Is salvation really that clear? I think many people assume it is the reward for living a good life, while others think it stems from doing good works or confessing a belief in Jesus. Still, others take the Calvinist view that it is all predestined and only a certain number will be taking the escalator to the sky.
Evangelicals believe they will be beamed up during an event called "the Rapture". Seems pretty unclear to me once I defocus back the microscope and take a more macroscopic view. Maybe moksha or nirvana is in store for us. Perhaps the Great Raven will fly us to Manitou. Onward to Valhalla! Maybe we will find ourselves asking the question, "How now brown Dao?"
To answer your question though; the rim size, flaring, vessel thickness and overall angle.
I think one of my favorite things about the link (that was shared as evidence for biblical inerrancy) is that while bludgeoning the Bible in order to make it fit with the numbers, it ends up claiming that the Bible contains a copyist error in 2 Chronicles.
I see it for what it is ---- a very profound illustration of the detail contained within the Bible that is often overlooked or ignored...
I'm afraid I fail to see how someone making up details that aren't there is a profound illustration of the detail that is there.
How many stalls of horses did Solomon have, 4,000 or 40,000? 1 Kings 4:26 and 2 Chronicles 9:25
40,000 (1 Kings 4:26) - "And Solomon had 40,000 stalls of horses for his chariots, and 12,000 horsemen." 4,000 (2 Chron. 9:25) - "Now Solomon had 4,000 stalls for horses and chariots and 12,000 horsemen, and he stationed them in the chariot cities and with the king in Jerusalem." There are two possible explanations for this discrepancy. 1) a copyist error. 2) the difference is due to time; that is, one account is at the beginning of Solomon's reign (1 Kings 4:26), and the other at the end (2 Chron. 9:25).
Does this prove the Bible cannot be trusted? NO!
No link with made up numbers about Solomon's oats production to support the number of horses?
Seriously though, my apologies for my tongue-in-cheek comment that has continued the train wreck of misunderstanding of what is historically meant by biblical inerrancy.
"Some people never go crazy. What truly horrible lives they must lead." ~Charles Bukowski
moksha wrote:Is salvation really that clear? I think many people assume it is the reward for living a good life, while others think it stems from doing good works or confessing a belief in Jesus. Still, others take the Calvinist view that it is all predestined and only a certain number will be taking the escalator to the sky.
Evangelicals believe they will be beamed up during an event called "the Rapture". Seems pretty unclear to me once I defocus back the microscope and take a more macroscopic view. Maybe moksha or nirvana is in store for us. Perhaps the Great Raven will fly us to Manitou. Onward to Valhalla! Maybe we will find ourselves asking the question, "How now brown Dao?"
Moksha, I hardly wish to propose everything with some sort of connection to salvation is clear. All kinds of things have connection to salvation, and all kinds of things are connected to those things. That results in a vary large amount of uncertain and unknown things. I am doubtful about any rapture. I think the whole end time scenario popular these days is unlikely.
I do think that from a Christian point of view the foundation of Salvation is clear. Nipper and I have different views about a good number of things. We share Jesus as Lord and Savior.
My thought on PREDESTINATION is that GOD knows exactly what Lucifer would do and Adam and Eve would do and yet HE goes ahead and creates this universe and everyone in it just so HE will one day save those who though Fallen (in their very nature) would choose to come to trust HIM through HIS PROMISES of Christ --- HIS eventual incarnation, death, and resurrection! In this GOD predestined everyone who is here to be here and end up as they select. GOD is not surprised at anything. Now while Christ existed on earth and has chosen to become a man, He has subjected HIMSELF to not knowing when HIS FATHER's plans will come to fruition but knows they will. And it is most obvious that the signs of the times are again beginning to come one after another in quick succession. I mean, who would have thought a mere few years ago that Jerusalem would be the site of the American Consulate for starters. Is the Anti Christ already born, active, ready to assume his role? Is the catching away at hand? No one knows the time or the hour!
The most awesome explanation of the apparently absurd value of π given by the Bible is an 18th century rabbinical argument that can be found quoted here. The relevant part is the section "The hidden key" that starts on page 25 of the paper.
The awesome explanation is to point out that Solomon's bowl is described in two parallel passages in the Old Testament (1 Kings 7:23 and 2 Chronicles 4:2). The two passages differ by an alternate spelling of one Hebrew word. Ancient Hebrew (like ancient Greek) used letters as numerals, so that every word was automatically also a number. The numerical values of the two alternatively spelled words in the bowl passages are 333 and 106, and 333/106 = 3.1415 to four decimal places. Whoa!
The whole linked paper is a very interesting survey of historical approaches to this surprisingly long-studied problem in interpretation of Scripture. For the record I do not believe in the literal inerrancy of a Scripture that features things like talking snakes. Gotta love those old rabbis, however. They were sharp.
Last edited by Guest on Thu Jun 07, 2018 6:53 am, edited 1 time in total.
Physics Guy wrote:The numerical values of the two alternatively spelled words in the bowl passages are 303 and 106, and 303/106 = 3.1415 to four decimal places. Whoa!
It's some impressive number wizardry, but...
The numerical values are 111 and 106. You have to multiply the first number by 3 to get the 333/106. Also, this particular use of Hebrew letters for numerals didn't exist until the 2nd century BCE.
Last edited by Reflexzero on Wed Jun 06, 2018 8:31 pm, edited 1 time in total.
"Some people never go crazy. What truly horrible lives they must lead." ~Charles Bukowski
The doctrine of biblical inerrancy is one of the biggest weaknesses of evangelical Christianity because there are documented errors in the Bible, some of the serious. If you press them, fundamentalists will usually resort to the argument that inerrancy only applies to the original manuscripts, which of course cannot be proven or disproven since we don't have any of the original manuscripts.
mikegriffith1 wrote:The doctrine of biblical inerrancy is one of the biggest weaknesses of evangelical Christianity because there are documented errors in the Bible, some of the serious. If you press them, fundamentalists will usually resort to the argument that inerrancy only applies to the original manuscripts, which of course cannot be proven or disproven since we don't have any of the original manuscripts.
But at least the Bible took place in a real location on Earth. You promote something even less credible than Atlantis, but at least Plato knew roughly where it was.
mikegriffith1 wrote:The doctrine of biblical inerrancy is one of the biggest weaknesses of evangelical Christianity because there are documented errors in the Bible, some of the serious. If you press them, fundamentalists will usually resort to the argument that inerrancy only applies to the original manuscripts, which of course cannot be proven or disproven since we don't have any of the original manuscripts.
It would seem that the Bible is full of errors until one asks, "OK, so point out at least one real obvious one!" Then suddenly, you find ---- they head it somewhere but never read the Bible for themselves --- so they don't know exactly....
You promote something even less credible than Atlantis, but at least Plato knew roughly where it was.