Oldest Bible Found - Christianity Under Attack?

[childeye]

words of christ? hmm you need to be able to know when the lord(YHWH) spoke and christ did. there are places where one or the other does speak.

in the tanakh most of the time the word YHWH is replace with LORD and that is the father saying that.

and when you look at the commandment given to moses by the YHWH to follow and obey the angel unto the LORD. you get a command from the father telling moses to listen to the son as in general theologicians see the malach YHWH as a preinicarnate christ. and christ claimed that name.

I already knew that. What makes you say I need to learn that? Is it because I said "he is"?

 

[Nevalti]

Correction, I said "I" never call "the scriptures", the word of God. I did not say anybody else must do what "I" do.

O.K. but thousands, millions even do claim (without thinking?) that the bible is the word of God or inspired by God etc. That belief is after all the basis of most current Christianity. It was not of course the basis of Christianity for the first 300 years or so before the bible was written. That change was deliberately brought about by Constantine to stop the various Christian factions fighting.

This to me is the absolutely crucial point. The bible was composed by men amid much bitterness and wrangling between the many different versions of Christianity. Vast amounts of text were declared gnostic and/or burned and opposing strains of Christianity were ruthlessly stamped out - slaughtered in some cases even hundreds of years later. This particular thread is simply about one of those gnostic versions, in video format, being given the light of day.

So, what of the bible (composed around 300AD)? Did those arguing men have the assistance of God in selecting what to put in it? Was the influence of Constantine important? Rather than us now claiming that they did have the help of God - because they said they did, how about looking for a little bit of evidence? I can't help thinking that God would have done a far better job of it than those arguing men 1700 years ago. He could, for example, have got them to leave out the whole of the OT - as some of them wanted to do. He could have left out support for slavery, beatings, wife abuse etc.

In reality, those bible editors could of course be every bit as accurate as you and I could be piecing together the true history of Shakespeare's life and his genuine bibliography. There are many records to draw upon of course but how many of them could we rely upon when there is so much conflicting evidence? No matter how violently someone argued that they know the truth about Shakespeare, we really could never be sure. The written records for Shakespeare are thousands of times greater than scripture but we do not know the true words of Shakespeare let alone the true words of God - no mater how violently someone wishes to argue that we do.

It is of course the same with the bible or even this so called 'oldest bible' video. We can choose to call anything the word of God but that is simply our choice, it does not make it fact. One could readily argue that the rejected gospels of Peter, Thomas and Magdalene etc were truly inspired by God. So, to argue over subtle variations on those words is more than a little pointless. The only worthwhile question is, 'why should we regard the bible or scripture as the word of God?' Once we have that answer we can unite the world. If we keep arguing over trivia, we just help to fragment the world.

 

[childeye]

O.K. but thousands, millions even do claim (without thinking?) that the bible is the word of God or inspired by God etc. That belief is after all the basis of most current Christianity. It was not of course the basis of Christianity for the first 300 years or so before the bible was written. That change was deliberately brought about by Constantine to stop the various Christian factions fighting.

This to me is the absolutely crucial point. The bible was composed by men amid much bitterness and wrangling between the many different versions of Christianity. Vast amounts of text were declared gnostic and/or burned and opposing strains of Christianity were ruthlessly stamped out - slaughtered in some cases even hundreds of years later. This particular thread is simply about one of those gnostic versions, in video format, being given the light of day.

So, what of the bible (composed around 300AD)? Did those arguing men have the assistance of God in selecting what to put in it? Was the influence of Constantine important? Rather than us now claiming that they did have the help of God - because they said they did, how about looking for a little bit of evidence? I can't help thinking that God would have done a far better job of it than those arguing men 1700 years ago. He could, for example, have got them to leave out the whole of the OT - as some of them wanted to do. He could have left out support for slavery, beatings, wife abuse etc.

In reality, those bible editors could of course be every bit as accurate as you and I could be piecing together the true history of Shakespeare's life and his genuine bibliography. There are many records to draw upon of course but how many of them could we rely upon when there is so much conflicting evidence? No matter how violently someone argued that they know the truth about Shakespeare, we really could never be sure. The written records for Shakespeare are thousands of times greater than scripture but we do not know the true words of Shakespeare let alone the true words of God - no mater how violently someone wishes to argue that we do.

It is of course the same with the bible or even this so called 'oldest bible' video. We can choose to call anything the word of God but that is simply our choice, it does not make it fact. One could readily argue that the rejected gospels of Peter, Thomas and Magdalene etc were truly inspired by God. So, to argue over subtle variations on those words is more than a little pointless. The only worthwhile question is, 'why should we regard the bible or scripture as the word of God?' Once we have that answer we can unite the world. If we keep arguing over trivia, we just help to fragment the world.

This is the Word of God. Love your neighbor as yourself and Love God with all you heart mind and soul. In other words, abide in Love for God is Love.

 

[Free]

O.K. but thousands, millions even do claim (without thinking?) that the bible is the word of God or inspired by God etc. That belief is after all the basis of most current Christianity. It was not of course the basis of Christianity for the first 300 years or so before the bible was written. That change was deliberately brought about by Constantine to stop the various Christian factions fighting.

This to me is the absolutely crucial point. The bible was composed by men amid much bitterness and wrangling between the many different versions of Christianity. Vast amounts of text were declared gnostic and/or burned and opposing strains of Christianity were ruthlessly stamped out - slaughtered in some cases even hundreds of years later. This particular thread is simply about one of those gnostic versions, in video format, being given the light of day.

Here you are simply begging the question by presuming that other sects were actually Christian. There was, in fact, large agreement on the majority of the books that were to be included in the Bible, and very good reasons for rejecting what was rejected.

So, what of the bible (composed around 300AD)? Did those arguing men have the assistance of God in selecting what to put in it? Was the influence of Constantine important? Rather than us now claiming that they did have the help of God - because they said they did, how about looking for a little bit of evidence? I can't help thinking that God would have done a far better job of it than those arguing men 1700 years ago. He could, for example, have got them to leave out the whole of the OT - as some of them wanted to do. He could have left out support for slavery, beatings, wife abuse etc.

There is no reason to believe that God was not involved somehow in the process. There were at least four criteria which were used in determining which books to be included. The references to parts of the OT show that you do not really understand what was written, but that is not what this topic is about.

In fact, I would argue that evidence of God's involvement is precisely why we have what we do in the Bible. Certainly if it were just men trying to make the perfect religion and make it appear as though the writings were divine, would have removed all the unfavorable and difficult parts.

It is of course the same with the bible or even this so called 'oldest bible' video. We can choose to call anything the word of God but that is simply our choice, it does not make it fact. One could readily argue that the rejected gospels of Peter, Thomas and Magdalene etc were truly inspired by God. So, to argue over subtle variations on those words is more than a little pointless. The only worthwhile question is, 'why should we regard the bible or scripture as the word of God?' Once we have that answer we can unite the world. If we keep arguing over trivia, we just help to fragment the world.

People do, of course, "readily argue that the rejected gospels of Peter, Thomas and Magdalene etc were truly inspired by God," but there are very good reasons for rejecting most, if not all, of them as pseudopigraphy and are generally accepted as much later works.

As to why should we should regard the Bible as the word of God, well, that's been answered more times than anyone can count and we are still not united.

 

[Nevalti]

Here you are simply begging the question by presuming that other sects were actually Christian. There was, in fact, large agreement on the majority of the books that were to be included in the Bible, and very good reasons for rejecting what was rejected.

Historically, there is no doubt that the other groups were Christian. The whole purpose of that first Synod at Mycea was to standardise the many variants of Christianity and stop the inter sect fighting that was the cause of Christianity being banned by Rome. Banned despite Rome's almost total tolerance of the multitude of religions within their Empire. It would be very sad to deny some of those groups the title 'Christian' as that is certainly how they regarded themselves and they died with the name of Christ on their lips. Consider in particular the Aryans (gradually died out) and the Cathars (Slaughtered mercilessly). It makes no more sense to deny them the title 'Christian' than it does to deny any of the 200 current Christian sects, denominations and orders the title 'Christian'.

There is no reason to believe that God was not involved somehow in the process.

There is no obvious reason to assume that God was involved of course.

There were at least four criteria which were used in determining which books to be included.

This interesting. I have never come across anything which describes the true process within the Synod, only the external record of major disagreements and of course the final, political, shared statement of Agreement - just like we get today. I would be really grateful for the historical references to the 'minutes' or anything vaguely similar.

The references to parts of the OT show that you do not really understand what was written

I presume that is just an insult which I can safely ignore or have I missed your point?

As to why should we should regard the Bible as the word of God, well, that's been answered more times than anyone can count.

I would be grateful if you could humour me and explain it one more time. It is probably the most important question for mankind.

This is the first time I have attempted to respond to multiple quotes. If I have done in wrongly it will be a mess so I will have another attempt fairly soon.