Biblical rebuttals

I am currently having a good old hand bag fight with PDN over 1 Kings 7, the bit of the Bible that gets Pi wrong.

It says that a metal cast of 10 cubits in diameter would produce a circumference of 30. Which it wouldn't, it would produce a circumference of 31 if you stuck to whole cubits.

PDN is now claiming that the engineers could have produced a base of 9.6 cubits, which would allow the circumference to be approx 30. And to avoid confusion the Bible authors rounded the bases up to full cubits when describing the lengths.

Which is perfectly true, but total nonsense as an explanation when placed beside the other possibility, the Bible got it wrong.

but i guess if you believe the Bible can't get it wrong, any explanation, no matter how unlikely, will be acceptable to you. The mind of a "rational" believer.

Gaviscon wrote: »

It will be interesting when PDN gets wind of this thread. It's all looking a bit one sided at the moment..

Happy Days.

Actually there are plenty of Biblical passages that cause real difficulties to most thinking Christians. What amazes me is that atheists so rarely touch on them and instead pick the silliest hills of beans on which to fight.

amadeus wrote:

One of the accusations thrown by theists is that unbelievers are simply uneducated. If we knew more about the bible we would believe. Now the bible being what it is it is strewn with verses that you can use to argue against a wise, all knowing and interventionist god.

My favourite is from the book of genisis, chapter 19, veses 30 - 38:

So Lot's daughters get thier father drunk so that they can have sex and get pregnant by him I think that breaks a couple of teh 10 commandments!

Are there any other good rebuttals that you know of?

Do you actually understand what a rebuttal is?

Of course Lot's daughters broke several of the commandments - that is the whole point of that passage! It is describing the illegitimate and sinful origins of the two nations that were descended from Lot's daughters and were bitter enemies of the Jews - namely Ammon & Moab.

I'm not quite sure how you think that rebutts anything. The fact that two women broke several of the commandments is hardly an earth-shaking revelation to anyone, or a rebuttal to any tenet of Christianity.

Charco wrote:

So God decides to slaughter the population of Sodom and Gomorrah because of their sexual activities yet he saves Lot's family who were into incestual rape and I believe earlier Lot offered his daughters to a crowd so that they could rape them. What strange standards God has.

The Bible simply says that God decided to punish Sodom and Gomorrah for their sinfulness. It does not say they were punished specifically for their sexual activities. Lot was saved because he believed the warning from the angelic visitors and fled the city before destruction arrived. Lot himself was obviously a weak and sinful person (as well as a crap parent), but his faith saved him.

You might not like this message, but it is untrue to refer to it as an inconsistency. The message that sinful men and women can be saved by putting their faith in God runs through the Bible from Genesis to Revelation.

Charco wrote:

Off the top of my head some rebuttals I can think of include how Jesus is said to be descended from David, however the line to David is through Joseph who was supposedly not related to Jesus. In the Gospel of Luke we see Mary describe Joseph as Jesus' father. Was Jesus descended from David through Joseph or wasn't he? He can't be both.

Joseph, as the husband of Mary, was the legal parent of Jesus. If Jesus had been illegitimate then Joseph would be Jesus' legal father but not his biological father. The same would apply in the case of a miracle such as a virgin birth. Now, as an atheist you will no doubt find it more likely that Mary slept with another guy rather than that a virgin birth occurred - but either way your example fails miserably as a rebuttal.

Charco wrote:

Another passage that can be rebutted was when Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane. He goes off to pray whilst the disciples slept and the Gospels provide quotations of what Jesus said and what he did. What I want to know is how does anyone know what he said, all the witnesses were asleep. Yet somehow we get detailed quotations of exactly what he said.

So Jesus talked to His disciples afterwards and told them what he prayed? Big deal!

Come on guys, you can do better than this!

Ikky poo 2 wrote:

And thou shalt not kill....?

God bless the internet! Where else could I get the opportunity to speak to someone called Ikky Poo?

Plenty of nations have laws forbidding murder but mandating capital punishment. Uncomfortable for a pacifist opposed to the death penalty like myself? Yes. But a rebuttal? Not in this universe, Ikky Poo. Go and wipe yourself clean.

anti venom wrote:

Deuteronomy 22:28-29 (King James Version)
King James Version (KJV)
Public Domain

28If a man find a damsel that is a virgin, which is not betrothed, and lay hold on her, and lie with her, and they be found;

29Then the man that lay with her shall give unto the damsel's father fifty shekels of silver, and she shall be his wife; because he hath humbled her, he may not put her away all his days.

Is this clearly not saying that if a man rapes a girl then he must pay her father and then marry her?

Yes, in the rough justice of nomadic societies many centuries ago a girl who had lost her virginity was considered disgraced and unmarriagable. This even applied to the unfortunate victims of rape who were frequently reduced to beggary and prostitution in order to survive.

This commandment, ordering the rapist to pay a dowry and then to marry his victim, was actually a great improvement on what happened in surrounding cultures.

Today we look at it from a different culture and cringe - but it hardly serves as a rebuttal of anything.

Zillah wrote:

My favourite part of the bible is when God sends two she bears to tear 42 children to pieces for making fun of Elijah.

Could a biblical apologist please address the above.

Hey, that's one of my favourite parts of the Bible as well! You very theatrically put your own spin on the story. Let's remove Zillah's embellishments and explore a different interpretation that remains faithful to the text.

It is a time of religious conflict and sectarian violence. A large crowd of young men (the Hebew word refers to any young male) form a mob and start abusing an elderly man about his baldness. Try to understand how the Bible speaks to situations that reoccur throughout human history. For me this reminds me of how, when I was a teenager, I was followed by a group of teenagers through Belfast city centre. As they subjected me to sectarian taunts I wondered when the first kick or punch would come. I was not brave enough to turn and confront them - I just hoped against hope that things wouldn't get worse (they did get worse and I was hospitalised). Other readers who are gay might think of that time a group of guys stalked them while making homophobic remarks.

The elderly man, although massively outnumbered, bravely turns round and curses the young men. What will happen now? Will they beat him up? Maybe even kill him? The reader waits with bated breath.

Then, out of the woods, two bears appears. They ignores the bald old man and head straight for the mob of young men. In a wonderfully comedic scene the bears manage to tear (ie maul or scratch) 42 of the young man. There is no mention of anyone being killed or "torn to pieces". Such an interpretation could only be produced by someone who has never watched the Discovery Channel or National Geographic. What kind of bears could kill 42 young men in a single attack? Anyone who suggests such a thing is guilty of antiscience!

Now, as we listen to the story, all of us who have ever been bullied or intimidated by a mob can't help smiling at the thought of these 42 young hoodlums squealing with fear as, scratched and bleeding, they run away from the bears.

The story is about rough, but extremely poetic, justice. Quite what Zillah thinks it rebuts is anyone's guess.

Wicknight wrote:

am currently having a good old hand bag fight with PDN over 1 Kings 7, the bit of the Bible that gets Pi wrong.

It says that a metal cast of 10 cubits in diameter would produce a circumference of 30. Which it wouldn't, it would produce a circumference of 31 if you stuck to whole cubits.

PDN is now claiming that the engineers could have produced a base of 9.6 cubits, which would allow the circumference to be approx 30. And to avoid confusion the Bible authors rounded the bases up to full cubits when describing the lengths.

Which is perfectly true, but total nonsense as an explanation when placed beside the other possibility, the Bible got it wrong.

but i guess if you believe the Bible can't get it wrong, any explanation, no matter how unlikely, will be acceptable to you. The mind of a "rational" believer.

So, because you're getting your ass kicked in this debate on the Christianity forum you try to bring it over here where you think you might find a more sympathetic response from a home crowd? Coward. :pac:

Asiaprod wrote: »

Would love to hear which Biblical passages cause real difficulties to most thinking Christians

You want me to help them?

The atheists are those who proclaim themselves to be rational and educated. Surely they can come up with the answers unaided?

Asiaprod wrote: »

Would love to hear which Biblical passages cause real difficulties to most thinking Christians

I would have thought it would be painfully obvious by now that there is no such thing, a true believer can make anything acceptable to their position given enough time and creative energy.

Young boys become young men become a mob of yobos.

Joking about a bald man becomes terrorizing him with the threat of violence.

Two bears taring apart a group becomes bears slightly crazing a mob who was about to beat up an old man.

An act of savage violence becomes "poetic justice"

A man being made pay compensation to the father of the women he raped becomes an "improvement"

And my personal fav, 10 becomes 9.6

And so on and so on....