Merged Topic - Historical Reliability of the Gospels

[widdershins]

The Ten Commandments are contained in Exodus 20.

Exodus 20:1-17

20 And God spoke all these words:

2 “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

3 “You shall have no other gods before[a] me.

4 “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.

7 “You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.

8 “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. 11 For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

12 “Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you.

13 “You shall not murder.

14 “You shall not commit adultery.

15 “You shall not steal.

16 “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.

17 “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”

Yeah, I didn't see any mention of any "stone tablets" in any of that.  Did you?  Did I miss it?  Which part was it, exactly, where it said that THE "Ten Commandments" were written on "stone tablets"?  I'm not seeing it there.  Obviously I must be missing something.  I mean, if it didn't say that why would you have included a handy little picture of the Ten Commandments written on stone tablets?  That cute little computer generated picture is certainly proof that you're right.  I just can't find it in the actual BIBLE.  In fact, I don't even see a reference there to "Ten Commandments".  To the untrained eye, that looks like a TOTAL fail on your part.   But I'm certain I must be mistaken.  So, please, do show me in the scripture were the Bible SAYS that the "Ten Commandments" were written on the "stone tablets" and lists those commandments.

Try Exodus 34.

Mary is not dead now. None of the saints are.

Mark 12:27
"He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. You are badly mistaken!”

Oh, so Mother Theresa isn't dead right now?  No grave with her body in it?  And you don't have creepy body parts from saints laying around your various churches?  There could not, after all, be a "dead body" if the person is not "dead".

So, why do you try to use the scriptures to justify your false idea that Catholics worship statues and dead saints? Or that honoring your father and mother are NOT one of the 10 commandments?

Could you at least TRY to be consistent?

I am being consistent.  Exodus 34 shows the Ten Commandments written on the stone tablets.  I have told you, it is the ONLY place in the ENTIRE Bible which uses BOTH phrases, "Ten Commandments" and "stone tablets" and it lists "NOT those ten".  I've told you where to find it.  And how do you respond?  You quote a list of the ten you BELIEVE are THE "Ten Commandments", a list which does not actually name them the "Ten Commandments", nor does it mention writing them on a "stone tablet", much less doing both, which is done only in Exodus 34.

So, show me where, in the Bible, it specifically states the Ten Commandments (by that name) and the act of or commandment to put them on "stone tablets" (specifically).  Hey, try Exodus 34

You have been badly misinformed about basic Christian doctrine and the contents of scripture, and I suspect it will be quite some time before you are able to approach the scriptures or a book of basic Christian theology calmly enough to evaluate it objectively.

Says the man who doesn't even know the Ten Commandments written on the stone tablets carried in the Ark of the Covenant.  This is very basic stuff.  I mean, the contents of the Ark of the Covenant, in as much as they are known, is pretty basic, important stuff for a good Christian to know.  It tells us what was important to God.  It tells us what he valued above all else.

So, show me the Ten Commandments again.  But I don't want just any old ten commandments.  I want THE Ten Commandments.  The ones God, himself, called the Ten Commandments in the Bible.  The ones which the Bible says were so important that they were inscribed on two stone tablets which were to be carried in the Ark of the Covenant.  Show me THOSE Ten Commandments.  Try Exodus 34!

[Randy Carson]

This is not true.  This is not indisputable.  Eyewitness accounts are notoriously unreliable.  Eyewitness accounts which include observations of magic are never taken at face value.  I very much dispute this.  It is very much not indisputable.  It is, in fact, very disputed.

It's also a loaded statement, a sly attempt to manipulate the argument.  The term "eyewitness account" only applies to witnesses of actual events.  You are trying to prove that the statements in the New Testament are real by getting us to, before the argument begins, accept that the accounts in the New Testament are real and build your argument from a position of "I win!"  Not going to happen.

Rewrite this.  Replace "eyewitness accounts" with something which DOES NOT start the argument with the assertion that you've won the argument before you've even given it.  Form a proper argument and I'll read the rest.

If it can be proved that an account was written by an eyewitness, this is indisputably better than saying, "We have no clue who wrote this."

As any district attorney.

[Randy Carson]

ANOTHER thread for this? Come on.

This is my first thread covering WHO wrote the gospels, and I have presented more information on this topic here than I have posted elsewhere.

Enjoy!

[Randy Carson]

Oh, really? Can we go visit them, then? Have a little talk with Mary over a cup of coffee and talk about her son?

You may get that opportunity, God willing.

[Randy Carson]

So, show me the Ten Commandments again.  But I don't want just any old ten commandments.  I want THE Ten Commandments.  The ones God, himself, called the Ten Commandments in the Bible.  The ones which the Bible says were so important that they were inscribed on two stone tablets which were to be carried in the Ark of the Covenant.  Show me THOSE Ten Commandments.  Try Exodus 34!

Exodus 34
34 The Lord said to Moses, “Chisel out two stone tablets like the first ones, and I will write on them the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke

God promises to write the words which were written on the tablets before Exodus 34:1...not in the verses which follow after Exodus 34:1.

What commandments were on the first set of stone tablets, widdershins? What verses contain them?

(Hint: see my previous post or this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten_Commandments)

[Hakurei Reimu]

The four gospels have been accurately delivered to us (meaning we know what they wrote).

•   Nearly 6,000 copies of the New Testament can be studied using textual criticism.

Textual criticism cannot tell you what the original form of a manuscript was. Only a date-able, exant manuscript can do that.

•   The Telephone Game analogy and all attempts to claim distortion via oral tradition are bogus.

Unsubstantiated claim. We have no original documents to compare to. It's not actually a far stretch to suppose that the gospels did spend a bit of time in an oral tradition, because most people in the ancient world were illiterate.

The authors wrote early (meaning it was possible that they were actual eyewitnesses).

Silence regarding the Destruction of the Temple (AD 70) and the martyrdoms of Peter and Paul) (AD 64-65) suggest an early date.

You've floated this reasoning before, and it is no more convincing now as it was then.

The authors recorded eyewitness accounts (meaning they either were or had access to actual eyewitnesses).

•   All of the early sources attribute the gospels to the traditional authors: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. The synoptic gospels are not attributed to major figures such as Peter, James or Mary; instead, they are assigned to a tax-collector (Matthew), a lesser character who may not have been present (Mark), and a gentile (Luke). This is one example of how the gospels meet the Criterion of Embarrassment.

The Criterion of Embarrassment is a non-starter. So what if the people who wrote the synoptics weren't the major players in it? It's even useful to have the actual writers be secondary characters, because it intoduces a layer of separation between you and the characters you write about, so any flubbing can be excused. In effect, the Criterion of Embarrassment negates itself because having being written by the head characters themselves introduces opportunity for MORE embarrassment â€" like having a Jesus describing things while he's dead.

And if Jesus, Peter, James and Mary never existed at all, it really should be no surprise that we have nothing in their own words, but only in the words of others.

•   Matthew was an apostle, and may have been chosen specifically because of his record-keeping skills which were needed to make contemporaneous records of Jesus’ teaching and deeds.

Evidence? Was there even a Matthew to make these records? After all, modern scholarship states that none of the gospels were written by the people they're named after. Not John, not James, not Luke, and not Matthew.

•   Luke interviewed people who were present. This may have included Mary for the nativity account.

Pure conjecture, to say the least. Modern interviews have accounts attributed to particular people. This gives you a paper trail to follow in case you want to do some fact-checking. Without them, you could make any old shit up and there's no way for outsiders to tell if they were derived from an actual account or just some fiction.

•   Mark was the companion of Peter, the leader of the apostles.
•   John was an apostle.

We don't even know if any of the apostles existed as such, let alone were companions of each other.

The authors wanted to write accurate accounts (as opposed to pious fiction).

False dichotomy fallacy. The authors were writing pious 'truth', but that doesn't imply that they were going for historical truth as well. For a more recent example, George Washington and the cherry tree story is absolutely historical fiction (it didn't happen), yet it quite clearly communicates a character truth of George Washington (he was a dilligent, honorable man throughout his life). It's historical fiction, yet it communicates a truth about Washington.

In fact, the notion of a historical truth is a very modern phenomenon. You really don't see a respect for it past a few centuries ago. Ancient peoples really had no use for the 'truth' as we would know it today. In fact, the Buddhists consider the 'real world' a veil over the truth of Enlightenment, and had a similar disregard for historicity. To them, the world is an illusion, so what does it matter whether that illusion went one way or another in the past, or even the present?

•   Luke and John specifically state that they are writing so that others may know the truth.
•   The disciples believed they were passing on the words of God â€" a responsibility they took seriously.

The communication of 'the truth' and the 'words of God' does not imply that a historical truth is the one being communicated. In fact, I dare say that these bible stories are meant to be read as parable and not as historical truth.

The authors wrote accurate accounts which are verified and corroborated.

•   Jewish and Roman accounts corroborate the basic story.

Every one of these "accounts" are later and use the bible as their source.

•   Verifiable external evidence suggests that the authors had intimate knowledge of the geography, architecture, religious and political leadership, religious customs, language of the day, etc. Even the names of the people appear in the correct percentages.

You'd kind of expect people living in the region to be able to describe the geology, architecture, etc of the region, and oral tradition can preserve a lot of detail in that respect. This is why Homer's accounts of Troy and of Bronze Age warrior Greeks were quite accurate, and he himself was living in a completely oral society centuries afterward. But even then, we don't trust Homer when he says that the Trojan war was ultimately the fault of Paris choosing Aphrodite over Hera and Athena as the fairest.

Furthermore, we know that Luke's account of the census (2:3-4) "3 And everyone went to their own town to register. 4 So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David," is incorrect, because cencuses were never, EVER conducted in such a manner. There is literally nothing that can be gained by moving to the town of your house's origin to be counted rather than just staying put and stating your house when the bean counters came along. Because even during a census, normal life has to continue â€" the Roman Empire didn't simply stop to be counted when a census was commanded.

If the bible is to be taken seriously on its spiritual details because of its accuracy of verifiable details, then the Illiad (being similarly right on verifiable details as the bible) should be taken at least as seriously on spiritual matters of the existence of the Olympian gods.

•   Unintentional internal corroboration provides additional evidence that the gospels are accurate.

I dispute whether this 'internal corroboration' was "unintentional" as you claim. How do you propose showing that the 'corroboration' between the gospels is really separate accounts and not just straight up retellings of an earlier, received story?

•   Accuracy regarding these details adds to the impression that the authors are credible.

Or their work has been redacted to correct earlier inaccuracies.
   

The authors were accountable to other eyewitnesses â€" both supportive and hostile.

•   Many eyewitnesses were still alive at the time the gospels and epistles were written. Anyone disagreeing with a gospel could have easily refuted an erroneous account.

You cannot prove this. Not only have you failed to show that the gospels were written as early as claimed (thus giving witnesses a fighting chance to be alive at that time), since the 'accounts' are unsourced, why would anyone believe that those decryers were witnesses at all? Its their disbelieving word against your holy 'accounts'.

•   The Jews did not deny the tomb was empty; they offered alternative explanations for why it was.

So what if they did?

The authors had no ulterior motive.

What did the authors of the gospels gain from their work? The three classic motives are: power, money, and sex. Not only did Christianity reject these things in general, but the authors were persecuted and killed.

Power, money, and sex are the classic motives, but not an exhaustive set of motives. Religious exhultation is also on the table. Also, this does not guarantee at all the veracity of the claims. You can be sincere, but still wrong.

Additional Points for Discussion:

•   The disciples suffered and died for their beliefs. None recanted their story at the last minute to save himself. People are willing to die for what they believe, but rarely are people willing to die for something they know to be a lie.

Irrelevant. Even if we assume the existence of these diciples and that they suffered and died for their belief, it only speaks to their conviction in that belief and not to its truth. You can certainly be willing to die for a lie if you don't know its a lie.

Second, what makes you think that it is the historical truth they suffered and died for, and not the pious truth? In fact, when faced with torture and death, historical truth has in practice proven to be the more fragile of the two â€" people will lie about a point of reality to make the pain stop much more easily than they would to betray their fundamental beliefs. This point is not any sort of evidence in the bible's favor.

•   Skeptics such as James and Saul were converted.

Equivocation of the term "skeptic" â€" the kind of skeptic that James and Saul were is not the same as the kind of "skeptics" we are. Did James and Saul have the same skeptical apparatus as we do, informed by psychology and science? Of course not. The fact that these "skeptics" were convinced is irrelevant, assuming they existed in the first place.

•   Key social structures were changed in the wake of the resurrection of Jesus.

Which ones?

•   The emergence of the Church suggests that it was founded by someone, directed by someone and based upon the life and teachings of someone.

Actually, there were several sects centered around Jesus, including Marcionism and the Gnostics. This hardly shows that there was a single founder.

Jesus is not a legend, and the New Testament is not a work of fiction.

Whatever, sport.

[Blackleaf]

You may get that opportunity, God willing.

You mean after I...die?

[Randy Carson]

Textual criticism cannot tell you what the original form of a manuscript was. Only a date-able, exant manuscript can do that.

"Original form"? Can you be more specific about what you mean here?

Unsubstantiated claim. We have no original documents to compare to. It's not actually a far stretch to suppose that the gospels did spend a bit of time in an oral tradition, because most people in the ancient world were illiterate.

Some time, yes, but not so much that the accuracy of the transcribed message is in doubt. 1 Corinthians 15:1-8 can be dated to within 3-5 years of the resurrection.

You've floated this reasoning before, and it is no more convincing now as it was then.

Many people obviously disagree. A history of New York should contain an account of the attacks on the World Trade Center in 1993 and 2001...unless they had not occurred, yet.

The Criterion of Embarrassment is a non-starter. So what if the people who wrote the synoptics weren't the major players in it? It's even useful to have the actual writers be secondary characters, because it intoduces a layer of separation between you and the characters you write about, so any flubbing can be excused. In effect, the Criterion of Embarrassment negates itself because having being written by the head characters themselves introduces opportunity for MORE embarrassment â€" like having a Jesus describing things while he's dead.

This is bad logic. Someone attempting to foist a lie on another group of people needs to spin it as positively as possible. Naming a gospel after a hated tax collector would NOT be a good marketing strategy. Further, if you examine the gMark carefully, you will see that Mark goes out of his way to AVOID saying anything negative about Peter from whom he got the material. So, one author avoids the criterion of embarrassment while the others do not. IOW, Christianity enjoys the luxury of having it both ways. Finally, Matthew, Mark and Luke were NOT major players...only John was. The gospel writers did not shrink back from telling the truth about what they saw and heard even when it portrayed them or the major characters in a negative light. This is a sign that they were being honest about what they wrote.

And if Jesus, Peter, James and Mary never existed at all, it really should be no surprise that we have nothing in their own words, but only in the words of others.
Evidence? Was there even a Matthew to make these records? After all, modern scholarship states that none of the gospels were written by the people they're named after. Not John, not James, not Luke, and not Matthew.

Josephus mentions Jesus AND his brother, James. There are other Roman historians who reference the events which are at the heart of the Christian message. You know who they are.

Pure conjecture, to say the least. Modern interviews have accounts attributed to particular people. This gives you a paper trail to follow in case you want to do some fact-checking. Without them, you could make any old shit up and there's no way for outsiders to tell if they were derived from an actual account or just some fiction.
We don't even know if any of the apostles existed as such, let alone were companions of each other.

We don't, eh?

Philemon 1:24
And so do Mark, Aristarchus, Demas and Luke, my fellow workers.

In this one verse, Paul mentions both Mark and Luke.

False dichotomy fallacy. The authors were writing pious 'truth', but that doesn't imply that they were going for historical truth as well. For a more recent example, George Washington and the cherry tree story is absolutely historical fiction (it didn't happen), yet it quite clearly communicates a character truth of George Washington (he was a dilligent, honorable man throughout his life). It's historical fiction, yet it communicates a truth about Washington.

That doesn't help you much. The gospel writers sought to tell us "pious truths" about Jesus, also. Can we finally settle the question of whether Jesus really existed historically once and for all, then?

However, Luke, John and Peter are all clear about their intentions as well as their status as eyewitnesses.

In fact, the notion of a historical truth is a very modern phenomenon. You really don't see a respect for it past a few centuries ago. Ancient peoples really had no use for the 'truth' as we would know it today. In fact, the Buddhists consider the 'real world' a veil over the truth of Enlightenment, and had a similar disregard for historicity. To them, the world is an illusion, so what does it matter whether that illusion went one way or another in the past, or even the present?

The authors were not Buddhists and they were clear enough about wanting to provide "the certainty of the things you have been taught." (cf. Luke 1:4)

The communication of 'the truth' and the 'words of God' does not imply that a historical truth is the one being communicated. In fact, I dare say that these bible stories are meant to be read as parable and not as historical truth.

Scholars disagree with you here.

Every one of these "accounts" are later and use the bible as their source.

Oh? When did Josephus write? Or Tacitus?

You'd kind of expect people living in the region to be able to describe the geology, architecture, etc of the region, and oral tradition can preserve a lot of detail in that respect. This is why Homer's accounts of Troy and of Bronze Age warrior Greeks were quite accurate, and he himself was living in a completely oral society centuries afterward. But even then, we don't trust Homer when he says that the Trojan war was ultimately the fault of Paris choosing Aphrodite over Hera and Athena as the fairest.

Thank you. This places the authors in a position to know these things accurately and not much later.

Furthermore, we know that Luke's account of the census (2:3-4) "3 And everyone went to their own town to register. 4 So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David," is incorrect, because cencuses were never, EVER conducted in such a manner. There is literally nothing that can be gained by moving to the town of your house's origin to be counted rather than just staying put and stating your house when the bean counters came along. Because even during a census, normal life has to continue â€" the Roman Empire didn't simply stop to be counted when a census was commanded.

Speculation on your part.

If the bible is to be taken seriously on its spiritual details because of its accuracy of verifiable details, then the Illiad (being similarly right on verifiable details as the bible) should be taken at least as seriously on spiritual matters of the existence of the Olympian gods.

Fair enough. Study the Iliad and determine whether its spiritual claims seem reasonable to you. Do the same for the NT.

I dispute whether this 'internal corroboration' was "unintentional" as you claim. How do you propose showing that the 'corroboration' between the gospels is really separate accounts and not just straight up retellings of an earlier, received story?

So, the authors colluded? Or are you admitting that there is multiple attestation of the resurrection narrative?

And here we see the other claim made by atheists: it was really one story repeated four times. Normally, skeptics argue against the gospels because of the differences (mistakenly termed "contradictions"), but you appear to be arguing that it was really just one story retold multiple times.

Well, atheists, which is it?

Or their work has been redacted to correct earlier inaccuracies.

Great. Do you have manuscripts containing the earlier errors intact?

You cannot prove this. Not only have you failed to show that the gospels were written as early as claimed (thus giving witnesses a fighting chance to be alive at that time), since the 'accounts' are unsourced, why would anyone believe that those decryers were witnesses at all? Its their disbelieving word against your holy 'accounts'.

I have shown that the gospels had to have been written prior to AD 70. And, btw, almost everyone agrees that John was written by the apostle ca. AD 95. Second, Paul invites his readers to consult with eyewitnesses who were still alive in his epistles...epistles in which he quotes passages from Luke's gospel. So, Luke's gospel must have existed during the living memory of the people Paul was referring to. My OP on the early dating covers this and more.

So what if they did?

That's enemy attestation that the tomb was empty. Which eliminates a couple of key arguments against the resurrection: The Swoon Theory and the Shallow Grave Theory.

The Jews could have produced a body and killed Christianity in its infancy. Except that the couldn't because there was no body in the tomb to produce.

Power, money, and sex are the classic motives, but not an exhaustive set of motives. Religious exhultation is also on the table. Also, this does not guarantee at all the veracity of the claims. You can be sincere, but still wrong.

As a police detective what the list of motives for any crime. You'll get the three I gave. But your addition fails to explain the conversion of Paul, because he was already the golden boy of the Pharisees, the group in power in Jerusalem. Why give up his position only to join the hated band of believers and become persecuted himself?

Yes, you can be sincere and wrong. But answer this for me: the disciples were transformed by what they believed to be physical appearances of Jesus. They touched his wounds. They saw him eat a piece of fish. He cooked breakfast for them. How do they get it wrong that badly if those things never happened?

Irrelevant. Even if we assume the existence of these diciples and that they suffered and died for their belief, it only speaks to their conviction in that belief and not to its truth. You can certainly be willing to die for a lie if you don't know its a lie.

Second, what makes you think that it is the historical truth they suffered and died for, and not the pious truth? In fact, when faced with torture and death, historical truth has in practice proven to be the more fragile of the two â€" people will lie about a point of reality to make the pain stop much more easily than they would to betray their fundamental beliefs. This point is not any sort of evidence in the bible's favor.

People willingly die for their beliefs; no one dies for a fraternity prank gotten out of hand. The disciples KNEW - they did not believe - whether Jesus had actually risen physically and appeared to them.  But if it was all a lie...if there was no resurrection, wouldn't the easiest way to make the pain and suffering of torture and imprisonment be to simply recant? Not one ever did.

Equivocation of the term "skeptic" â€" the kind of skeptic that James and Saul were is not the same as the kind of "skeptics" we are. Did James and Saul have the same skeptical apparatus as we do, informed by psychology and science? Of course not. The fact that these "skeptics" were convinced is irrelevant, assuming they existed in the first place.

Josephus mentions James the brother of Jesus, so that's one strike against you. Second, Saul was not merely an indifferent skeptic. He was zealously persecuting the church, arresting believers, etc. But I see, you modern-day skeptics are so much superior to skeptics in the past because science. Heh...yeah, those clods had no idea that people who died on a cross couldn't rise from the dead. Fools.

Which ones?

Temple sacrifices ended in AD 70, for one. Families were divided between believers and non-believers. Neighborhoods and villages were divided.

Actually, there were several sects centered around Jesus, including Marcionism and the Gnostics. This hardly shows that there was a single founder.

Those are heresies and even they were centered on Jesus.

Whatever, sport.

Yep.

[Randy Carson]

You mean after I...die?

Physically, yes.

Your soul is eternal.

[widdershins]

Exodus 34
34 The Lord said to Moses, “Chisel out two stone tablets like the first ones, and I will write on them the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke

God promises to write the words which were written on the tablets before Exodus 34:1...not in the verses which follow after Exodus 34:1.

What commandments were on the first set of stone tablets, widdershins? What verses contain them?

(Hint: see my previous post or this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten_Commandments)

Wikipedia is not the Bible.  Wikipedia has what a majority of people believe.  It's usually pretty accurate, but the page for my home town used to say we had an "up and coming economy", which has not been true my entire life.  Wikipedia is neither the Bible nor an authority.  It's a great place for general information, and it is "peer reviewed", in a sense, but in the case of Wikipedia the "peers" are everyone, everywhere.

I am not ceding the point that you have in any way "proved" what the original tablets said based on a Wikipedia page says.  I am willing, however, to end this conversation so as not to detract from the more civil conversation we are having elsewhere.

[Randy Carson]

Wikipedia is not the Bible.  Wikipedia has what a majority of people believe.  It's usually pretty accurate, but the page for my home town used to say we had an "up and coming economy", which has not been true my entire life.  Wikipedia is neither the Bible nor an authority.  It's a great place for general information, and it is "peer reviewed", in a sense, but in the case of Wikipedia the "peers" are everyone, everywhere.

I am not ceding the point that you have in any way "proved" what the original tablets said based on a Wikipedia page says.  I am willing, however, to end this conversation so as not to detract from the more civil conversation we are having elsewhere.

Deal.

[Unbeliever]

Pagans have been known to kill Catholic priests, also. But yeah, we won the battle for the hearts and minds of the people the world over.

Damn...we must have a good story to tell.

Yeah - the greatest story ever sold!

[Unbeliever]

Because even though we have an "ignore" button, no one is really interested in using it. The only place I've ever seen actually use it is a guitar forum my father used to frequent... ten years ago.

Despite the fact that perfectly good discussion forums like /r/DebateReligion are entirely dedicated to this discussion, atheist forums will often get used as religious debate platforms. Self-styled missionaries like Randy want to convince us that we're wrong, so they seek us out and badger us. Since many of the atheists on this site are here precisely because they hate dealing with this BS in real life, seeing folks like Randy barging in and preaching like he owns the place angers them to the point where they feel as though they must respond.

Or maybe people just like being assholes, I don't fucking know.

And some us just like playing with the kittens...

[Randy Carson]

Because even though we have an "ignore" button, no one is really interested in using it. The only place I've ever seen actually use it is a guitar forum my father used to frequent... ten years ago.

Despite the fact that perfectly good discussion forums like /r/DebateReligion are entirely dedicated to this discussion, atheist forums will often get used as religious debate platforms. Self-styled missionaries like Randy want to convince us that we're wrong, so they seek us out and badger us. Since many of the atheists on this site are here precisely because they hate dealing with this BS in real life, seeing folks like Randy barging in and preaching like he owns the place angers them to the point where they feel as though they must respond.

Or maybe people just like being assholes, I don't fucking know.

I'm restricting my posting to the Christianity subforum.

What were you EXPECTING to discuss when you clicked on the link to "Christianity"?

[Mike Cl]

Wikipedia is not the Bible.  Wikipedia has what a majority of people believe.  It's usually pretty accurate, but the page for my home town used to say we had an "up and coming economy", which has not been true my entire life.  Wikipedia is neither the Bible nor an authority.  It's a great place for general information, and it is "peer reviewed", in a sense, but in the case of Wikipedia the "peers" are everyone, everywhere.

Here ya go widdershins--the 10 commandments:

The Bible is full of commandments given by its god Yahweh but there is only one group of commandments that he specifically gives the title "The Ten Commandments" to and they are not what most Christians think they are. If you ask almost anyone to list The Ten Commandments they will try to recite a partial list found at Exodus 20:1-17 and repeated at Deuteronomy 5:6-21. However if one reads the Bible those commandments are never referred to as "The Ten Commandments" and according to Exodus they are not even on the stone tablets. They are just select commandments from a collection which Moses recited verbally to the people in Exodus.

Where are the actual Ten Commandments?

In Exodus 24:12 Moses gets stone tablets.

In Exodus 32:19 Moses breaks the stone tablets before anyone else has a chance to read them.

In Exodus 34:1 Yahweh said to Moses, "Chisel out two stone tablets like the first ones, and I will write on them the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke."

In Exodus 34:10-26 Yahweh says he is making a covenant with Moses then cites the commandments of the covenant.

In Exodus 34:27-28 Yahweh tells Moses to write down the commandments he just cited. The Bible says Moses wrote on the tablets (even though Yahweh said he was going to write on them) the words of the covenant then calls the covenant "The Ten Commandments."

The Ten Commandments (according to the Bible)

1.Obey the commandments. Yahweh will conquer the Amorites, Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites. Be careful not to make a treaty with those who live in the land where you are going, or they will be a snare among you. Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones, and cut down their Asherah poles.

2.Do not worship any other god, for Yahweh, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous god. Do not make treaties with those in other lands who worship other gods.

3.Do not make cast idols.

4.Celebrate the Feast of Unleavened Bread. For seven days eat bread made without yeast during the first month of the Hebrew Year.

5.Sacrifice the first born of every womb, including all the firstborn males of your livestock. You can sacrifice a lamb in place of a firstborn donkey but if you do sacrifice the donkey break its neck. If your firstborn child is a boy sacrifice something else in its place. None shall appear before Yahweh without a sacrifice.

6.Do not work on the sabbath, even during the plowing season and harvest you must rest.

7.Celebrate the Jewish holiday "The Feast of Weeks" with the firstfruits of the wheat harvest and celebrate the Jewish holiday "The Feast of Ingathering" at the turn of the year. Three times a year all your men are to appear before the god of Israel and he will conquer surrounding nations before you enlarging your territory.

8.Do not mix blood sacrifices to Yahweh with yeast and do not let any sacrifice from the Passover Feast remain until morning.

9.Bring the firstfruits of your land to the house of Yahweh, your god.

10.Do not cook a baby goat in his mother's milk.

The name "The Ten Commandments" is only used once in the Bible and it is used for the covenant listed in Exodus 34:10-2 and according to Exodus it is this set of commandments which are on the stone tablets within the Arc of the Covenant. However, the book of Deuteronomy which was written after the book of Exodus tells us that a different list of commandments are written on the stone tablets. Deuteronomy 5:6-21 lists the more commonly known commandments as being written on the stone tablets despite what Exodus clearly tells us.