There is no such thing as The Bible

Ah, yet another lying historian.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Hah - she's STILL at it, you were lucky that post was as coherent as it was.(I'm currently getting a lecture about the political divide between french and flemish speakers and how that affected record keeping and thus historical perspectives in 20c europe..please..please..make it stop...)This message has been edited by CK, 11-Sep-2005 07:18 PM

To answer this it should be pointed out that the interpretation is based on the strong case that the 4th Empire is the Hellenistic Empire of Alexander and his successors. That case you have not attempted to answer.Although Daniel closely links the Medes and Persians it should be pointed out firstly that Daniel is working to an existing structure - a sequence of Gold-Silver-Bronze-Iron. If he has to start with the Babylonians and end with the Greeks he needs four Empires. This in itself is grounds for a split. Also the second Empire is described as inferior to the Babylonian Empire - but the Persian Empire was larger still.Historically, calling the Persian Empire a confederation with the Medes is dubious. The Persians - former subjects of the Medes - conquered the Medes in 550 BC under Cyrus II ("THe Great"). Then the Persians conquered Lydia, then Babylon in 539 BC. The author of Daniel on the other hand believes that it was the Medes under a fictional Darius (5:31) that conquered BabylonSo on this point you need to directly address the evidence that the 4th Empire is intended to be the Greeks, rather than trying to force the count to come out right.I find it interesting that somebody who claims to be against adjusting the text, now claims that it is a mistake NOT to adjust the text. Worse, you claim that it refers to a future event so your interpretation cannot even make it right. In fact it makes it even more wrong because your interpretation demands that this figure is a Roman Emperor - and there has not been one of those for centuries, nor one who matches as well as Antiochus.Nor is it the slightest problem to my interpretation that the author of Daniel should be wrong on this point. So it seems that you are wrong on every point.

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Re. assuming an ancient document to be true until proven otherwise, good historians do that all the time.

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Not without the information I mentioned above. Anyone who unquestioningly trusts a document simply because it is old is a very BAD historian.

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It is also obvious that the end of Daniel in no way refers to a past historical event (like the 160's B.C.) but to one that is still future (see Dan. 11:40).

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11:40 DOES refer to a historical event. Antiochus' defeat of Egypt. How can you miss the fact that 11:4 refers to Alexander's Empire amd explicitly tells us that the kings in the later sections are the kings of the successor states ?

I don't see an argument here. All I see is "well, I was referring to these guys, and I don't like them." You haven't presented any reasons that they are wrong. Note - I'm not saying their work is valid, I've never read any of it. All I'msaying is that you need to provide a little more to make an argument.In any case, you haven't addressed my point. The "Jesus Seminar" is hardly the only group who determines canon. My point is that not all groups agree, and that as a result multiple versions exist.You seem to say that I am wrong because the "other" groups are wrong, but that's irrelevant. The other versions exist, have substantial numbers of followers, and there is no single version of the Bible. There's one version that you like. That's all. I wasn't talking specifically about OT texts alone, and the Ethiopian Church isn't the only Christian sect to determine the canonicity of OT writings. It wasn't a simple copy-paste of the Jewish Torah, you know. I don't care how much authority you think they had - the fact is, there are several different versions of canon, and thousands of people disagree with you. What's your point? The Ethiopian church has a different NT. That's fact. Other denominations also have a different NT from the typical KJV. Again, what's your point? The Jewish Canon is not identical to the Christian KJV OT, or varous other versions.The point of this thread, Steve, is that there is no such thing as a single, universally accepted version of the Bible. You haven't really argued against that point at all - all you've done is say that the other versions that exist are wrong, which is irrelevant. Whether you, or I, or anyone else personally accepts these other versions, the fact is that they do exist, and as such there are different accepted versions of the Bible. There is no single collection of Scripture. But that has nothing to do with this thread. Even if it was, you haven't presented the arguments of the "majority ofProtestants." You've simply stated repeatedly that the other denominations are wrong, and that they "don't have authority." That's an ad hominem attack on the other denominations - whether they have "authority" or not as defined by you has no bearing on their arguments.

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Every time a fundy breaks the laws of thermodynamics, Schroedinger probably kills his cat.

Well, I guess if you want to start a thread with a conclusion, I guess there's no point in having a discussion at all is there?

That's a silly thing to say. The thread was started with the original poster making a point. The fact is that he was right. The debate is an attempt to support or refute his claims. All debates flow this way. If the OP didn't have a thesis, the thread would never have been promoted. All threads begin with the OP's conclusion.In this instance the OP just happened to be right.

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Every time a fundy breaks the laws of thermodynamics, Schroedinger probably kills his cat.

All debates don't flow that way, most I've been in in the past pose a question to begin with.
Anyway, just because there are many canons, they still are in large part in agreement that the Protestant books are part of the canon, the few who omit a few of them would not be undermining the essential doctrines of the Christian faith. I think it would be a mistake to conclude from our debate here that there are no truths in the Christian faith, because there are some differences in canons. If the books included by other denoms. contradict the base ones in doctrine however, then that's a whole other debate.

I don't think anyone is saying that. I think what folk are saying is that none of the truths in Christian Faith depend on the Canon, any Canon.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

As jar said, nobody is claiming anything appraoching that.All that our discussion means is that there are many versions of the Bible. This means that when someone says "the Bible says this!" it is relevant to ask which Bible they are talking about.It also raises questions about the literal truth of the Bible - such as, "which version of the Canon is inerrant?" But that's an entirely different topic. If you would like to discuss that one, you can start a new thread.But the result of this thread has been exactly this: there is no single version of the Bible. There are severa versions of the Canon accepted by various different denominations. To simply say "the Bible" without giving the version is a bit of a misnomer.This thread say nothing more and nothing less. It has nothing to do with how much, if any, of the Biblical books is true.

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Every time a fundy breaks the laws of thermodynamics, Schroedinger probably kills his cat.

How do you figure that?

does "Love thy neighbor as thyself" still hold validity even if everything in the Bible was no more than tales told around the campfire?

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Absolutely.

It doesn't, just like the rest of the Bible.Does the story of the Three Little Pigs have to be literally true to tell us not to build houses out of flimsy materials? Does this mean that there are really wolves who will try to blow down our homes?Does the Pied Piper story have to be lieterally true to teach us not to blindly follow after, and to repay our debts?

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Every time a fundy breaks the laws of thermodynamics, Schroedinger probably kills his cat.

If it was consistent with your God it would. Again, where would you be getting your notion of God from, and what kind of God would he/she/it/them be?

Suppose there was NO GOD. Would the message still be the same?

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion