However, his target audience are those who don’t believe in God (such as myself), and those who have little background in Christianity (I don’t fit into that bill).

If you’re going to use this information “against” a Christian, I highly suggest you study up a bit. There is nothing like considering yourself knowledgeable on a subject after only reading 7 synopses. Still, you won’t have to look too hard to understand why Christianity, along with all the other religions, are total bunk.

Religion is the antiquated system which begins to rust with age, polluting and corrupting the very soul the clergymen purport to save.

In the end, I found that “god” was not an answer to any question I had, nor was it an answer to any other question worth asking.

A most excellent observation.

personally, i believe the reason that there are similarities is because the “Divine Spark” (as Quakers call it) or God’s image or God’s Breath of Life is in all humans.

Again, I have known many people who would agree with you completely. In fact, the many appearances of similar biblical motifs among disparate religions caused me to want to know more about all religions. And for a while, I too shared the notion that these similarities were the most real evidence of important ideas that undergird many religions.

But as I investigated further, it became clear to me that there are perfectly good, natural, human, social, non-religious reasons for these similarities. Just as there are natural human reasons for the way trousers and gloves are designed by many different peoples throughout history.

But part of all of these personal investigations tend to lead to definitions of god different from the one typically found in traditional religions.

In the end, I found that “god” was not an answer to any question I had, nor was it an answer to any other question worth asking.

YMMV

thanks for your engagement on the points. i think you bring some real issues that followers of Jesus have to address. let me comment a little on your pt about the similarities with other religions. let me be up front: I AGREE!

you see, i think people are too quick to reject everything another person has to say because they dont agree with one pt. i agree with you, i think there are many similarities in religions ancient and present. i think we probably might disagree on the conclusions from that, however.

personally, i believe the reason that there are similarities is because the “Divine Spark” (as Quakers call it) or God’s image or God’s Breath of Life is in all humans. so even if a person doesnt have complete understanding of God (and to be honest, who does? i know i dont), this doesnt mean that they should be rejected entirely. so as one who follows Jesus as my Lord, i apologize for others who can be overzealous in that regard.

at the same time, i dont believe in nothing (nihilism or whathaveyou). i believe that there are some things that make more sense than others. i believe, not in perfect knowledge or proof, but in probability. personally, weighing the different factors, i believe the God of the Bible is God and that He exists and is an infinite-personal God.

so i agree that there are similarities, because i think there are truths in all of us, even atheists

peter

When skeptics allege that Jesus lied when He stated He would rise from the grave “after three days” (Mark 8:31), because on other occasions He indicated that He would rise “the third day” (Matthew 16:21; 17:23; 20:19; cf. Acts 10:40), they fail to recognize a common figure of speech in ancient times. “After three days” and “on the third day” frequently meant the same thing

Then why not translate it as the same thing? If, in the idiom of the time, they meant the same thing, then clearly they would be translated to a singlular phrase, rather than the contradictory results we see. Or were the people who made these translations not smart enough to know the difference? If that’s the case, they have no business translating anything, let alone something that is supposed to be a god’s literal espousings.

In the Cain’s wife episode, we see these apologists arguing that Cain’s wife must have been a near relative and take the bible literally to justify this conclusion, then recant on the doctrine of the unchangingness of their god by citing a mosaic law as the start of laws against incest, and then follow this up by calling the ‘patriarchal age’ where man was supposedly relatively sinless, contradicting the doctrine of original sin, and then start talking about genetics. C’mon, you can ride a white elephant, sideways, though those inconsistences.

So, apologetics now means pulling any old opinions out of your arse the air to justify presupposed conclusions and create a runway-sized bypass around blatent inconsistencies?

And congrats on West Point!

PBandJ’s investigations into the ancient Hebrew works outside of the Bible are very helpful in understanding how they interpreted passages that pose real barriers to Christians who rely solely on the Biblical text.

I always figured that the ancient Hebrews understood the meanings of their own holy books better than anyone else could, so I heartily endorse their study by Christians.

PBandJ said:
so i believe it may not seem harmonious, but that is because we are hardheaded and slow to learn. i dont believe God has changed, merely the way we see Him. and thus the writers of the Bible progressively get more and more to the point.

I think your statement here is one that is shared by quite a few people. And as far as being “hard headed”, yeah, whether there is a god or not, we humans can be extremely hard headed.

But I have a different take on many of the contradictions in the Bible, especially within the Pentateuch & the early histories. I base it on rather extensive textual criticisms, comparative mythology (especially ancient Egyption, Sumerian, and Babylonian), and what we know of the history of the relevant geographic areas.

There were several contributors (writers, editors, whatever you want to call them) to the text we now call the Old Testament. The various contributors were not in agreement with one another but politically they could not simply edit out stuff that supported their political rivals, but they could insert new material in order to buttress their own claims.

You don’t need to do this very often to come up with a real hodge-podge of conflicting tales. It seems that the internal competition between the scribes & ancestors of those who represent the ancient Hebrews in Isreal vs those of Judah are reflected in the numerous contradictions of the Bible’s early books.

Also, there are many anachronisms within the texts that can help direct investigations and studies to particular times and places, and by so doing, shadows of the politics and crises of the surrounding civilizations can be seen.

It’s all quite fascinating, but the more I studied, the more I became convinced that the Judeo-Christian origins, rather than being unique, were just more of the same tales coming from other ancient peoples.

Two good examples:

The “contradictory” creation accounts: http://www.apologeticspress.org/articles/2194

How Cain found his wife: http://www.apologeticspress.org/articles/2181

For the sake of intellectual honesty, I plan on checking out the links you provided, AA, and giving them serious consideration. I would appreciate your posting any other links which you feel are healthy for Christians to wrestle with.

personally they are some i have vigorously struggled with in the past few yrs. a little background: i went to west point and am in the military now. used to think the Bible was to be taken “literally” meaning when God commands war, we are still to go to war, etc. i had a life changing experience, and began questioning everything.

my conclusions from the past few yrs has been very illuminated by contextualizing the Bible in Hebrew culture. i found that although the Old Testament commands “eye for eye”, etc, the Jewish people have never actually put this command into practice. i read rabbinic commentary and found that this was because God gave Moses commentary on the Torah simultaneously with the commands. basically God gave the way to interpret the written Teaching.

i also found that the rabbis of the past and present look at the Bible as multiple layers in each text. you see the literal doesnt always mean the purpose. so eye for eye might have the purpose of proportional punishment, not literal application.

in the same way, i think it has been vastly important for me to realize that the God of the Bible (real or imagined) wasnt forcing men to reach Him but for Him to reach them. what i mean is this:

when a parent has a baby, they breast feed, then spoon feed, then teach the child to feed itself, then teach more lessons. they tell the child not to play in the street with no explanation, then they explain the rule, then they allow the child to play in the street at a certain age because they are mature enough.

i truly believe that is why so much of the Bible seems contradictory and messed up. because it is God reaching people where they are, teaching them to be where they should be.

so in a polygamous and idolatrous culture, he doesnt emphasize monogamy, but teaches them to abstain from idol worship. slowly, over time, he teaches them the original intent.

so i believe it may not seem harmonious, but that is because we are hardheaded and slow to learn. i dont believe God has changed, merely the way we see Him. and thus the writers of the Bible progressively get more and more to the point.

thats my perspective. yall feel free to ravagely attack.

i am not trying to put anyone down, i think that both sides have many valid things to say. i personally have just found the God of the Bible to be consistent in my own life, and i believe He has been throughout history as well.

may we learn from each other and not throw stones
peter