tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29373297.post140967004385628501..comments2024-03-23T18:50:32.902-04:00Comments on Telling Secrets: An Important Lesson from Dr. CrewElizabeth Kaetonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06787552280232329081noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29373297.post-41376021905913788582007-10-10T20:20:00.000-04:002007-10-10T20:20:00.000-04:00Bill, there is a science called textual criticism,...Bill, there is a science called textual criticism, whose work it is to examine ancient texts and to seek to come as close as possible to the original text as possible. One factor textual critics look at is the gap between the time of original document and the earliest copy. Textual critics also look at the number of copies we have now.<BR/><BR/>The New Testament has over 10,000 copies in Greek and Latin, from a book or two to entire Testaments. The earliest complete MS of a the NT is from the early 300's; since the NT was completed about 100 or so, there is only a 250 year gap between the originals and the earliest copy. There are fragment of the NT that are datable to within the first century AD. Other ancient manuscripts have a gap of 1,000 or more years between the time of composition, and far fewer copies -- yet they are used as historical records.<BR/><BR/>In those thousands of copies, there are variations, but over 95% of the texts are in agreement. Most of the variations are trifling, and of those variations that make the meaning unclear, none occurs in a passage foundational to a creedal assertion.<BR/><BR/>Yes, the four Gospels do each have their own viewpoint, and there are some variances between accounts of several events. I have yet to find a flat contradiction in any of the Gospels, and I have been reading the Bible regularly for decades.<BR/><BR/>Elizabeth, yes, it is a step of faith to trust Jesus and to place one's trust in the Scriptures. I think, however, that calling such faith "speculation" is not accurate. My time on earth is limited and I do not want to live it in a dream world. In my teens and early twenties, I examined the Christian faith in the light of reason - did it make sense? Did it have a correspondence to live as I both experienced and observed it? Why did others accept it, or reject it?<BR/><BR/>I came to believe that historic Christianity is a rational faith, with good reasons to accept it. Not that anyone can fully comprehend the teachings of the Bible nor know Jesus inside out -- He is far too large for that. But the historic teachings have both an internal consistency and a correspondence to life.<BR/><BR/>If you take the Gospels as at least reasonably accurate accounts of the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, you can examine his life and what he said. It is clear that he offered wise and powerful advice for living in good relationships with others. But he also taught about himself, and what he said about himself (especially in light of what the Jews thought about God and what they expected in a Messiah) shows that he was claiming to be divine. He also taught about God, and about God's Word. He believed the Scriptures to be reliable and accurate.<BR/><BR/>And if he did, so will I. I am not smarter or more enlightened than Jesus.Hiramhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00845924600039905182noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29373297.post-41168188250767235012007-10-08T10:24:00.000-04:002007-10-08T10:24:00.000-04:00Arguing against the fundamentalist perspective is ...Arguing against the fundamentalist perspective is something I choose not to make a habit of doing. I can’t begin to imagine what Galileo went through when he was made to renounce all his beliefs and writings supporting the Copernican theory. Of course he was being threatened with being burned as a heretic by the Inquisition of Rome in 1633 and I’m only being asked to use reason and the findings of Biblical scholars to point to the fact that with hundreds of translations and variations on text, it becomes quite impossible to point to one and say, “aha”, that is the correct one and all others are wrong.<BR/>For me, it is enough to say “Christ has risen”. I don’t need to point to a particular scripture and say it was a man in white at the tomb, or there was an angel at the tomb, or there were two angels at the tomb, or Mary was alone or with another, or she was afraid and didn’t tell anybody, or she went and told Peter and then came back with him, or that Peter wasn’t there but had run on back to Galilee. Take your pick, they are all written in one Gospel or another. For me, the only thing that matters, is that Christ has risen. Everything else is a multiple choice test for the literalist.Billhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05623709712119761741noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29373297.post-6156874260209778282007-10-07T17:47:00.000-04:002007-10-07T17:47:00.000-04:00Nor does "fornication" mean "sex outside marriage"...Nor does "fornication" mean "sex outside marriage"; my little Webster's says "voluntary sexual intercourse, generally forbidden by law." nor "immoral sex".<BR/><BR/>Not an especially good effort, so far.johniebhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11635403219973766022noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29373297.post-85733406516110163022007-10-05T18:44:00.000-04:002007-10-05T18:44:00.000-04:00Hiram said, "If we cannot trust the Bible to have ...Hiram said, "If we cannot trust the Bible to have been written under the guidance of the Holy Spirit and preserved with integrity by his power, then all we have a bunch of interesting ideas and speculations -- some quite beautiful, others less so. But none worth building your life on."<BR/><BR/>Well, Hiram, that's a value statement that is ultimately left to the individual to make, isn't it? I mean, in the same way you have.<BR/><BR/>Besides, isn't faith, by definition, speculation? It's just that my speculation may be arrived at differently from yours.<BR/><BR/>When we begin to put limits and conditions on the value of the faith of individual persons, we set ourselves up to be charged, and rightly so, with spiritual arrogance.<BR/><BR/>It tends to be a weakness of the fundamental evanglicalism of the Right. <BR/><BR/>On the other hand, the spiritual pragmatism of the liberal Left can lead to a sort of "flabby theology."<BR/><BR/>The Good News is that God's love is abundant and blind to our rigidity or fuzziness.<BR/><BR/>Amazing Grace, indeed!Elizabeth Kaetonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06787552280232329081noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29373297.post-63321163621031023392007-10-05T18:16:00.000-04:002007-10-05T18:16:00.000-04:00If the original article can cite Acts as a basis f...If the original article can cite Acts as a basis for making decisions, then I can cite Acts, and make my own arguments based on how the text reads.<BR/><BR/>If we cannot trust the Bible to have been written under the guidance of the Holy Spirit and preserved with integrity by his power, then all we have a bunch of interesting ideas and speculations -- some quite beautiful, others less so. But none worth building your life on.Hiramhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00845924600039905182noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29373297.post-5315003996358007752007-10-05T11:34:00.000-04:002007-10-05T11:34:00.000-04:00Hiram writes: “The contents of the Epistles sugge...Hiram writes: “The contents of the Epistles suggest that, while the first three restriction(s) underwent some modification, the fourth never did.”<BR/><BR/>That’s a pretty strong statement considering no original documents exist. What we know of the early writings, whether we are talking about epistles or gospel sources, is that we don’t have copies of copies. We don’t even have copies of copies of copies of copies. What we have is the product of scribes many, many times removed from the original. We also know from research that scribes tended to make unintentional copy errors along with intentionally re-writing text when they disagreed with the document they were copying from.<BR/><BR/>Many of the early Christian leaders are on record of complaining bitterly as to the state of copied materials and the textual errors they contained. Any statement alluding to actual content is not supported by the historical evidence.<BR/><BR/>The Council of Jerusalem is thought to have been held in approximately 50 C.E. when Paul and Barnabas left Antioch and went back to Jerusalem to talk to the Apostles and elders. This is reported in Acts 15. <BR/>The Date of Composition of ACTS:<BR/>“The date of the completion of Acts is therefore dependent on the date of St. Paul's Roman captivity. Writers are quite concordant in placing the date of Paul's coming to Rome in the year 62; hence the year 64 is the most probable date for the Acts.”<BR/><BR/>There are more objections against the Authenticity then there are arguments for authenticity. (Source Catholic Encyclopedia).Billhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05623709712119761741noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29373297.post-1932172647509565482007-10-04T22:27:00.000-04:002007-10-04T22:27:00.000-04:00It was not their "manner of life" that the Hebrew ...It was not their "manner of life" that the Hebrew Christians found distressing; it was their ethnic background and the fact that up until that time, all gentiles who joined the people of God underwent conversion to Judaism. The question before the Council was, "Do the gentiles who believe in Jesus as Messiah need to convert to Judaism (including circumcision for the males) and to follow the dietary and other ceremonial laws or not?"<BR/><BR/>The Council decided that the sacrifice of Christ on the cross fulfilled all that the sacrifices of the Law of Moses had pointed to. They also recalled that Jesus had declared all foods to be "clean" (Mark 7:19 & 20).<BR/><BR/>The four restrictions given by the Council (Acts 15:29) were restrictions that God expected all humankind to observe. Three restrictions were dietary -- no food offered to idols, no blood (probably an injunction against drinking blood), no eating of meat from animals killed by strangling. The fourth restriction was not dietary: no sexual immorality, that is, no sexual activity outside marriage. And of course the only form of marriage they would have recognized was a marriage of a man and a woman. The contents of the Epistles suggest that, while the first three restriction underwent some modification, the fourth never did.Hiramhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00845924600039905182noreply@blogger.com