genez said:
So the content of the argument can be ignored if you don't like the form of the argument. How convenient. Hm, I don't really like your attitude here, so I'll just ignore any claims that you make about how the Bible contains no errors. What? Me ignoring your claims doesn't make them untrue? Dang, that sucks...
genez said:
Show me where I said this. Here I'll help. I said this:
"The Bible also talks about domesticated camels before camels were known to have been domesticated and coins before coins were known to have been used."
Then I said this:
"I'll have to dig up the specific ones I was referring to, but here are a few other spots that contain factual inaccuracies:"
Then I said this:
"Gotten my hands on it? Um, it's right there in the Bible. Are there certain passages of the Bible I shouldn't have my hands on? And is it significant that you offered no refutation to the points?"
Where, in any of those quotes (or something I didn't repeat here), did I claim to have found those particular passages.
Tell you what, I'll do you one better. I googled "bible errors" and found those verses. Happy now? Guess what...it still doesn't change what the verses say. Doesn't change the fact that the verses I posted, wherever I copied and pasted them from, contain factual errors that you are apparently unable to explain away.
genez said:
Perhaps they got disgusted with the idea of eating poo. Or perhaps, in your younger days, you were more convincing. Maybe it's because I'm not an athiest. Maybe it's because I don't have an all or nothing attitude about the Bible like atheists and many Christians apologists have. I don't know, I wasn't there. Or are you trying to say that I should roll over and accept yor arguments, simply become someone on Compuserve did, many years ago?
genez said:
"cud" comes out of one end of an animal and "poo" comes out of the other end...so which end of the hare does the stuff come out of? I think it's the koala bear that eats it's mother's poo when it's a baby, in order to build up the bacteria in its gut necessary to digest eucalyptus leaves. So is the koala chewing its cud? Or its mother's cud? Or is it just eating it's mom's poo?
Anyway, you're totally missing my point..or the author's point, really. For you to spend time on this, trying to figure out how you can turn a cud chewing hare into reality, is to take away from the real message.
genez said:
I'm glad you acknowledge that. The obvious question, which I won't actually ask you, is...if the Bible is the Word of God, which he inspired men to write down, why did he allow these slight slips of the pen and other translation errors to make it in there? As another inerrant Bible type said in one of these other threads (I'm paraphrasing), are you saying God didn't have the power to make sure everything got translated and copied correctly? Are you saying God is NOT omnipotent? Or just didn't care that his inerrant Word was getting mangled by incompetant scribes??
Right, so I'm not going to pursue that line of questioning. Mainly because I agree with you and don't want to start a fight over the issue.
genez said:
Fair enough. However, I'm going to SWAG it and say that probably 95% of American Christians who hold the inerrant Bible view are basing this view solely on what they read in the KJV or NIV or whatever English translation. So, unless you're going to bust out the original text in Hebrew or Greek, showing me where the translation error is, I think it's safe to exclude this from our discussion.
Even assuming you could do so (maybe you can, I don't know), I can say with virtual certainty, that it wouldn't clear up all the issues. Maybe some of the issues like 4000 stables or 40000. Maybe the original Hebrew says "or the hare, which is nasty and eats its own poo...don't eat this filthy animal", I don't know. But since the Bible was written by men, copying down oral traditions of events that happened many years before they were born, it's unlikely that there were no discrepencies somewhere along the way. Maybe if we find some problems in the original Hebrew writings, we should go back and see what the oral traditions had to say, because maybe if we hear the original stories spoken it will clear up any errors that we erroneously find in today's versions.
genez said:
Wow, all we had to do was round down...why? Because the ancients can't be expected to be held to the same standards as us sophisicated modern mathematicians:
Ok, that's cool. I don't necessarily agree with his condecending attitude towards the mathematical abilities of the ancients...I mean, we're still using mathematical forumulas and principles that are thousands of years old (pi, for example?). Ancient cultures were also able create highly accurate calanders, which we have only recently been able to match (last few centuries, anyway). But ok, they weren't as precise as we are today, fine. So we can allow for a slight fudge factor...
Anyway, that was an interesting read, thanks.. But it does bring up a few questions...if, as your link explains, we can't really expect that much mathematical accuracy from the ancients, why should we put so much stock in the accuracy of their other scientific explanations *cough*genesis*cough*? Another example is an explanation of the hare chewing its cud (one I thought you might bring up)...while the hare doesn't chew its cud like a cow, as you pointed out, it does eat its own poo. Apparently, and this is something I didn't know, it does this by eating the poo directly out of, uh, the exit point for said poo. It moves rather quickly when doing this, so that an observer might not notice the source of the material that he sees the hare munching on. After watching cows display similar behavior, it would seem reasonable to the observer that the hare was doing the same thing the cow does, even though the two behaviors are actually quite different. I would guess that the problem with this explanation is that it shows that the hare doesn't "cheweth the cud" after all, thereby causing inerrant Bible types to have an anurysm.
I'm not really sure if I even want to continue this for a couple of reasons. First of all, it's an awful waste of time...for me, anyway. It doesn't bother me in the least that the Bible might contain a few mistake, of different kinds, here or there. For me to argue back and forth over the meaning of "cud", as I've said, kind of takes away from looking at the real meaning behind the words, rather than the words themselves. It is precisely for the reasons that you pointed out...translation issues, possible mistakes while making handwritten copies...that we have to try to look past the details and get to the real message, the spirit of the law rather than the letter of the law, so to speak. Regardless of whether a hare eats its poo or chews the cud, what is the point? Don't eat dirty animals...good advice in a time before reliable refridgeration and sanitation standards. Did Solomon have 4000 stables or 40,000? Who cares, he had a bunch, he was a rich, powerful guy, that's the point. Was the Earth created in six days? Do we need to spend time explaining away the differences between Genesis 1 and 2? Look, God's in charge, he made all of this (in one way or the other), don't disobey him, great, let's move on. Is God going to quiz us when we get to Heaven?
God: How many stables did Solomon have?
Me: Dang...I know this one...dang...4 or 40 thousand?
God: Haha, trick questions...sorry, please take the elevator down to the basement
Me: No, wait...ask me how many days it took you to create everything...ask me if a hare chews its cud!!!
Oh yeah, second reason I'm not sure I should continue this...I'm concerned for your well being. See, I only have to be right once, whereas you have to be right every time.. We can go through 100 examples of Biblical mistakes and if you can only explain 99 of them, then the Bible is inerrant. For you, it's all or nothing, baby. For me...ok, I'll allow for some Biblical scribe that didn't like fractions, so he rounded 31.4... down to an even 30...but poo is poo and cud is cud. I'm just afraid that if I do finally come up with some problem that you can't figure out and can't recall from your Compuserv days and you can't google the answer, your head might explode or something. I'd hate to be responsible for that.
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