Miller <millers@inetnebr.com>]

Paul Schlyter wrote:

> In article <3A8D3A8C.737D64E2@inetnebr.com>,
> Roy and/or Janet Miller  <millers@inetnebr.com> wrote:
> >>
> >>> Yes, I do. However, since you have claimed that statements of Christ,
> >>> as recorded in scripture were the words of the evil one, that means
> >>> that you are a son of the father of lies.
> >>
> >> Both those who claim that the Bible is the "words of God" and those
> >> who claim it's the "words of Satan" are liars really.
> >
> > I don't make that claim.
>
> Do you agree or disagree with that claim?

I answered that later in the post.

>
>
> > 1. Do not call men liars before you accurately understand what they
> > mean by what they say, otherwise you are a liar when you brand them so;
>
> OK -- so I'll ask then: do you agree or disagree with the Bible's
> claim to be the "words of God"?

See above.

>
>
> > 2. Do not put yourself so quickly in the category of the above quote
> > "untaught and unstable who twist to their own destruction"
>
> Sorry, but you are a few centuries late with that one!  A few
> centuries ago it would probably have worked to scare people with hell
> (no, you don't say "hell" explicitly, but you do say "..to their own
> destruction").

The point wasn't to frighten you, though you should be, but rather to point out
that you have at times distorted the meaning of texts, like the untaught, and
the unstable.

>
>
> > 3. The historic Christian position has always been that the Scripture
> > are both the words of men, and completely the Word of God.
>
> Which implies that the words of men and the words of God are one and the
> same, right?  BTW the Bible itself disagrees with this position.

You are wrong. The Bible passages that I quoted showed that the final form of
the work is exactly what God wanted. So then, when Luke says that he conducted
research before writing, he did, but that the final form was "Godbreathed" and
therefore also exactly what God wanted put down. Ditto for the so called
"Historical" books of the OT which quote from various sources of material. To
anticipate a sophomoric objection, when the lies of men and Satan are quoted,
the point is that the lies are quoted accurately, and that is also what God
wanted. And that is what those and several other texts in the Bible claim for
the Bible. If you dispute this, that's one thing, but "put up or shut up" on
your claim that the Bible itself disagrees with that position.

>
>
> > Thus, one can find differing vocabularies, differing writing styles,
> > three different languages used (Hebrew, Aramaic, Koine Greek),
> > differing issues, but the teaching is the same.
>
> Not quite -- the teaching in the Old Testament (originally in Hebrew)
> and in the New Testament (originally in Aramaic and Koine Greek) are

Wrong. The OT is in Hebrew and Aramaic, the NT in Koine Greek.

>
> noticeably different -- just like Judaism and Christianity are
> noticeably different.

Wrong there too. While there are discontinuities, the two testaments have
remarkable continuities. The discontinuities are also not the primary issues
between Jews and Christians: the Trinity, and the Person and Work of Jesus of
Nazareth. There are substantial OT passages which imply what the NT makes
explicit. The discontinuities concern the national and ceremonial aspects of the
Law of Moses, and modern Judaism doesn't keep all of those either.

>
>
> > To the last point, "untaught and unstable people" often "twist ... the
> > scriptures" by failing to see that sometimes, exactly the same thing is
> > said, but two differ authors use terms in such a fashion that a cursory
> > reading leads the "untaught and unstable" to conclude that the authors
> > are contradicting one another.
>
> ...which means exactly the same things aren't written, or else these
> different interpretations would not be possible.  Perhaps you should
> look up "exactly" in your dictionary?

If I said that you are an atheist, and olcott says that you claim that God
doesn't exist, what, "exactly" is the difference? If Paul says that one is saved
by grace, and has a new man, a new nature, and then describes that new person in
terms of active righteousness, and James says that a person knows that they are
saved by active righteousness, then they have said the same thing, using
difference terms, or words with slightly different meanings. Surely you have
seen in dictionaries that words can have more than one meaning? Paul uses the
word "law" with at least 5 different shades of meaning in the book of Romans.
The word "world" (from kosmos) is used with 9 different meanings, to be
determined from the context. Modern literature, some times even scientific
literature does the same thing. You, my friend, in the words of Jesus, are
straining out a gnat, and swallowing a camel.

>
>
> > Case in point, Paul and James on the subject of justification by
> > grace/works. The both quote the same OT passage, and use it to claim
> > justification by grace (Paul) or works (James). Contradiction! No, Paul
> > is claiming that one is justified (declared righteous by God) via grace,
> > whereas James is claiming that one proves one's justification by grace
> > through works. No contradiction at all. Just closer, more careful reading.
>
> So you're thus claiming that "works" and "grace" actually are synonyms?
>
> >
> >> As a matter of fact, the Bible is the words of men.....
> >
> > A half truth is a lie.
>
> If so, is a half lie the truth?  If not, why not?
>
> > Prove that the Bible isn't what it says it is,
>
> I cannot do that.  LIkewise I cannot prove with 100% certainty that the
> tooth fairy doesn't exist either.  Should my failure to prove the
> non-existence of the tooth fairy make us conclude there actually is a
> tooth fairy?

You made a claim. Back it up. Do you claim that the tooth fairy exists?

>
>
> > and do so either through email, or posting elsewhere. BTW, you said you
> > were agnostic. The word means "a" negative "gnostic" one who knows;
> > translation: ignorant, one who has no knowledge. Now you claim to know
> > something. Make up your mind, either you don't know, or you do know
> > (or think you know.)
>
> I was just expressing my belief.....

Thank you. You see, you have demonstrated that both agnosticism, and atheism are
religions, or perhaps a better term, anti-religions. No "reason", just a
"belief".

> try some closer, more careful,
> reading not just with the Bible but also with other stuff.....

I do. Don't assume so much about people you have never met. Case in point, this
week I started and finished Barbara Tuchman's "Guns of August" and finished
Edward Crankshaft's "Bismarck",  professionally I read "The Old Testament and
the Literary Critic" by David Robertson, of course my local paper each day,
spent 2 hours with my Cub Scouts on Tuesday evening, 10 chapters of the Bible,
reread Steven Levy's "Hackers", studied closely 2 Kings 6:24 - 7:20 (tomorrow
morning's preaching passage) as well as Romans 1:1-6 (tomorrow evening's
preaching passage) and finally did some reading in four books here concerning
the last two centuries of the middle ages for a class that I teach in Church
History. Not an atypical week for me. Oh yes, and spent far too much time
answering silly pretentious posts on csa2.

>
>
> >> In another few thousand years, Christianity may very well be an
> >> extinct religion -- like the religions of ancient Greece and Rome are
> >> extinct today.
> >
> > I'm wouldn't be surprised to hear you say that you hope so. However,
> > under the rigorous anti Christian persecutions by the atheistic rulers
> > of the Soviet Union for 75 years, Christianity has become stronger than
> > ever.  Ditto in mainland China, and other communist countries. It still
> > exists, in Iraq and Iran where centuries of total societal rejection
> > hasn't stamped it out. The Turks practiced genocide on the Christian
> > Armenian people, and yet both the people and the faith survives. And
> > Christians don't have the ethic unity that has helped the Jews to remain
> > a people.  So, time will tell, but I am confident that the faith, which
> > is still spreading and growing (outside Europe) will survive. I
> > personally think that you suffer from a provincial attitude in this area.
>
> So what does this teach us?  It teaches us the very reason people
> become religious: out of fear!

You are incredibly stupid. Many people recant out of fear. Many millions in the
former Soviet Union professed atheism because of fear. So then, perhaps you hold
your beliefs out of fear. Out of a deep psychological fear of hell, you have
created all kinds of reasons to not believe in God, so that you can assure
yourself that you have nothing to fear after death.

> Persecuting people in order to try to
> eradicate their religion is indeed counter-productive, as all the
> examples you've given above so clearly show: it merely enhances the
> fear among those persecuted people, who then cling to their religion
> even more to be able to endure this fear.

That doesn't explain why former Christian areas are now muslim, does it??? That
doesn't explain why nominal Jews become Christians, when they know that those
who are closest to them will treat them as though they were dead. That doesn't
explain why some scientists, trained in the finest universities in the English
speaking world come out as young earth creationists, knowing that their open
profession of the faith and open profession of how they interpret the data means
the end of their academic careers. You are far too simplistic Paul. Your obvious
hatred for organized Christianity has produced an almost pavlovian response in
you. Who rang your dinner bell?

> Medieval priests knew, and
> used, this too, when they frightened the people by the eternal
> flames, pains and suffering in hell -- and from their point of view,
> it was a productive method since it did scare the uneducated to cling
> to their religion -- after all, who wants eternal suffering?

Why pick on the middle ages. In the classical era Christianity taught the same
thing. And among those Christians were some of the most highly educated men of
the classical world. And so, your knee jerk response could very well indicate
your own such fear, and your valiant efforts to convince yourself that you have
nothing to fear, you are educated, you know (or think you know) better, you are
better than those poor ignorant masses, for you are among the elite, the
enlightened. Poor man that you are.

>
>
> Instead educate people and remove their fear -- then they won't have
> as strong need for religion.  That's what has happened in my
> "province" of the world.

All that proves is that in Sweden, the State has educated people to not belief
in the State religion (Lutheranism), and has taught by societal pressure that
deeply religious people aren't what we want Swedes to be. So then, fear, again,
is used, but a more subtle fear, fear of peer pressure, fear of seeming
ignorant, fear of seeming to be too much like the past, instead of the glorious
future. Fear is used for, and against religion. You have practiced fear in your
post.

> And it's very likely that a number of
> Soviet Union officials have marvelled at the Swedish success in
> secularizing the country -- and we even did it without putting people
> in jail for their religion!

The Soviet's also put people in psychological institutions for their faith. If
you posit that there is no god, and someone believes in something that doesn't
exist, they must be crazy. They need help. Give them more education, and
psychological adjustment. Further, if you taught your children religion, you
would have your kids become wards of the State, and you could go to the gulag,
the jail, or the afore mentioned psychological institutions. Believers drafted
into the military of the SU were often beaten, many times to death. So much for
the compassion of atheists and socialism. Or will you say that that's because
they were Slavs instead of being Swedes?

>
>
>
> Now, to return to the question about the lifetime of Christianity: I
> said that in a few thousand years Christianity may very well be
> extinct.  However I don't think all religions will be extinct by
> then, but Christianity may have been replaced by some other religion
> which hasn't been formed yet, just like Christianity once replaced
> the ancient Roman gods Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, etc.  Basically all
> religions deal with one thing: our death.

Wrong. Again. You see, you keep putting religions into your preconceived boxes,
you create straw men, and then they don't fight back when you gore them. Must be
tough. I think it fair to say, that Jews that I have known, the few Hindus that
I have known, and the bulk of the Christians that I have known contend that
religion is about life, not death. The Roman world became Christian, not because
of fear of hell, but because of the lives of the Christians.

> Just like all other
> animals, humans will die, but unlike the other animals we're aware we
> will die long before it happens.  A lot of people don't like the idea
> that they will cease to exist, so mankind created religions.

<Snicker> So presumptuous, so superior. So sadly misinformed.

> And all
> religions have one thing in common: they all promise some kind of
> afterlife after the physical death.

Not really, but please go on with your fantasy.

>
>
> Therefore God didn't create Man -- instead Man created God !

LOL. Lester delRay lives!! Here he is folks, Paul Schlyter, the god maker. He
sees through your poor ignorant fog, and brings you the light! He goes to the
AIDS wards, and cleans the sores, he lives in poverty to met the needs of the
poor, and the sick, he gives up his wealth, his home, and his family and travels
to the far corners of the world, teaching people how to raise crops, how to have
sanitary conditions, and how to know that they are god.

>
>
> (no, I cannot prove this -- I was merely expressing my belief.

Your religion. It must be nice to be your own god, then you can worship
yourself.

>
> And of course I may be wrong -- time will tell....)

Roy