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Its not just that some attempts at secularism in the past werent successful. Its that no attempts

not even one

was successful. That indicates to me a fundamentally unworkable set of values. periods with secular values are brief and are bracketed on both sides by longer periods of religious values. religious values are stable. they work. they have a long track record. the record of secular values are much sketchier.

We cant argue meaingfully about the modern period because no one knows how secularism will play out in europe or the united states etc. I'd hazard a guess it will fail in those places for the same reason it failed in the past, but thats just speculation.
AF

Wwll, religious periods tend to be ruled by an iron fist that is not to be argued with under penalty of stoning, burning, racks, public executions in various gruesome forms. Perhaps that is why they last longer. The marriage between a monarchy and the church was a mutually assured boon for both of them so it took a while for either side to diss their conspiratorial partner in crime. The pope says the king is ordained by god... the king likes this... the king says the pope speaks for god... the pope likes this... so pay your taxes peasants to the king and fess up your tithe to our clerical brothers. Lovely racketteering scheme. Two baseless claims on power each tooting each other's horn to take advantage of the ignorant.

Guitardian
maybe it is why they last longer. have you considered the possibility that people are by nature selfish, violent, short-sighted, stupid - and that only the strong hand of government and of religion working together keeps their basically savage nature from destroying every achievement of civilization? What would our lives be without order imposed from above? A savage, endless war of all against all, incapable of resolution, from which no one benefits. If it takes a little despotism to prevent that then I'm for it. And if it requires the backing of religion to make it stick, then I'm for that too. People who dont believe in God after all dont fear God or divine punishments - they just fear the police man and going to jail. Maybe under those circumstances civilization is totally impossible.

If that seems like a nightmare scenario then reflect just how damn rotten your average human being is when on one's watching. A little divine wrath might straighten people up a bit. Hopefully though the industrial revolution has made different kinds of government possible. I think that our nature is basically so bad that some element of religion is required, but hopefully not despotism. I dont think your average human being is constitutionally capable of going through life without belief in the divine. So that by itself tells against secular values.
AF

AbaddonFidelis wrote:General
some areas of the bible have widely different versions depending on what manuscript we're using. For instance the end of the gospel of mark. apparently in some of the oldest manuscripts Jesus doesnt rise from the dead. He just dies.
AF

How bout a source?

GG

I gak you not

In Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament Metzger states: "Thus, on the basis of good external evidence and strong internal considerations it appears that the earliest ascertainable form of the Gospel of Mark ended with 16:8. Three possibilities are open: (a) the evangelist intended to close his Gospel at this place; or (b) the Gospel was never finished; or, as seems most probable, (c) the Gospel accidentally lost its last leaf before it was multiplied by transcription."

The 1984 printing of the NIV translation notes: "The most reliable early manuscripts and other ancient witnesses do not have Mark 16:9–20." However, the Committee on Bible Translation has since changed this to read "The earliest manuscripts and some other ancient witnesses do not have Mark 16:9–20." No major English translation mentions any of the patristic evidence from the 100's that favors the inclusion of the "Longer Ending."




Just google it I'm not telling you stories.
AF

The argument that the Bible varies from version to version is almost always used as argument against biblical inerrancy. In that sense its fairly strong, given the absence of true source material.

A better argument regarding inerrancy is the variation in canon.

AbaddonFidelis wrote:Its not just that some attempts at secularism in the past werent successful. Its that no attempts

not even one

was successful.

And not one Religious one was successful either. Since you exclude anything that is current, all civilizations that data can be collected on for this experiment must have fallen...Secular and Religious as well.

dogma wrote:The argument that the Bible varies from version to version is almost always used as argument against biblical inerrancy. In that sense its fairly strong, given the absence of true source material.

A better argument regarding inerrancy is the variation in canon.

well I dont really have anything to say about how variations in the versions etc reflects on the truth of its contents. I do think some christians have gotten some pretty bad information about their book from "apologists" and other interested parties.

There's also the post that prompted to say that the world is round. It translates from Hebrew as "enthroned on the circle of Earth" and there are better words describing a sphere or round shape in the language. The word for circle (flat 2d object) is used. Various flat adjectives are used especially when concerning the 'ends' of the earth.

Or how about that 2 of the 4 books leave out the virgin birth? Pretty important part there.

Further, there have been texts found with varying ages that change what the number of the beast is, how many were slain at such and such battle, how many God commanded to slay etc. And let's not forget centuries of years of editing by the Vatican allowing which texts to be in the Bible or other scripture.

*edited for more examples

generalgrog wrote:

mrwhoop wrote:Well, noone should really take the Bible as the word of God as it's gone though so many renditions and translations. Hebrew to Greek/Latin to Middle English to King James Version to *shudder* the newest edition which takes the poetic rhythm out. But then maybe it should be taken as the literal word as one person said to me "If English was good enough for Jesus, it's good enough for me"

I hate the South so very, very much. The very marrow of my bones seethes in this Bible belt.

*edited for grammar

Also your notion that the "The Bible has been through so many renditions and translations" line is used over and over again, by the unstudied and uninformed. The fact of the matter is, while there are some minor transcriptions errors in the Bible(that do not effect any major orthodox doctrine), when you look at the 1,000's of manuscripts, it's quite remarkable how little was changed. Not to mention the minuscule differences(again no doctrine affected) between the dead sea scrolls and the modern Old Testament.(2,000 years between them)

GG

Well, I got you here GG.

Consider the difference between the following:

"Verily, I say unto thee, This day thou shalt be with me in paradise"

and:

"Verily I say unto thee this day, Thou shalt be with me in Paradise"

The first version is the Protestant interpretation of the passage. (Luke, xxiii, 43)

It skips over Purgatory and takes the thief being crucified alongside Jesus straight to heaven.

The second version is the Catholic interpretation, and promises Paradise at a later date, leaving purgatory nicely in the picture for Catholics who believe in it.

And all because of a "minor transcription error".

Would you not agree that that little comma switcheroo has a rather massive impact on doctrine?


*I stole this example from Lynne Truss' fantastic book, "Eats, Shoots and Leaves"

skyth wrote:
And not one Religious one was successful either. Since you exclude anything that is current, all civilizations that data can be collected on for this experiment must have fallen...Secular and Religious as well.

nonsense.

What part in nonsense? I took your theory and your method of determining it, and applied it to religious cultures and found the same result.

sebster wrote:We're still free to debate what God might want, whether he'd actually care if two dudes got it on. And more importantly, whether personal faith is enough to force one's beliefs onto another person.

But that debate is utterly pointless when, out of some misguided notion of politeness, we have to give theists a pass on having a testable, rational and falsifiable position. You can't have a debate when you start by agreeing that one side can jst say anything they want without ever being called out on it.

Now, it may just be that you're here to win and so you don't care - you're going to keep on insisting your take was reasonable no matter how clearly it wasn't. But it might be that you're hear to talk, maybe share some idea, in which case I think it might be best for you to think about how you go about reading other people's posts - do you really stop to consider the context? Do you look to understand their point, or skim looking for something to prove them wrong on?

I did read your comment in context, and my reading of it was quite fair. You're meaning was not as clear as you think.

all of it. Egyptian civilization survived for about 4000 years on a religious basis. I call that a success. Chinese civilization right up to the present day for about 4000 too. Thats success. French Italian Russian etc etc right up to the present day on an almost entirely religious basis. Those are successes. I excluded modern societies because you dont know how they'll end up so its not fair to make any final judgements. you just decided that because modern societies are outside my cut off date then anything that isnt modern isnt around anymore so they must have been failures. thats ridiculous. straiten up.
AF

I like this idea of using only the most negative people as examples to represent each side.

There is also the attitude that only religious people are intolerant and atheists are the only rational people being tossed around which is fairly fun as well.

Monster Rain wrote:Unless he edited it it should still be in the other thread, as it was definitely said. There was an attempt to weasel out of it when he was told how crazy it was, and was likely a mistake to bring up because it will only serve to cast all other statements he makes in an unfavorable light. To even think that killing 18 month olds is a reasonable thing to say smacks of asperger's.

I never said that killing 18 month old babies is a reasonable thing to do, in fact I clearly argued that it was not. So don't lie.

You jerks keep bringing it up, but you know what none of you will do? Try to engage the point in a reasonable manner. No, instead you attack me personally for saying it, but not one of you has even tried to engage the idea. Not one of you is willing to deal rationally with the consequences of declaring personhood at conception.

I picked 18 months because that's when self-awareness can be proven, so it seems less arbitrary than saying "at birth," which doesn't really make a whole lot of sense. We can argue that point if you want, but bringing it up out of context in order to bash on me and avoid the actual argument in front of us? All that does is demonstrate how completely dishonest and disingenuous you are.

Also, has there been a rash of Gay Stonings that I am unaware of? Someone that would indicate that that mainstream Christianity would advocate such a thing has so little concept of what they are talking about I should think it wouldn't even be worth refuting.

Try Islamic countries. Happens all the time.

And gays get bashed all the time in America. Plus gays are constantly under legal attack from the Christian right. If you think God's supposed hatred of gays has nothing to do with this, you're utterly deluded.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

AbaddonFidelis wrote:all of it. Egyptian civilization survived for about 4000 years on a religious basis. I call that a success. Chinese civilization right up to the present day for about 4000 too. Thats success. French Italian Russian etc etc right up to the present day on an almost entirely religious basis. Those are successes. I excluded modern societies because you dont know how they'll end up so its not fair to make any final judgements. you just decided that because modern societies are outside my cut off date then anything that isnt modern isnt around anymore so they must have been failures. thats ridiculous. straiten up.
AF

You really have no grounds for calling anyone ridiculous, AF. France has been secular for over a hundred years. Russia was communist for most of the 20th century, and thus embraced a policy of atheism. You're basically just making stuff up, and playing fast and loose with definitions, in order to twist facts to fit your case.

Bruce Metzger of Princeton was a fairly controversial guy, even though well respected. Mark 16:9-20 was quoted by some of the early church fathers (2nd century). This is what happens many times, because some of the surviving 1st century texts don't have 9-20 doesn't automatically = someone edited those verses in. It also in no way = a "wildly different version", even if it was added after the fact.(which is an unprovable theory from the start).

So we have a few possibilities.
1) The original actually had more to it than ending at verse 8
2) The original did end at verse 8
3) Somehow the early copies lost some of the text after verse 8, (assuming there was more)
4) Someone added verses 9-20 at a later date.

Regardless of which scenario happened, there was no "wild difference", since if it was left out, everything else up to that point was in agreement with the other texts, and if was indeed edited it still agrees with everything else.

These kinds of difficulties are only really problems to people that think that the Modern Bible is somehow supposed to be totally non influenced by man at all. The fact is, that it was men that translated it and men did make transcription mistakes. (however slight they may be). As stated before, there are really only a few "controversial" texts out of may thousands of texts and text pieces (some are only bits and pieces of a certain passage or book) and biblical scholars are well aware of these.

GG

skyth wrote:And not one Religious one was successful either. Since you exclude anything that is current, all civilizations that data can be collected on for this experiment must have fallen...Secular and Religious as well.

The Vatican is gone?

I need to watch more news...

Gailbraithe wrote:And gays get bashed all the time in America.

Meh. Violent crimes should be punished. I don't think anyone is saying that they shouldn't be. Your hysterical ranting about this seems unnecessary.

AbaddonFidelis wrote:

not necessarily in the sense of building an engine or a bomb or whatever, but in the sense of consistently yielding predictive results. of saying something useful and reliable about the phenomena under examination.

A theory that says 'if A, then B' and people test it again and again, we aren't looking at a useful thing, we're looking at a true thing, because we know now that when A happens, then B will happen shortly afterwards.

This thing may or may not be useful, it could be 'if you throw a rock at Ms Gardiner's window she'll call you a prat'. That it happens everytime makes it true, but it doesn't make it very useful to know.

well we're just using different words to describe the same thing.
We don't know that a scientist's theory is true by any means other than watching how his theory plays out in the physical world. Did what he said would happen actually happen? Well I would argue that we can look for results in the field of religion and make similar inferrences. If followers of XYZ religion consistently commit suicide, then for gods sake lets all avoid that religion. If followers of ABC religion live happy and prosperous lives, then let's investigate the cause of that. (protestants have a higher rate of suicide than catholics btw. did you know that? I think thats fascinating. anyway...) It's not a scientific experiment, but in both cases I'm making inferrences about the theory based on the outcome I observe. In a field where methodology and experimentation are impossible, in the rigorous sense of science, I think its fair. Unless there's a better way available.....?

You make a jump... and this is what I am pointing out.

Your are jumping and saying that the simple process of Observing a phenomenon, Explaining the pattern you see, Making a prediction based on your explanation, and then testing it is the same thing as (in your words...) "making inferrences about the theory based on the outcome" which to me doesn't even make sense...

Did you mean: Conclusions inferred from multiple observations may be tested by additional observations?

You can't draw inferences from a theory... inferences would come from observations! the inferences as you put them ARE the theory.... The way I read what you said... (making inferrences about the theory based on the outcome I observe) sounds like you're making a theory about a theory?

Or do you mean "I'm revising my theory based on the results of my observational experiment?"

I just require clarification of your idea : )

Gail
France has been secular for about 250 years out of a total history of about 1500. That's why I said ALMOST entirely religious. Read, then type.
AF

generalgrog wrote:
These kinds of difficulties are only really problems to people that think that the Modern Bible is somehow supposed to be totally non influenced by man at all. The fact is, that it was men that translated it and men did make transcription mistakes. (however slight they may be). As stated before, there are really only a few "controversial" texts out of may thousands of texts and text pieces (some are only bits and pieces of a certain passage or book) and biblical scholars are well aware of these.

GG

Whoa... wait a minute here... a year ago you made exactly the argument I highlighted above....

You said there were no mistakes caused by man...

Have you changed your ideas?

Monster Rain wrote:

skyth wrote:And not one Religious one was successful either. Since you exclude anything that is current, all civilizations that data can be collected on for this experiment must have fallen...Secular and Religious as well.

The Vatican is gone?

I need to watch more news

The Vatican doesn't fit his definition.

AbaddonFidelis wrote: I only chose states whose history is known from beginning to end.

That excludes the Vatican.

AbaddonFidelis wrote:Gail
France has been secular for about 250 years out of a total history of about 1500. That's why I said ALMOST entirely religious. Read, then type.
AF

And this is what I mean by playing fast and loose. If you're going to claim France "survived" for 1500 despite being invaded multiple times, having multiple revolutions and restructurings, despite wave after wave of immigration, and constantly changing culture, then you have to grant that France has survived the last 250 years as a secular state.

Which completely destroys your claim that no secular society survives.

rubiksnoob wrote:

Well, I got you here GG.

Consider the difference between the following:

"Verily, I say unto thee, This day thou shalt be with me in paradise"

and:

"Verily I say unto thee this day, Thou shalt be with me in Paradise"

The first version is the Protestant interpretation of the passage. (Luke, xxiii, 43)

It skips over Purgatory and takes the thief being crucified alongside Jesus straight to heaven.

The second version is the Catholic interpretation, and promises Paradise at a later date, leaving purgatory nicely in the picture for Catholics who believe in it.

And all because of a "minor transcription error".

Would you not agree that that little comma switcheroo has a rather massive impact on doctrine?


*I stole this example from Lynne Truss' fantastic book, "Eats, Shoots and Leaves"

That's a good point rubicsnoob. Jehovah's witness' do the same thing in their New World Translation, because they don't believe in hell.

GG

Gailbraithe wrote:
You jerks keep bringing it up, but you know what none of you will do? Try to engage the point in a reasonable manner.

It's not something that deserves reasonable discussion. If you had denied the Holocaust or something I'm sure the treatment would be similar. What you said is that crazy.

generalgrog wrote:Bruce Metzger of Princeton was a fairly controversial guy, even though well respected. Mark 16:9-20 was quoted by some of the early church fathers (2nd century). This is what happens many times, because some of the surviving 1st century texts don't have 9-20 doesn't automatically = someone edited those verses in. It also in no way = a "wildly different version", even if it was added after the fact.(which is an unprovable theory from the start).

So we have a few possibilities.
1) The original actually had more to it than ending at verse 8
2) The original did end at verse 8
3) Somehow the early copies lost some of the text after verse 8, (assuming there was more)
4) Someone added verses 9-20 at a later date.

Regardless of which scenario happened, there was no "wild difference", since if it was left out, everything else up to that point was in agreement with the other texts, and if was indeed edited it still agrees with everything else.

These kinds of difficulties are only really problems to people that think that the Modern Bible is somehow supposed to be totally non influenced by man at all. The fact is, that it was men that translated it and men did make transcription mistakes. (however slight they may be). As stated before, there are really only a few "controversial" texts out of may thousands of texts and text pieces (some are only bits and pieces of a certain passage or book) and biblical scholars are well aware of these.

GG

How you interpret differences between the texts is open to debate, but the existence of those differences is not. You said the manuscripts agree almost all the time. I don't think that's accurate.if the last chapters of mark had been left out in just 1 or 2 instances then mb it would be an accident. But that the resurrection story starts appearing in later manuscripts rather abruptly leads me to believe it wasn't there in the 1st place. Anyway it's not just those 2 sources I mentioned. This is a pretty well known instance in biblical scholarship. I first became aware of it by reading Crossan. The information is pretty readily available. AF

frgsinwntr wrote:

generalgrog wrote:
These kinds of difficulties are only really problems to people that think that the Modern Bible is somehow supposed to be totally non influenced by man at all. The fact is, that it was men that translated it and men did make transcription mistakes. (however slight they may be). As stated before, there are really only a few "controversial" texts out of may thousands of texts and text pieces (some are only bits and pieces of a certain passage or book) and biblical scholars are well aware of these.

GG

Whoa... wait a minute here... a year ago you made exactly the argument I highlighted above....

You said there were no mistakes caused by man...

Have you changed your ideas?

frigs if I did say that, then yes I was in error. I would like to see my quote in context. :-)

GG

Monster Rain wrote:

Gailbraithe wrote:
You jerks keep bringing it up, but you know what none of you will do? Try to engage the point in a reasonable manner.

It's not something that deserves reasonable discussion. If you had denied the Holocaust or something I'm sure the treatment would be similar. What you said is that crazy.

It's not crazy at all. Under current law we don't even recognize 17 year old children as having full rights. Your counter-argument isn't an argument at all, it's just a personal attack. And when someone makes a personal attack in lieu of an actual rebuttal? That person is generally recognized to have lost the debate.

Gailbraithe wrote:

AbaddonFidelis wrote:Gail
France has been secular for about 250 years out of a total history of about 1500. That's why I said ALMOST entirely religious. Read, then type.
AF

And this is what I mean by playing fast and loose. If you're going to claim France "survived" for 1500 despite being invaded multiple times, having multiple revolutions and restructurings, despite wave after wave of immigration, and constantly changing culture, then you have to grant that France has survived the last 250 years as a secular state.

Which completely destroys your claim that no secular society survives.

What the hell are you even talking about? Honestly. Do you deny that France has survived as an independent state/cultural group from conquest by the franks right up to the present day? AF

AbaddonFidelis wrote:Guitardian
maybe it is why they last longer. have you considered the possibility that people are by nature selfish, violent, short-sighted, stupid - and that only the strong hand of government and of religion working together keeps their basically savage nature from destroying every achievement of civilization? What would our lives be without order imposed from above? A savage, endless war of all against all, incapable of resolution, from which no one benefits. If it takes a little despotism to prevent that then I'm for it. And if it requires the backing of religion to make it stick, then I'm for that too. People who dont believe in God after all dont fear God or divine punishments - they just fear the police man and going to jail. Maybe under those circumstances civilization is totally impossible.

If that seems like a nightmare scenario then reflect just how damn rotten your average human being is when on one's watching. A little divine wrath might straighten people up a bit. Hopefully though the industrial revolution has made different kinds of government possible. I think that our nature is basically so bad that some element of religion is required, but hopefully not despotism. I dont think your average human being is constitutionally capable of going through life without belief in the divine. So that by itself tells against secular values.
AF

I have to disagree with you. Needing a respect for a social order does not have to tie in to superstitious ghost stories to tell you to be nice. I belive there is a god, but I also believe that all human accounts for such a thing are self serving tools for worldly gain. Yes I agree people can be harsh, rude, cruel, and generally bad when not held to some accountability. We can have morals and idealism without needing the book of Bubba 13:11 telling us why. The problem I have isn't with the existance of a higher power, but why the specific ones detailed and (like the post chapter 8 stuff) quite possible conveniently made up for sociological reasons, quenched by the vatican, re-interpreted according to the times. Sorry, but Jesus didn't die for my sins. Jesus died. Let that be a lesson to people who think they are god I believe was what they were thinking at the time. Only later, with the lies of Paul, did Jesus become the demigod ideal he is so revered for with all the magical powers and godlight shining out of his butt.

So God is (probably) a real thing, that we cannot actually know. Why any specific religious take on it though? That is stories invented by people to serve people's purposes.

For all I know God is a giant uncaring amoeba and we are little atoms that make up it's big cosmic cell. God may not think at all as we can understand it, God just is. Religion as a social control mechanism and a 'necessary' despotism as you pointed out, is not the reflection of a higher power at work, but of our own failed natures needing to be kept in check by the fear of retribution from something that may or may not exist. I do fear cops because I have been wrongfully harassed by them before. I do not fear being struck by lightning for working on the sabbath though. I prefer to be good for goodness's sake, because it feels good to be good and helpful and kind and so on, not because I am afraid of some guy with a pitchfork slow roasting me till the end of time. It is a sign of weakness to invent supernatural stories as an excuse for idealism. Why not just have idealism for its own sake.

So my God says I must partake of no hot-dog-buns on friday because of the doctrine of the Origional Snub. Does that make me a good person? No. Helping out my old neighbor lady take out her lawn clippings to the curb makes me a good person, and God isn't responsible for that, I am.