Well written, but still factually biased. I don't dispute it takes a certain amount of faith to believe in something, but saying it takes more faith to believe in science over a religion is laughable, seeing as how most scientific processes can be duplicated in a lab, and the only time people see the immaculately concepted Jesus is in stale bread.

Calling them "errors" is an error, if you cant prove it so...

I don't even want to get started with your "#2" ...but I will touch on it:

"It is He [God] who sits above the circle of the Earth." Job also talked about the earth being round."
You mean to tell me that it wasn't the sun he probably was referring to? It is a very vague statement, loosely translated. I mean, wasn't the voyage of Christopher Columbus nearly defunded by the Queen of Spain due to the fact most of the Catholics believed the earth was flat? How could they possibly misinterpret such a factual document as the Bible then but not now, or at any other time?

#3 is also a gross interpretation of the bibles factuality, the closest thing people had to a science was alchemy if I'm mistaken, and there is a reason we don't teach Alchemy 101 these days. It was full of holes where we as a species didn't have an understanding of our own surroundings. Take beer brewing for example, even the German purity laws had to be amended to allow yeast as a viable and lawful ingredient to beer because the humans of the past flat out didn't understand or fathom its use/need in the brewing process because it had been introduced naturally to the unaware brewers since beer has been around. <-Thank you science, not the all knowing bible. External sources are just as unreliable then as they are now, if not more so, smart people expect some credibility, and aren't the type to blindly accept.
#4 "The history of the bible is made up, it is just mythology"
Most people don't dispute the correlation of events in the bible to that of actual history, its just obvious that either initially or over the years, the truth was embellished to that of an Aesop fable. The bible was meant to instill fear into the hearts of what are supposed to be "god fearing" people, what better way then writing about a hellish environment and 30 ft tall giants? (wait, was that part real, or no?) Oh and Nelson Glueck wrote that quote? Impressive... unless you consider the thousands of other scientists that have a slightly different opinion on the matter...

But I guess you can laugh at me while I burn in hell (decompose) and you are in heaven (decomposing) It would make much more sense if people would accept the fact that "God" no matter how you look at it, is just a manifestation of our own self righteousness as a species? That being said, please think "peace" and I to wish all of us a hearty blessing from "God."



>> ^shinyblurry:

It takes more faith to be an atheist than it does to be a Christian. I'll point out some common errors and misconceptions that atheists have.
Atheist error #1 Translation upon translation has corrupted the original bible so now we don't know what it actually said
The truth: Today there survives more than 25,000 partial and complete, ancient handwritten manuscript copies of the New Testament alone, not to mention hundreds of Old Testament manuscripts that survive today dating back to as early as the third century B.C. These hand written manuscripts have allowed scholars and textual critics to go back and verify that the Bible we have in our possession today is the same Bible that the early church possessed 2,000 years ago.

Atheist error #2 The bible is only confirmed by the bible, there is no outside external verification
The truth: There are over 39 sources outside of the Bible that attest to more than 100 facts regarding Jesus’ life, teachings, crucifixion, and resurrection. External sources verify that at least 80 persons from the bible were actual historical figures, 50 people from the Old Testament and 30 people from the New Testament. This includes Pontius Pilate, Caiaphas the High priest, and King David.
Atheist error #3 The bible is unscientific
The truth: The bible contains no scientific errors. In fact, it reveals a number of facts about the Universe that simply were not known at the time. For instance, the bible states that the Sun is on a circuit through space, yet scientists at the time thought it was stationary. Even more amazing, the bible states the Earth is round when everyone else thought it was flat:
Isaiah 40:22 says, “It is He [God] who sits above the circle of the Earth." Job also talked about the earth being round.
This was 300 years before aristotle. The bible was over 2000 years ahead of its time. It was also widely thought at the time that the Earth was carried on the back of something else, like a turtle or the greek god Atlas. The bible taught the truth: Job 26:7 “He [God] hangs the Earth on nothing.” Scientists did not discover that the Earth hangs on nothing until 1650.
Another amazing fact that the bible uncovered far before man discovered the facts is that the number of stars is as the sand in sea.
Jeremiah 33:22 “The host of heaven [a reference to the stars] cannot be numbered, nor the sand of the sea measured.”
Before the telescope was invented, man was able to number the stars. The count was usually just over 1000. That was the prevailing scientific knowledge until the telescope was invented. The bible revealed though that there were more stars than anyone could count.
Atheist error #4 The history of the bible is made up, it is just mythology
The truth: In every instance where the Bible can be, or has been checked out archaeologically, it has been found to be 100% accurate. The Bible has proven so accurate that archaeologists often refer to it as a reliable guide when they go to dig in new areas.
Nelson Glueck, who appeared on the cover of Time magazine and who is considered one of the greatest archaeologists ever, wrote: “No archeological discovery has ever controverted [overturned] a Biblical reference. Scores of archeological findings have been made which confirm in clear outline or in exact detail historical statements in the Bible. And, by the same token, proper evaluation of Biblical descriptions has often led to amazing discoveries.”
The fact is there have been more than 25,000 discoveries within the region known as the "Bible Lands” that have confirmed the truthfulness of the Bible.
So there are just some of the common misconceptions atheists have concerning the bible. If you had any of these misconceptions then I venture that you must re-evaluate your position. God bless.


*Edited punctuation at 23:40 5/2/2011

It takes more faith to be an atheist than it does to be a Christian. I'll point out some common errors and misconceptions that atheists have.

Atheist error #1 Translation upon translation has corrupted the original bible so now we don't know what it actually said

The truth: Today there survives more than 25,000 partial and complete, ancient handwritten manuscript copies of the New Testament alone, not to mention hundreds of Old Testament manuscripts that survive today dating back to as early as the third century B.C. These hand written manuscripts have allowed scholars and textual critics to go back and verify that the Bible we have in our possession today is the same Bible that the early church possessed 2,000 years ago.


Atheist error #2 The bible is only confirmed by the bible, there is no outside external verification

The truth: There are over 39 sources outside of the Bible that attest to more than 100 facts regarding Jesus’ life, teachings, crucifixion, and resurrection. External sources verify that at least 80 persons from the bible were actual historical figures, 50 people from the Old Testament and 30 people from the New Testament. This includes Pontius Pilate, Caiaphas the High priest, and King David.

Atheist error #3 The bible is unscientific

The truth: The bible contains no scientific errors. In fact, it reveals a number of facts about the Universe that simply were not known at the time. For instance, the bible states that the Sun is on a circuit through space, yet scientists at the time thought it was stationary. Even more amazing, the bible states the Earth is round when everyone else thought it was flat:

Isaiah 40:22 says, “It is He [God] who sits above the circle of the Earth." Job also talked about the earth being round.

This was 300 years before aristotle. The bible was over 2000 years ahead of its time. It was also widely thought at the time that the Earth was carried on the back of something else, like a turtle or the greek god Atlas. The bible taught the truth: Job 26:7 “He [God] hangs the Earth on nothing.” Scientists did not discover that the Earth hangs on nothing until 1650.

Another amazing fact that the bible uncovered far before man discovered the facts is that the number of stars is as the sand in sea.

Jeremiah 33:22 “The host of heaven [a reference to the stars] cannot be numbered, nor the sand of the sea measured.”

Before the telescope was invented, man was able to number the stars. The count was usually just over 1000. That was the prevailing scientific knowledge until the telescope was invented. The bible revealed though that there were more stars than anyone could count.

Atheist error #4 The history of the bible is made up, it is just mythology

The truth: In every instance where the Bible can be, or has been checked out archaeologically, it has been found to be 100% accurate. The Bible has proven so accurate that archaeologists often refer to it as a reliable guide when they go to dig in new areas.

Nelson Glueck, who appeared on the cover of Time magazine and who is considered one of the greatest archaeologists ever, wrote: “No archeological discovery has ever controverted [overturned] a Biblical reference. Scores of archeological findings have been made which confirm in clear outline or in exact detail historical statements in the Bible. And, by the same token, proper evaluation of Biblical descriptions has often led to amazing discoveries.”

The fact is there have been more than 25,000 discoveries within the region known as the "Bible Lands” that have confirmed the truthfulness of the Bible.

So there are just some of the common misconceptions atheists have concerning the bible. If you had any of these misconceptions then I venture that you must re-evaluate your position. God bless.

Well first, the bible wasn't written singularly but rather a collection of a variety of 'apostles' own writings. Which you should know if you've ever opened one of these books.

Second, the ones in the bible were written from 50 to 200 years of his 'death'. They were all a second, third or fourth generation telling of the tale.

Third, in the very earliest 'books' that eventually went on to become the bible, the first one we know about, Jesus was never talked about as a real person but rather as a spiritual being. It wasn't until 'many' years later that the spiritual 'son of god' was given a story of his supposed life. All those manuscripts and 'books' of the bible, at least a hundred of them, conflicted greatly about the 'man'.

Fourth, the story of Jesus mirrors almost exactly other gods in ancient mythology. It is a 'very' common theme going back many thousands of years. Jesus was far from the first 'son of god' and far from the first who was resurrected after his untimely death.

In the end it is easy to understand that A: The bible was not written by god, and B: Jesus was originally an idea of a man. Jesus was so 'perfect' because he was a symbol and his life story was just taken from that of far older stories of other gods who were the son of god and fleshed out over many hundreds of years until finally around the sixth century a group came together and chose the 12 books we have today (from at least one hundred) to form the bible you know of today.. although that has constantly been reshaped as well.

Did I just write all that when I could have just said;

'Your an idiot.' ?

*citation needed

No one could ever answer my critical thinking questions sufficiently enough to make me even consider it.

For me I need no manuscript to tell me to respect my neighbor or to prevent me from harming another person. Oddly, many of those people who celebrate this supposed "good book" and it's message do exactly the opposite.

I don't always agree with Penn but he is bang on here. I have always been an atheist, even as a child I felt no connection to religion. Any involvement that I ever had with religion felt uncomfortable and plain wrong. No one could ever answer my critical thinking questions sufficiently enough to make me even consider it. When I got older I read through as much of the bible as I could manage and found none of the salvation or enlightening that was promised. All I found was a poorly written collection of stories loaded with mixed messages and undertones that I personally felt to be morally questionable.

For me I need no manuscript to tell me to respect my neighbor or to prevent me from harming another person. Oddly, many of those people who celebrate this supposed "good book" and it's message do exactly the opposite.

>> ^westy:

Unfortunatly you cannot make it eligal to be a retard , and thats the issue at hand , has nothign to do with clothing but the ablity for people to be so uterly retarded that they want to cover there face up and ware uncomfortable things not bassed on scentific fact but on some old manuscript bassed on old stories created by uneducated desperate and supersitois people.


But how do you really feel?

_{I kid, I kid.}

Unfortunatly you cannot make it eligal to be a retard , and thats the issue at hand , has nothign to do with clothing but the ablity for people to be so uterly retarded that they want to cover there face up and ware uncomfortable things not bassed on scentific fact but on some old manuscript bassed on old stories created by uneducated desperate and supersitois people.

Do what thou wilt has little, read nothing, to do with the naive and simplistic interpretation most often applied resulting in the wastrel excesses all too often attributed to it.

One must first have Will, not will, but Will.

Oh and that bugaboo, Knowledge. Don't forget the Gnostic influence.

The Beast indeed.

Old G. I. was mentioned. Cool.

Oh, and he was brilliant. Insane, a legal term. Crazy, interesting.

Magick not real? On the first page of the book entitled so he defines a magician as one who seeks personal power. I could tell you things.

He created no religion. The practices he employed and taught were older than you can imagine. The Christian Church itself stole Gnostic Masses. He studied and mastered disciplines from the most ancient extant sources. His disdain for the Golden Dawn, the Church, or anyone else was based on his dislike for inefficiency, inefficacy, and ignorance. He refined practices that in the Golden Dawn, for instance, would take five minutes, but his would take a few seconds utilizing his abreviation and would Work.

Try reading a few books, won't do much good. He and Gurdjieff wrote in a very ancient and prescribed manner. G. I. would have his students and fellows read his manuscripts. If they could read and comprehend, he would rewrite. Read Crowley voluminously and repititiously and at a point of critical mass it will all come together and make sense.

Pick up a Buddhist Tantric Sutra. You may understand every word in it but you will not comprehend one sentence without initiation.

Please, I apologize if this seems diatribic, it is not meant so I assure you.

Sex and drugs, whole other long...already ran my mouth too much.

Yup, and PLoS is proving that decent quality control and open access can both be had by the same journals.

...ok PLoS, I put in a plug for you; now stop rejecting my manuscripts without review!

>> ^cybrbeast:
..can't really blame armchair scientists for not checking out scientific literature. Because most of that is only accessible at high price or via university subscriptions (at very high cost for the university).
We need science to go into public journals...

Photographs of the original manuscript in L Ron Hubbard's handwriting are easy enough to find on the internet. Lots of former Scientologists have confirmed it. But a lot of those still inside Scientology don't rank highly enough to have seen any of that stuff and might think it's a hoax. OTIII is probably less than the top 10% of them.

yes, the translation that was penned 1540+ years after the original manuscripts, and 1200 yeas after the council of nicaea voted on which of those manuscripts are the right ones, why yes, that version is the original.

In reply to this comment by Skeeve:
Ok, good points about the non-humanness of angels. I can accept that Gabriel was very androgynous in that scene/movie. But what about Lucifer then? He is most definitely a masculine character. Kinda seems like they're attempting at having both interpretations instead of one or the other.

^enoch:

this is why gabriel is known as the angel of resurrection,and his punishment/duty is to stand watch over the four watchtowers- north(might be south,too lazy to check)and will utter no sound until the end-times(book of john,gabriel blows his horn).

Sorry to single you out enoch, but the idea that Gabriel blows the trumpet in the end times is not found anywhere in scripture, the earliest source for this is from an Armenian manuscript from 1455, and it reached the English language in Milton's Paradise Lost. As for not uttering a sound until the end times, the Bible specifically names Gabriel and the angel who announces the births of John the Baptist and Jesus (Luke 1:5-20 and Luke 1:26-38 respectively) hence his title as the Archangel of Annunciation.

Yes there are many different stories about angels, many of which contradict each other, but the standard beliefs as written in the Bible and accepted by the major churches stand on their own.

I know I am picking at a movie you guys enjoy immensely, I'm not trying to attack your taste/choice, I just think it's a little odd the way they chose to portray it. Either way, I don't really know anything about the movie or its universe so I'll shut up about it now .

lol..naw..you got me..you got the tater.my fault for being lazy and just posting stuff offa my head.didnt know about the paradise lost deal..thats a nice lil nugget.

gabriel has been many things in scriptures,messenger,voice and teacher(muhammhed).
the incarnation i am most fascinated with is the arch angel gabriel of the resurrection,who along with uzriel,rapheal and michael gaurd the four watchtowers.the apocryphal books have a much richer history concerning gabriel than canonized scripture ever will.
if you are interested in such things allestier crowley and don milo duquette are fascinating reads.

Ok, good points about the non-humanness of angels. I can accept that Gabriel was very androgynous in that scene/movie. But what about Lucifer then? He is most definitely a masculine character. Kinda seems like they're attempting at having both interpretations instead of one or the other.

^enoch:

this is why gabriel is known as the angel of resurrection,and his punishment/duty is to stand watch over the four watchtowers- north(might be south,too lazy to check)and will utter no sound until the end-times(book of john,gabriel blows his horn).

Sorry to single you out enoch, but the idea that Gabriel blows the trumpet in the end times is not found anywhere in scripture, the earliest source for this is from an Armenian manuscript from 1455, and it reached the English language in Milton's Paradise Lost. As for not uttering a sound until the end times, the Bible specifically names Gabriel and the angel who announces the births of John the Baptist and Jesus (Luke 1:5-20 and Luke 1:26-38 respectively) hence his title as the Archangel of Annunciation.

Yes there are many different stories about angels, many of which contradict each other, but the standard beliefs as written in the Bible and accepted by the major churches stand on their own.

I know I am picking at a movie you guys enjoy immensely, I'm not trying to attack your taste/choice, I just think it's a little odd the way they chose to portray it. Either way, I don't really know anything about the movie or its universe so I'll shut up about it now .

Hmm... Reading the contest details for non-Evangelist Christians...

Answer this question without contradicting yourself and take home $5,300

Is the God that has revealed Himself in your religious text infinitely just and infinitely merciful? Yes or No. Please justify your answer from the text on which you consider to be ultimately authoritative (Koran, Torah, Book of Mormon, Council of Trent manuscripts, etc.).

Hints: For all of you who believe in purgatory and think that this helps your case, you are very mistaken. For if your God is infinitely merciful, then there would be no need for purgatory since all of your sins have already been forgiven. If you are working off your sins in purgatory, as some individuals interpret it, then you have not received infinite mercy. For if you had received infinite mercy, then there would be nothing for you to work off.

It looks like the hint tells you exactly how to win the $5300. Simply answer 'no', find a passage regarding purgatory and copy-paste the hint.

Wow, I never meant to be so controversial in my statements. In the interest of full disclosure, I am an atheist/agnostic who finds religion in general to be convoluted. Mormanism specifically stands out to me because I have first hand experience with it and feel qualified to address it.

I fell out of theology in general approximately 10 yrs. ago because I failed to reconcile the concept of hell with just and loving god. For 10 yrs. I was the only deconvert in my family.

My brother was a priesthood holding member and church attendant for 35 yrs. and only confessed to the family that he was no longer a follower this last Easter. He lost his faith by specifically looking into church history and my criticisms of it are informed on conversations I've had with him. Unfortunately it is 5am here and I won't be able to call him for another 2 hours, at which time I will offer a more substantive critique.

Based purely on my own experience, it seems the church sort of attempts to set up a persecution complex in its members, an us against them mentality if you wish. I was very aware of the fact that there is antimormon literature and people actively seeking to bring down the church. I never read any and it is seen as purely blasphemous material. Any reading of it is highly frowned upon by church members. When I was a member I had never heard of Joe being anything but a standup guy. Indeed, even Dag's statement that Joe was a "showman and philanderer" would have shocked the shit out of me. Of course its possible that this is only because I fell out at a young age and I would imagine that with the advent of the internet this is very different today.

"Were you trying to say that they should have addressed the early church in the video?"

No, I was only trying to point out that the emphasis on early church history is probably an area in the mormon church in which they part ways with most denominations of Christianity.

"Oh, crap. PLEASE don't refer people to that stupid South Park video!"

I stand by my previous statement that this is a factually correct portrayal of how the word of god was received by Joe, including the sheet. Nobody was allowed to see plates as he translated them. You forgot the magic stones.
http://www.mormonwiki.com/Translation_of_the_Book_of_Mormon
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_plates

"And as for the Martin Harris thing, they're trying to make Mormons look like idiots for believing that."

How else do you think I would see it?

"Since it was likely that some enemy of Smith's had their hands on the pages, it would have been stupid to translate them again in exactly the same way. Someone could have changed the manuscript and then shown how it was different from the new translation, thus proving Smith a false prophet. I know it seems unlikely to us, but it isn't as if Mormons have never thought about it. They aren't "dumb"."

I can honestly say that the thought never occurred to me or came up in church at all. I wouldn't say dumb, but naive.