Evidence for God from Science

I don't know any Christians who don't believe the Bible wasn't written by people and influenced it with their own writing style.

^

I believe the main point of issue on this is books like genesis and exodus when god spoke directly to his chosen prophets and they, if I under stand correctly, wrote his words word for word. Now they found that the style of writing differs in parts of genesis and exodus which could lead one to believe they were not directly from god.

The topics contained in the first five books written by Moses differ, why is it that people must be expected to use the same writing style in different topics? Deuteronomy covers law, Genesis creation, ancient history etc. Exodus modern history and events still happening as Moses is writing.

The Bible itself is not the divine word of God in the sense that God wrote it word for word, rather the inspired word of God from men of God who wrote down what happened in regards to God, with the direction of God (e.g. some of the prophetic books such as Jeremiah are written in first person from the perspective of Jeremiah, which would mean that Jeremiah being inspired by God and not God Himself wrote the book). This does not mean that it is false, however.

Telstra Robs wrote:The topics contained in the first five books written by Moses differ, why is it that people must be expected to use the same writing style in different topics? Deuteronomy covers law, Genesis creation, ancient history etc. Exodus modern history and events still happening as Moses is writing.

Surely an excellent point!

Murray wrote:^

I believe the main point of issue on this is books like genesis and exodus when god spoke directly to his chosen prophets and they, if I under stand correctly, wrote his words word for word. Now they found that the style of writing differs in parts of genesis and exodus which could lead one to believe they were not directly from god.

What you're describing is sometimes referred to as verbal dictation. That's one view. It's not the only one. I personally don't subscribe to it.

Murray wrote:Check out this article that claims the bible, through study, seems to be more of human origon than divine. Kind of a big dent in my faitth, was hopeing you guys could clear this ilk up for me.

http://news.yahoo.com/israeli-algorithm ... 28454.html

Nothing new here... Man has been saying this kind of junk for years.

There is actually a mechanics to scripture and I can tell you from experience it wasn't man made..

If the bible was perfect... I don't think God would have killed people... or anyone, or anything or even decreed that anyone would kill anything. I think it is only man who has such bloodlust... and that God would be above such dirty actions. (yes this is heavily tainted with strong personal belief)

To the article:
OK. It's not a big surprise that the books of the Bible were written by different people, but to assume they had different secret agendas just because they weren't who we thought they might've been is absurd. I haven't believed that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God in a long time. By that I mean that God personally gave the authors word by word what to write, as there are so many different versions of the BIble out there with totally different wording. It would've been pointless.

I do believe, however, that God gave them an idea to write about. God told them to write about this idea, or this topic, or people need to realize this, etc.

Jonouchi Katsuya wrote:If the bible was perfect... I don't think God would have killed people... or anyone, or anything or even decreed that anyone would kill anything. I think it is only man who has such bloodlust... and that God would be above such dirty actions. (yes this is heavily tainted with strong personal belief)

How does that and how would that make the Bible perfect? I suggest you look around the main site more:
http://www.godandscience.org/apologetics/notkill.html
http://www.godandscience.org/apologetics/killergod.html
http://www.godandscience.org/apologetics/hell.html

You used a lot of "I thinks" in there, which are generated from your opinion. To look at something you don't agree with, you can't be "heavily tainted with strong personal belief" while analyzing it. That's unfair. You have to try your best to be unbiased.

One more thing I want to point out is if man had such a strong bloodlust, why would they fabricate the Ten Commandments, which clearly states "Thou Shalt Not Murder"?

The scripture proves it is divine in origin. A study of Daniels weeks prophecy demonstrates the divine inspiration of scripture.

No where is it claimed that God grabbed a heavenly quill and penned the words. It says, "but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. (2 Peter 1:21) And, All scripture is given by inspiration of God. (2 Tim. 3:16)

Men, who make these arguments don't even understand what truth claims are being presented by the Christian faith. Or, they are arguing against those who have a distorted view of how God originated the scriptures.

Scripture being of divine ORIGIN is something that must be take on faith, there is no evidence of that.
We have evidence that man wrote it and man copied it and edited it and so forth.
Does that distract from what the Bible is?
That would depend on what a person THINKS the bible to be.

PaulSacramento wrote:Scripture being of divine ORIGIN is something that must be take on faith, there is no evidence of that.
We have evidence that man wrote it and man copied it and edited it and so forth.
Does that distract from what the Bible is?
That would depend on what a person THINKS the bible to be.

what?

DannyM wrote:

PaulSacramento wrote:Scripture being of divine ORIGIN is something that must be take on faith, there is no evidence of that.
We have evidence that man wrote it and man copied it and edited it and so forth.
Does that distract from what the Bible is?
That would depend on what a person THINKS the bible to be.

what?

He's saying that he personally believes that man wrote it from the divine inspiration of God, but that the man had put in his own personal writing styles and edits into it, but the divine original idea is still the same.

He's also saying that this shouldn't break your faith unless you used to think that the Bible was given by God word for word.

At least, I think that's what he's saying. He worded it oddly.

Mariolee wrote:

DannyM wrote:

PaulSacramento wrote:Scripture being of divine ORIGIN is something that must be take on faith, there is no evidence of that.
We have evidence that man wrote it and man copied it and edited it and so forth.
Does that distract from what the Bible is?
That would depend on what a person THINKS the bible to be.

what?

He's saying that he personally believes that man wrote it from the divine inspiration of God, but that the man had put in his own personal writing styles and edits into it, but the divine original idea is still the same.

He's also saying that this shouldn't break your faith unless you used to think that the Bible was given by God word for word.

At least, I think that's what he's saying. He worded it oddly.

I didn't realize it sounded so odd.
Sorry about that.
But yes, you are correct, that is what I was TRYING to say.

We can't use passages WITHIN the bible that say it is "divine" and "god breathed" as "proof" or "evidence" that the bible is such.
The bible is a LOT of things:
It is a book written by men inspired by God's spirit, it is a book of parables, songs, the history of a people and their struggles, a book the points the way to God, a book of so much richness and beauty and also much pain and hurt.
It is MANY things.
What it is NOT is the Living Word of God, Christ and ONLY Christ is that.

Just trying to follow this, Paul

PaulSacramento wrote:We can't use passages WITHIN the bible that say it is "divine" and "god breathed" as "proof" or "evidence" that the bible is such

Why not?

The bible is a LOT of things:
It is a book written by men inspired by God's spirit, it is a book of parables, songs, the history of a people and their struggles, a book the points the way to God, a book of so much richness and beauty and also much pain and hurt

It is MANY things

Absolutely

What it is NOT is the Living Word of God, Christ and ONLY Christ is that.

Of course it’s not the “living word of God”

But in the bible we have God speak and describe some of his wonderful attributes