Evidence for why we know the New Testament writers told the truth.

[SezMe]

Wow, I am flattered that DOC thinks so highly of my opinion.

Consider embarrassment?

 

[Lord Emsworth]

In the unlikely event of you actually complying with my request, here's a tune that is - I think - rather fitting for this never-ending thread:

​

Try this:

 

[Lothian]

Wow, I am flattered that DOC thinks so highly of my opinion.

At least we know why is was asking for our favourite bible versions.

 

[Belz...]

Here is what the asterisks reference says "cut to pieces" can also mean -- it can also mean "cut him off". Now "cut him off" could mean other things , especially when followed by "and put him with the unfaithful". It could mean cut him off from the rest of the servants.

Just something to consider from other translations

Okay, what do the originals say, then ? Let's forget about those meddlesome translations.

 

[Rincewind]

This one?

However did you guess?

 

[Moss]

However did you guess?

Inspiration.

 

[Waterman]

I didn't think that my musings would garner so much attention. Thank all of you for the complementary remarks.

 

[RoboTimbo]

A posting's value is inversely proportional to the amount of attention that DOC gives it. Yours he had to totally scrub clean from his memory with bleach.

 

[Rincewind]

Waterman - please continue to muse.

I'm one of the people who have come here to learn. (unlike ....)

Well, OK - and to be amused, of course.

 

[DOC]

New Important Info about Oral Tradition.

I've already talked about how important oral tradition was in that era of little literacy and no paper in passing on historical information and how we have just scratched the surface on this topic of oral tradition. One rabbi, I've already mentioned, said Oral tradition was more important than written history concerning the Torah.

http://www.aish.com/jl/48943186.html

In the book "Misquoting Truth (a guide to the Fallacies of Bart Ehrman)" by Timothy Jones, Jones talks of how a consistent oral account of the Crucifixion and Resurrection of Jesus emerged shortly after he died. He states this oral history can be found in the writings of Paul. Paul reminds the Corinthians of the truths that he had proclaimed to them 3 years earlier around A.D. 50. Jones says there are clues that show how quickly an oral account emerged and how consistent the tradition stayed as it was circulated.

1 Corinthians 15:3-7

For I handed over to you what I also received.
That the Messiah died on behalf of our sins according to the Sriptures,
And that he was buried,
And that he rose on the third day according to the Scriptures,
and that he was seen by Cephas,
then the Twelve;
then, he was seen
by more than five hundred brothers at once;...
then, he was seen by James,
then by all the apostles.

Here is what Jones says on page 91:

"So, how can scholars know that these words actually come from an early oral history? In the first place, Paul introduced this summation with two Greek words that clearly indicated it was oral tradition. These two words were "paradidomi" ("handed over" in my translation above) and "paralambano" ("received"). Ancient readers understood these two words -- when used together -- to imply that the writer was quoting words that he or she intended to become oral tradition. In this way, Paul clearly informed the Corinthians that he was about to pass on oral tradition."

Jones goes on and says there are clues in the text that suggest where and when the tradition began. I'll try to talk about that later as time permits.

 

[Akhenaten]

I've already talked . . .

What's this drivel?

Why are you ignoring all the questions you've been asked?

Who do you think you're fooling with this totally dishonest evasion?

 

[Akhenaten]

<nonsense>

Answer this DOC:

In reading through DOC’s arguments (and yes I am one of those that has read every post) It appears that there is some fundamental difference in how the two sides are using the term evidence in the context of this discussion.

Per DOC’s usage in post 13, Evidence is something that is used to arrive as a determination or decision. He has turned this definition around in that ANYTHING that is used to arrive at a decision or determination is to be considered Evidence.

Per this definition anything considered becomes evidence:
Facts (irrelevant and relevant)
Quotes (and misquotes)
Logical Arguments
Fallacious Logical Arguments (especially if you don’t recognize the fallacy)
Statistics (both correctly applied and misapplied)
Opinions of Famous People
Untruths (either unknown to the presenter or not)
Speculation and Conjecture
Inspirational thoughts / ideas
Tradition

People do and often use all of these to help make decisions. However that does NOT mean that they rise to what the majority of the posters of this board consider to be GOOD EVIDENCE.

Irrelevant Facts – It is a fact that my house is green. However that has no bearing on whether or my computer crashed while working on a project last week. Unless I can link these two items together the fact is unimportant to solving my computer dilemma. Many people are asking for that logical link between your facts and your conclusion. 42 Presidents are Christian. OK link that to the Truthfulness of the NT.

Quotes and Misquotes are not Evidence at best they document the opinion of the person. At worst when taken out of context mean the opposite of what speaker intended. They have to be evaluated carefully for context. Even when they evaluated, quotes are only indications of their opinion on a topic and are not in themselves Evidence for anything other than their opinion. They can be useful in pursuing things in more detail (ala Greenleaf) to evaluate what their reasoning is to see if is supports your position. I believe that Greenleaf provided his quote and believed what he said. However a review of his argument showed that he employed faulty reasoning in arriving at that conclusion. I have yet to see a counter argument to the contrary.

Opinions of famous people, see above. In addition many famous people use their status of famed to spout all sorts of non-sense (Jenny McCarthy, Tom Cruise) while others actually get things right. You have to make sure that the famous person is knowledge able in the area they are being quoted on and then follow up on whether or not their reasoning is sound. Then you can present the argument not just the conclusion.

Untruths – Even if they are used to make the initial decision they should not be considered Evidence! Once an untruth is identified is should be stricken from list if items.

Tradition – This is also not Evidence, it is a way of doing things which may be founded in reality or it may be to counter something that no longer is of concern. Take the eating of pork or shellfish as an example.

Inspirational thought or idea: These sorts of things make us feel good about our decisions however that is all that are. They are only indications that the idea or thought is emotional satisfying for what ever reason. It is not Evidence of any truth.

Fallacious Logical Arguments: for those not schooled in logic is can be relatively easy to make a bad logical argument especially if it reaches the desired conclusion. These can be rooted out through a dispassionate evaluation of the individual points and the reasoning that binds the argument together. Once the hole in the argument is identified it should be discarded from the class called evidence. The arguments presented here are of the ‘Does not follow’ or ‘unstated major premise’ type. If A=B and B=C then D is orange, there are a lot of missing steps. Plus there is a lot of ‘Special Pleading’ My Martyrs count your martyrs are deluded.

Speculation / Conjecture This is a tricky one. When much of the ‘Bad Evidence’ is stripped away sometimes there is little left with to make a strong conclusion and that is all that you have left. This is using educated guesses and filling in the blanks. This can be problematical especially of one starts with a desired conclusion and oversteps the logical inferences to arrive at where you want to be. You have to use this sparingly and limit yourself to moving forward where the data leads without forcing it in a particular direction and stopping when you run out of reasonable extrapolations. I for one am willing to accept the idea of a Historical ‘Yeshua’ a radical rabbi around with the biblical story of Jesus evolved. However to go beyond and say he was divine and worked miracles that is reaching.

If we eliminate the bad evidence and arguments what do we have left as good evidence.

Relevant Facts – These MUST BE relevant to the conclusion. In many of DOCs posts there are some factual data. However it breaks down is in his application in support of the OP

Logical Arguments – Facts are very useful here, but those facts must point clearly to one another and to a logical conclusion. All major assumption must be stated for the argument to stand up to scrutiny.

Limited Speculation and Conjecture – this can only be used when there is insufficient facts to support a logical argument to arrive at a conclusion. Care must be taken to not reach too far beyond the available data.

So far people (myself included) have reviewed what you consider to be ‘evidence’ and have determined that it is ‘bad’ or ‘invalid’ evidence. If you want to punt and rephrase this as:

‘Reasons that DOC believes that the NT is True’ then you would have probably fewer people arguing with you. You can use what ever illogical reason you want to arrive at a conclusion or determination.

However you imply that you purpose here is to provide the members of the board with the reasons that they should believe that the NT is True. You have presented a lot of information that qualifies as ‘bad or invalid’ evidence and you are being offered an education in logic and reasoning to tell the good from the bad if you chose to learn.

 

[Cleon]

I've already talked about how important oral tradition was in that era of little literacy and no paper in passing on historical information and how we have just scratched the surface on this topic of oral tradition. One rabbi, I've already mentioned, said Oral tradition was more important than written history concerning the Torah.

http://www.aish.com/jl/48943186.html

*facepalm*

I realize you know little about theology, or religions that don't happen to be Christian, but would you at least read the fracking articles you link to?!?!?! Is that really too much to ask?

Rabbi Kaplan is not talking about "oral tradition" in pre-literate societies. He was speaking of rabbinic interpretation of Torah - an oral tradition which was eventually written down in texts like the Talmud, Midrash, Mishnah, and so forth.

You only had to read as far as the second sentence to know this:

This oral tradition is now essentially preserved in the Talmud and Midrashim.

This is not about the passing of oral history. This is about rabbinic Judaism and the role Talmudic teachings play in Judaism.

In other words - you are misrepresenting what the Rabbi said. You are, again, being dishonest.

 

[RoboTimbo]

DOC, I wonder if you would take a little time to answer Waterman's post:

In reading through DOC’s arguments (and yes I am one of those that has read every post) It appears that there is some fundamental difference in how the two sides are using the term evidence in the context of this discussion.

Per DOC’s usage in post 13, Evidence is something that is used to arrive as a determination or decision. He has turned this definition around in that ANYTHING that is used to arrive at a decision or determination is to be considered Evidence.

Per this definition anything considered becomes evidence:
Facts (irrelevant and relevant)
Quotes (and misquotes)
Logical Arguments
Fallacious Logical Arguments (especially if you don’t recognize the fallacy)
Statistics (both correctly applied and misapplied)
Opinions of Famous People
Untruths (either unknown to the presenter or not)
Speculation and Conjecture
Inspirational thoughts / ideas
Tradition

People do and often use all of these to help make decisions. However that does NOT mean that they rise to what the majority of the posters of this board consider to be GOOD EVIDENCE.

Irrelevant Facts – It is a fact that my house is green. However that has no bearing on whether or my computer crashed while working on a project last week. Unless I can link these two items together the fact is unimportant to solving my computer dilemma. Many people are asking for that logical link between your facts and your conclusion. 42 Presidents are Christian. OK link that to the Truthfulness of the NT.

Quotes and Misquotes are not Evidence at best they document the opinion of the person. At worst when taken out of context mean the opposite of what speaker intended. They have to be evaluated carefully for context. Even when they evaluated, quotes are only indications of their opinion on a topic and are not in themselves Evidence for anything other than their opinion. They can be useful in pursuing things in more detail (ala Greenleaf) to evaluate what their reasoning is to see if is supports your position. I believe that Greenleaf provided his quote and believed what he said. However a review of his argument showed that he employed faulty reasoning in arriving at that conclusion. I have yet to see a counter argument to the contrary.

Opinions of famous people, see above. In addition many famous people use their status of famed to spout all sorts of non-sense (Jenny McCarthy, Tom Cruise) while others actually get things right. You have to make sure that the famous person is knowledge able in the area they are being quoted on and then follow up on whether or not their reasoning is sound. Then you can present the argument not just the conclusion.

Untruths – Even if they are used to make the initial decision they should not be considered Evidence! Once an untruth is identified is should be stricken from list if items.

Tradition – This is also not Evidence, it is a way of doing things which may be founded in reality or it may be to counter something that no longer is of concern. Take the eating of pork or shellfish as an example.

Inspirational thought or idea: These sorts of things make us feel good about our decisions however that is all that are. They are only indications that the idea or thought is emotional satisfying for what ever reason. It is not Evidence of any truth.

Fallacious Logical Arguments: for those not schooled in logic is can be relatively easy to make a bad logical argument especially if it reaches the desired conclusion. These can be rooted out through a dispassionate evaluation of the individual points and the reasoning that binds the argument together. Once the hole in the argument is identified it should be discarded from the class called evidence. The arguments presented here are of the ‘Does not follow’ or ‘unstated major premise’ type. If A=B and B=C then D is orange, there are a lot of missing steps. Plus there is a lot of ‘Special Pleading’ My Martyrs count your martyrs are deluded.

Speculation / Conjecture This is a tricky one. When much of the ‘Bad Evidence’ is stripped away sometimes there is little left with to make a strong conclusion and that is all that you have left. This is using educated guesses and filling in the blanks. This can be problematical especially of one starts with a desired conclusion and oversteps the logical inferences to arrive at where you want to be. You have to use this sparingly and limit yourself to moving forward where the data leads without forcing it in a particular direction and stopping when you run out of reasonable extrapolations. I for one am willing to accept the idea of a Historical ‘Yeshua’ a radical rabbi around with the biblical story of Jesus evolved. However to go beyond and say he was divine and worked miracles that is reaching.

If we eliminate the bad evidence and arguments what do we have left as good evidence.

Relevant Facts – These MUST BE relevant to the conclusion. In many of DOCs posts there are some factual data. However it breaks down is in his application in support of the OP

Logical Arguments – Facts are very useful here, but those facts must point clearly to one another and to a logical conclusion. All major assumption must be stated for the argument to stand up to scrutiny.

Limited Speculation and Conjecture – this can only be used when there is insufficient facts to support a logical argument to arrive at a conclusion. Care must be taken to not reach too far beyond the available data.

So far people (myself included) have reviewed what you consider to be ‘evidence’ and have determined that it is ‘bad’ or ‘invalid’ evidence. If you want to punt and rephrase this as:

‘Reasons that DOC believes that the NT is True’ then you would have probably fewer people arguing with you. You can use what ever illogical reason you want to arrive at a conclusion or determination.

However you imply that you purpose here is to provide the members of the board with the reasons that they should believe that the NT is True. You have presented a lot of information that qualifies as ‘bad or invalid’ evidence and you are being offered an education in logic and reasoning to tell the good from the bad if you chose to learn.

 

[Lothian]

He states this oral history can be found in the writings of Paul.

So he doesn't believe it either.

 

[DOC]

DOC, I wonder if you would take a little time to answer Waterman's post:

I already did:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=6010320#post6010320

If you don't like my response then so be it.

 

[Akhenaten]

I already did:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=6010320#post6010320

That's not a response at all, and you know it. Why must you lie all the time, DOC?

If you don't like my response then so be it.

Nobody likes your lying, evasive non-responses. Not one person.

Why do you bother with them?

 

[paximperium]

 

[Hokulele]

Here is what Jones says on page 91:

"So, how can scholars know that these words actually come from an early oral history? In the first place, Paul introduced this summation with two Greek words that clearly indicated it was oral tradition. These two words were "paradidomi" ("handed over" in my translation above) and "paralambano" ("received"). Ancient readers understood these two words -- when used together -- to imply that the writer was quoting words that he or she intended to become oral tradition. In this way, Paul clearly informed the Corinthians that he was about to pass on oral tradition."

Ah, so even Jones admits that the "evidence" is nothing but hearsay.

Got it.

 

[RoboTimbo]

I already did:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=6010320#post6010320

If you don't like my response then so be it.

I'm glad you labeled that as a response and not an answer. After you've taken some time to answer his post, you may wish to address this:

Just for the record some people have mentioned...

...your many fallacies that you asked about. You appear to have skipped over posts #13747 through 13765. Are you going to address those now?