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Bible, Truth or Myth?, Discussion about the Bible (any religion)
AshyGames
post Sep 25 2013, 05:07 PM
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Hello all. And good day.

I've always wondered what other peoples views on the Bible were.

I know some people will say it's 100% true, some will say only parts are true. Along with those who say none of it is true.

I just want to know personal opinions.

And possibly why you have that opinion.

My own personal opinion is that the Bible was created by humans. That there is no God. I believe this simply because of all of the contradictions in the Bible, along with all of the horrible things that went on (killings, etc).

If anyone takes offence to this, I apologize in advance. I'm just simply curious.
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The Unholy Diver
post Sep 28 2013, 12:32 AM
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I mostly agree with you, but I just think saying that "there is no God" is just a little arrogent IMO

More on topic, though, so many people live by The Bible as if it's the word of God. I sincerely disagree with that in every possible way I can. Just think about it: Does it really make sense that Jesus would spend his time writing a book while the rest of the world suffered? He was the only version of God to ever grace our barren planet as it would seem, and he was busy with things that actually mattered. Things such as healing the sick, helping the needy, walking on water, etc.
I know what you're thinking: "People wrote it, but God told them what to write." Let me ask you this: Did He really? Think about it, if somebody in modern times claimed to hear God, or claimed to be the son of God, wouldn't we dismiss them as crazy? What about those who commit murder and claim that God told them to do it? Did God speak to them? If so, why would God, who is supposed to be pure love for his creations, and has thousands of divine methods of killing someone if need be, command one of His lesser subjects to commit murder? If he didn't command them, and they really are crazy, then what's to say that those who wrote the Bible are not?
I know what you're thinking again: "God didn't command people to murder, the Devil disguised himself as God and caused them to murder." OK, that make sense. So, if the Devil can do that, what's to say that Satan didn't write the Bible? Does subjecting a person to eternal damnation due to their sexual orientation sound like something who God, the ultimately powerful and perfect being who 1.) loves and respects all his creations, and 2.) has absolute power to change the way people think at any given time, would do? It doesn't, but it does sound like something Lucifer would do...

Just a little something to think about. There are actually some passages of the Bible that make great sense, but also some that don't. In my opinion, the Bible is just like any other text of any kind: imperfect and need outside knowledge to fit in the missing peices and to point out the self-contradiction.

This post has been edited by Zer0hundred: Sep 28 2013, 12:34 AM


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wildmanjesse
post Jan 29 2014, 12:49 PM
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Okay this shall be fun! Well I am a Christian so of course I am going to say that the Bible is 100% true. There is a lot of evidence out there that proves the Bible and to show that the events really did happen and that it was not man made. Especially if we compare the Bible to other religions and most have even admitted it such as Jehovah's Witness, and the Quran. There is also way to many contradictions is other thoughts such as evolution no one can prove that we evolved from apes or whatever no one can prove that a species changed to a different species. The biggest question is not weather there is a God or whatever the bigger question is why if he "loves" of so much would he cast all the bad stuff out this world. but this is not how God works he won't just cast away anything evil from this world because when God created this world he knew that everything would happen that Adam and Eve would sin and so on. So God gave everyone the freewill to choose weather to love him back or not because he could of easily made so everyone believed in him and the world was perfect but he didn't. I hope I didn't offend anyone if I did I apologize.
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Asmodeus
post Sep 23 2014, 07:06 PM
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There is truth in the Bible, but it is not one hundred percent accurate. The original texts are in Ancient Hebrew and Greek, so I wouldn't trust any translations that people today, or even the first translations of the texts into English and just about every other language it is now in to be accurate enough to believe in wholly and undoubtedly. Keep in mind that the Bible is also written by man, and that those who wrote it claim that God spoke to them. We can't actually verify this. There is no proof. Yes, events that happened in the Bible did occur. Yes, relics from those times do exist. This does not mean you should wholly believe in it. Everyone who reads it needs to keep an open mind, and remember to leave room for human interpretation.

Nobody is perfect.


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Indigo League
post Oct 14 2014, 05:47 PM
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Well to say that it's true, or not true is a hard question to answer, for anyone to answer no matter what they believe. But here is my rendition on the matter, and whether you want to take it into consideration is all the reader's choice!

I was told years ago that humans have adapted the habit of trying to record everything they saw and experienced since the Stone Age with cave drawings, and with the lack of science, they explained things in their own words. Animals they have never seen before, odd coincidences, they would give it a name such as "Dragons", "Phoenix", or even "God" to put them at ease about what they don't understand.

A lot of humans have a hard time believing that there is nothing after death, and to think that there isn't something or someone waiting frightens them since consciousness was born into the human psyche. So creating something bigger than them was the answer to make death an easier transition for the dying and for the one who is mourning.

So for the Bible it could be similar to that, putting an explanation to what they could not explain with science. Either it was a string of strange coincidences and they had to write it down, in their own words in order to explain what just happened, or they embellished the situation due to their overwhelming awe. Remember there have been a lot of translations of the Bible since its creation, thus many things could have been lost in translation or dramatically changed (take the apple of Eden who some scientists believe it was a Pomegranate or some other fruit).

I could honestly go on forever with this and bore you with lots of things, I am Christian, but I listen to their stories with a pinch of salt. I must say my favorite story has to be the one of Moses due to it actually having some plausible facts, scientifically it is a string of natural phenomenons who coincidentally happened so close to each other that its hard to fathom that it was naturally occurring. Do I believe in God? Perhaps. However even this story could have been embellished of how close these phenomenons happened.

My end note, the Bible is a really cool story with lots of wonderful texts in it - is it real? For the most part, maybe. Just exaggerated big time from the lack of science.

This is my own personal opinion however and I do not mean to step on anyone's toes. I was told years ago that if science and religion would go hand in hand some day, it would be a beautiful marriage - so since I have been looking at it in a religious and scientific way, the Bible has become far more interesting.
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Mercutio3
post Dec 5 2014, 11:01 PM
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I don't believe in the Bible. I feel as though, even if it is all or mostly true (which it's not, translation + editing over time at least), it doesn't matter. These were events that took place in a society and culture astronomically different from our own, involving people long dead. Instead of basing our lives on one solitary book, shouldn't we take the best of everything and forge our own paths?


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Jonahman10
post Jan 1 2015, 11:04 AM
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This is more of a flow of thoughts rather than an actual argument, but I'd like to bring up some things that were not mentioned yet. Take into account that I am biased both because I am scientist (more as a strong interest rather than as a main profession) and a Christian.

Just to clarify the Bible is actually a collection of quite a few texts with many purposes and sometimes the expressions used to accomplish the purpose only apply in circumstances. If in a poem I said "Sadness is an ocean" it is unlikely I literally mean that, and there are many poetic sections in the books of the Bible, both in Historical Narratives (Like Exodus) and Poetic Books (such as the entire book of Psalms) and pretty much every Biblical genre. Also, especially in the Epistles (those smallish books in the New Testament after the book of Acts which were actually letters) the intended audience shifts drastically; some of the epistles are written to church which apparently acting wild and crazy, while others were being legalistic and exclusive. Clearly, higher ups in the church would send what appears to be opposing advice to these two churches because they are experiencing opposite extremes.

It seems to me that the book of Job was written allegorically, and was never exactly intended to be interpreted as an actual event, but I could be wrong.

The book of Genesis then seems to be interesting. Its early narratives (creation, the Tower of Babel, the Flood and whatnot) seem to be mocking pagan culture (though if they were based on real events you could also make the argument that most cultures around that region should have adopted some similar narrative). Creation very specifically makes the argument that there is one God, and he is the God of everything, rather than a pantheon of gods living in a universe created by a battle between an evil snake god and a good sub god and their lesser fire, and fertility gods who are morally ambiguous or whatever the specific pagan beliefs are. Other stories, such as the flood narrative, seem to be using common legends to explain similar theological concepts about God. (this is not so weird considering that similar things happened in Europe after the rise of Christianity, where pagan understanding of the world was used as a springboard to create parallels with a monotheistic triune-God). After this, the narrative shifts to Abraham and his family, which is more like a traditional historical narrative, though some actions seem to be rather specific for something that would have been spread by oral tradition. By this I mean that sometimes it may say something like "character X brought 10 camels as a gift." I think symbolic numbering is used quite a lot and could communicate something like "character x was completely serious about being friends that he gave them a completed number of livestock" rather than the literal statement "character X brought 10 camels as a gift."

Perhaps the Bible was God inspired, but man written? This does not mean God dictated. Different books have very unique audiences, and their interpretation may be very different by modern audiences than what the original intended audience. Different authors have different vantage points of God. I feel like if a God existed, then he would be so complex that we could not comprehend all of his aspects simultaneously, and we could only see a very narrow part of God at a time. In that way it would explain the variation in the books in the Bible and the differences in between denominations. A lot of Christians may make the claim that the entire Bible is completely clear in all of its meanings to anyone, but the truth is I do not believe it is so.


Edit Summary (Here is where the Bias Really kicks in):
So in short, I guess it depends on what you consider "truth." Personally, I uphold the Bible as a group of founding documents about my personal faith that gives a comprehensive view of Theology, History, as well as other subject matters. Some parts are symbolic, others allegorical, others literal, others a combination, and sometimes its difficult to tell the difference between the different parts. Overall, it has truth in all of those aspects in some regard, but not always a literal truth (in the Prophets and Revelation, there are numerous times were this is explicitly stated in explanations of visions). I believe it is inerrant in that sense then. Some people act like the Bible is God instead of about God, and that also not consistent with my beliefs.

This post has been edited by Jonahman10: Jan 1 2015, 01:28 PM
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raven roth logan
post Jan 3 2015, 05:40 PM
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[quote name='Jonahman10' date='Jan 1 2015, 12:04 PM' post='2399233']
This is more of a flow of thoughts rather than an actual argument, but I'd like to bring up some things that were not mentioned yet. Take into account that I am biased both because I am scientist (more as a strong interest rather than as a main profession) and a Christian.

Just to clarify the Bible is actually a collection of quite a few texts with many purposes and sometimes the expressions used to accomplish the purpose only apply in circumstances. If in a poem I said "Sadness is an ocean" it is unlikely I literally mean that, and there are many poetic sections in the books of the Bible, both in Historical Narratives (Like Exodus) and Poetic Books (such as the entire book of Psalms) and pretty much every Biblical genre. Also, especially in the Epistles (those smallish books in the New Testament after the book of Acts which were actually letters) the intended audience shifts drastically; some of the epistles are written to church which apparently acting wild and crazy, while others were being legalistic and exclusive. Clearly, higher ups in the church would send what appears to be opposing advice to these two churches because they are experiencing opposite extremes.

It seems to me that the book of Job was written allegorically, and was never exactly intended to be interpreted as an actual event, but I could be wrong.

The book of Genesis then seems to be interesting. Its early narratives (creation, the Tower of Babel, the Flood and whatnot) seem to be mocking pagan culture (though if they were based on real events you could also make the argument that most cultures around that region should have adopted some similar narrative). Creation very specifically makes the argument that there is one God, and he is the God of everything, rather than a pantheon of gods living in a universe created by a battle between an evil snake god and a good sub god and their lesser fire, and fertility gods who are morally ambiguous or whatever the specific pagan beliefs are. Other stories, such as the flood narrative, seem to be using common legends to explain similar theological concepts about God. (this is not so weird considering that similar things happened in Europe after the rise of Christianity, where pagan understanding of the world was used as a springboard to create parallels with a monotheistic triune-God). After this, the narrative shifts to Abraham and his family, which is more like a traditional historical narrative, though some actions seem to be rather specific for something that would have been spread by oral tradition. By this I mean that sometimes it may say something like "character X brought 10 camels as a gift." I think symbolic numbering is used quite a lot and could communicate something like "character x was completely serious about being friends that he gave them a completed number of livestock" rather than the literal statement "character X brought 10 camels as a gift."

Perhaps the Bible was God inspired, but man written? This does not mean God dictated. Different books have very unique audiences, and their interpretation may be very different by modern audiences than what the original intended audience. Different authors have different vantage points of God. I feel like if a God existed, then he would be so complex that we could not comprehend all of his aspects simultaneously, and we could only see a very narrow part of God at a time. In that way it would explain the variation in the books in the Bible and the differences in between denominations. A lot of Christians may make the claim that the entire Bible is completely clear in all of its meanings to anyone, but the truth is I do not believe it is so.


Edit Summary (Here is where the Bias Really kicks in):
So in short, I guess it depends on what you consider "truth." Personally, I uphold the Bible as a group of founding documents about my personal faith that gives a comprehensive view of Theology, History, as well as other subject matters. Some parts are symbolic, others allegorical, others literal, others a combination, and sometimes its difficult to tell the difference between the different parts. Overall, it has truth in all of those aspects in some regard, but not always a literal truth (in the Prophets and Revelation, there are numerous times were this is explicitly stated in explanations of visions). I believe it is inerrant in that sense then. Some people act like the Bible is God instead of about God, and that also not consistent with my beliefs.
[/quot the bible is true the king james verstion is all truth
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kaseykg
post Jul 17 2015, 11:28 AM
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I don't know what I believe in terms of if god is real or not. I'm leaning towards probably not.
However, I feel that the bible was written in a different time, and should not be used as a basis for how society works today. People love to use the bible as a crutch. "Well the bible says...." The bible is so old. We (people) have made so many advances in society, that people should not be looking to this old book for answers.


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Gryphaena
post Jul 17 2015, 03:25 PM
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QUOTE(kaseykg @ Jul 17 2015, 09:28 AM) *
I don't know what I believe in terms of if god is real or not. I'm leaning towards probably not.
However, I feel that the bible was written in a different time, and should not be used as a basis for how society works today. People love to use the bible as a crutch. "Well the bible says...." The bible is so old. We (people) have made so many advances in society, that people should not be looking to this old book for answers.


I think there are still good things to be found in the Bible. I admit that i do not care much for the genealogy parts.

"No greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends"

"...[H]ope, faith and love. But the greatest of these is love, for if i do not have love, i am nothing."

"If man dwell in love, he dwells with God."

"If you hate your neighbor who you do see, how can you claim to love God, who you cannot see?"

"Thou shall not kill"

"Thou shall not steal"

"Thou shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or your neighbor's goods"

"Thou shall not commit false witness against your neighbor"

These are things i remember right now but I think there are more things that are still useful that people from the Bible and Jesus have to say.

I don't think I'm stating anything wrong but if i am then i guess i'll get punished sometime.


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Azor Ahai
post Jul 19 2015, 03:38 AM
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kumoku
post Apr 27 2016, 09:14 PM
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I feel like the Bible was written with good intentions, but should be taken with a grain of salt. The culture of the day was also bluntly evident within it.


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maeriia
post Sep 3 2016, 09:01 PM
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As a Christian, I tend to take it as a combination of fables and true-to-life events, more so intended as a communication platform than a historical record. While some of the material may not seem applicable in today's world, I feel as though the deeper meaning that it communicates would still apply centuries from now.
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tooawkwardtolive
post Oct 15 2016, 04:35 PM
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I believe that most of the bible is bs. People shouldn't live by it and follow every word to the T, because the time it was written in was so different that it really doesn't apply anymore. The tales (to me at least) are far-fetched and honestly are extremely unrealistic. It honestly sounds like more of an old-timey fantasy novel than a book.


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DamienLee
post Jul 29 2020, 03:21 AM
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QUOTE(Asmodeus @ Sep 23 2014, 07:06 PM) *
There is truth in the Bible, but it is not one hundred percent accurate. The original texts are in Ancient Hebrew and Greek, so I wouldn't trust any translations that people today, or even the first translations of the texts into English and just about every other language it is now in to be accurate enough to believe in wholly and undoubtedly. Keep in mind that the Bible is also written by man, and that those who wrote it claim that God spoke to them. We can't actually verify this. There is no proof. Yes, events that happened in the Bible did occur. Yes, relics from those times do exist. This does not mean you should wholly believe in it. Everyone who reads it needs to keep an open mind, and remember to leave room for human interpretation.

Nobody is perfect.


For the most part I agree with you. The Bible provides much as a basic rule for a happy life, but interpretations can distort the meaning to the exact opposite.
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SaltyMissingno
post Jan 6 2021, 01:26 AM
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This is an interesting discussion and it's nice to see everybody expressing their thoughts on it civilly.

Personally, I don't believe any part of the bible is true. I'm pagan for one. For two, the bible was written by humans. Humans have biases, especially hundreds of years ago where people could be burned at the stake for wearing clothes deemed to be for the opposite gender. And for something that is supposed to be the word of the highest power, it has sure been revised a lot. There are a lot of inconsistencies and contradictions in the bible, you can probably find a bible verse supporting any argument you have regardless of what side of the debate you're on.

For example, the bible states drunkards are one of the groups that will not inherit the Kingdom of God (1 Corinthians 6:9-10). But Jesus turns water to wine, and it wasn't a small amount. If I remember correctly there's even a remark made about the host withholding the good stuff. Soo...are all these wedding guests barred from Heaven because they got plastered especially in Jesus's presence?

And Noah's ark is not at all plausible. The ark was only about the size of the titanic...but it had enough room to hold two of every animal? Maybe two of every animal for the middle-eastern region, but two of every animal on Earth would not be possible. Plus this spirals back to the Adam and Eve debate: If all animals alive today descended from the pair on the ark, wouldn't that mean there have been thousands of years if inbreeding going on? And if so, why doesn't today's animal population reflect that? In fact, many animals have biological programming to prevent inbreeding.

There are more, those are just two examples of biblical contradictions and inconsistencies. I apologize if I came off as aggressive in any way. I'm trying to discuss this topic as civilly as I can.
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The quiet wolf
post Jan 7 2021, 10:46 PM
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My favorite answers and the ones pretty much spot on about how I interpret the Bible are #2 & #3, both well put enough I feel comfortable not repeating the same message again as my words would be redundant.

I will say they don't say it directly, but I think it would be silly to doubt the existence of Jesus of Nazareth and other people and events referenced outside of the Bible. (While certainly appreciating what actually happened might be quite different.)


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