NONSENSE FROM THE BIBLE Page 14

  So what really happened? First of all, everyone present was already highly charged with emotion and expectancy, the inspirational singing and music enhanced this to a higher degree. Most of those on the platform already knew how to react when prayed for, that was to fall backwards. I have also witnessed, in many similar meetings, the preacher actually pushed each one backwards and unbalanced them so they had no option but to fall. As for the wheelchairs, it has been revealed many times in investigatory television programmes, that people who had walking difficulties were placed into the wheelchairs in order to be taken to the front for prayer. They did not normally require a wheelchair. Most people with crutches can also walk without them for short periods of time. It is also strange that people with lost limbs or who are blind are rarely seen at these events, or if they were it would be completely obvious that they had not been healed by the prayers of the evangelist.

  In a television enquiry into such a meeting held in Australia by a well known evangelist, some 30 people had claimed at the service to be completely healed but when interviewed a few weeks later, all were in their original condition. Not one ‘healing’ proclaimed by the evangelist could be substantiated. The main beneficiaries of these events are the evangelists themselves as is evidenced by their lavish lifestyles - as of the rich and famous. Some have many homes - mansions in fact - fleets of cars and several aircraft including private jets worth many million dollars.

  On a personal note: When I resigned from the ministry I handed over the church and total ministry to my eldest son. He took over as pastor and CEO from that day back in 1989. After twenty years of working and devoting his life and time ‘for the Lord’ he suffered a major medical problem. He was on holiday with his wife overseas when he suddenly collapsed and was rushed to hospital where they diagnosed a tumour on his brain! He was flown back to Australia and immediately admitted to hospital.

  He had surgery to remove the tumour which fortunately was benign. That is the good news, but the bad news is that part of his brain had been damaged. He has lost most of his sight and is partially physically impaired; he was unable to walk for many months without assistance. His recovery during the past two years has been slow but his general condition is better. He will never be able to drive a car again and he is unable to go anywhere without a carer or friend. He spends periods of time at home with his family but also stays most days each week in a remedial care home. He had to resign his position in the ministry of course and he will never be able to work again in any capacity. He is now 52 years old married with three daughters.

  The reason I have included this story is because I know for sure that many thousands of Christians in Australia and in some other countries were all praying for him from the day they heard about this tragedy. He was an excellent minster and International speaker and author and had a weekly television programme which was broadcast by many stations worldwide. He worked hard for God and he continues to hold to his faith to this day.

  What did God do about his ‘faithful servant’ and all those prayers of his followers?

  Nothing!

  A final verse:

  1 John 5:14-15

  And this is the confidence that we have in him, that, if we ask any thing according to his will, he heareth us: And if we know that he hear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him.

  NONSENSE!

  CONCLUSIONS

  1. The Bible cannot seriously be considered as a reliable and accurate source of information concerning the legitimacy of the existence of God.

  2. The Bible itself is a compilation of ancient manuscripts which were written by at least 40 different authors over a period of up to 1600 years. The content of those manuscripts were entirely based on ‘word of mouth’ - hearsay passed from generation to generation at least 30 years after the recorded event. Some of the Old Testament manuscripts are claimed to be written by ‘eye wittnesses’ to the event recorded, but none of the New Testament texts are claimed to be ‘eyewitness’ accounts. No original manuscripts extant; many hundreds or even thousands of manuscripts were not selected for use.

  3. The content of the Old Testament reveals God as a devious and untrustworthy creator and also as exterminator of the human race.

  4. The New Testament contains details of the alleged life and works of Jesus and his apostles, none of which can be substantiated by evidence other than the Bible.

  5. The entire Bible has many contradictions and flaws although it is claimed that every scripture it contains was ‘inspired’ by God rather than the individual thoughts and research by the various authors.

  6. The major events claimed to have occurred all contain highly questionable information and are devoid of evidence apart from the Bible itself.

  7. The alleged life and death and resurrection of Jesus as recorded in the four Gospels is seriously flawed by variation and human imagination or assumption and again the lack of evidence other than the Bible.

  8. There is virtually no scientific, historic or archaeological evidence other than the Bible to substantiate the existence of God, the authors or content of the Bible.

  9. There is substantial evidence that God does not answer prayer as promised in many texts within the Bible.

  10. My final conclusion, which has not changed since I became an atheist after my disillusionment with Christian faith, is that the Bible is a collection of myths, legends and human imaginations dating back to the earliest human life on planet earth.

  The Bible is, at best, interesting and enlightening, sometimes poetic and it does include passages of human wisdom and thought. Apart from that, the rest is unsubstantiated hypotheses or simply:

  NONSENSE!

  ONCE I WAS BLIND BUT NOW I SEE!

  Brian Baker - August 2012

  NOTES

  Chapter One

  1. Preterists

  The term preterism is from the Latin praeter meaning something which has passed. Christian preterists hold the eschatological view which interprets that all or the majority of the prophecies in the Bible, especially Daniel and Revelation, as events which have already happened in the first century, and were fulfilled when Jerusalem was destroyed in 70CE.

  2. Thomas Jefferson

  1743 – 1826. 3rd president of the USA 1801–09, Founder of the Democratic Republican Party. He published A Summary View of the Rights of America 1774 and as a member of the Continental Congresses of 1775–76 was largely responsible for the drafting of the Declaration of Independence. He was governor of Virginia 1779–81, Ambassador to Paris 1785–89, Secretary of State 1789–93, and Vice President 1797–1801.

  3. Robert Green “Bob” Ingersoll

  1833 – 1899 was a Civil War veteran, American political leader, and orator during the Golden Age of Free Thought, noted for his defence of agnosticism. He was nicknamed The Great Agnostic.

  4. Luther, Martin

  1483 – 1546. German Christian church reformer, a founder of Protestantism. While he was a priest at the University of Wittenberg, he wrote an attack on the sale of indulgences (remissions of punishment for sin). The Holy Roman emperor Charles V summoned him to the Diet (meeting of dignitaries of the Holy Roman Empire) of Worms in Germany, in 1521, where he refused to retract his objections. Originally intending reform, his protest led to schism, with the emergence, following the Augsburg Confession 1530 (a statement of the Protestant faith), of a new Protestant church. Luther is regarded as the instigator of the Protestant revolution, and Lutheranism is now the predominant religion of many N European countries, including Germany, Sweden, and Denmark.

  5.Armageddon,

  In the New Testament (Revelation 16:16), the site of the final battle between the nations that will end the world; it has been identified with Megiddo. According to premillennial Christian interpretation, the Messiah will return to earth and defeat the Antichrist - ‘the Beast’ and Satan the Devil in the battle of Armageddon.

  6. Rudolf Steiner

  1861 - 1925. Austri
an philosopher, occultist, and educationalist who formulated his own mystic and spiritual teaching, which he called anthroposophy. This rejected materialism and aimed to develop the whole human being, intellectually, socially, and, above all, spiritually. A number of Steiner schools follow a curriculum laid down by him with a strong emphasis on the arts.

  7. Herbert W. Armstrong

  1892 - 1986 founded the Worldwide Church of God in the late 1930s, as well as Ambassador College (later Ambassador University) in 1946, and was an early pioneer of radio and tele-evangelism, originally taking to the airwaves in the 1930s from Eugene, Oregon. Armstrong preached an eclectic set of theological doctrines and teachings that he claimed came directly from the Bible. These theological doctrines and teachings have been referred to as Armstrongism. His teachings included the interpretation of biblical prophecy in light of British Israelism and required observance of parts of the covenant Law including seventh - day Sabbath, dietary prohibitions, and the covenant law Holy Days.

  Chapter Two

  8. Emperor Nero

  37 CE - 68CE - Adopted name of Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus AD 37–68. Roman Emperor from 54CE. In 59CE he had his mother Agrippina and his wife Octavia put to death. In 64CE, most of Rome was destroyed in the Great Fire of Rome, which many Romans believed Nero himself had started in order to clear land for his planned palatial complex, the Domus Aurea In 68CE, the rebellion of Vindex in Gaul and later the acclamation of Galba in Hispania drove Nero from the throne. Facing assassination, he committed suicide on 9 June 68CE.

  9. Emperor Constantine

  306 CE - 337 CE - Constantine was the first Roman Emperor to convert to Christianity. From the time of Constantine, Christianity became the Roman religion. Constantine and co-Emperor Licinius issued the Edict of Milan in 313 CE which proclaimed religious tolerance of all religions throughout the empire.

  10. Roman crucifixion

  Death by fastening to a cross, a form of capital punishment used by the ancient Romans, Persians, and Carthaginians, and abolished by the Roman emperor Constantine. Specifically, the Crucifixion refers to the execution by the Romans of Jesus in this manner. Trees were often used for crucifying convicts. Originally only slaves were crucified; hence “death on the cross.” Roman citizens were exempt under all circumstances. The following crimes entailed this penalty: piracy, highway robbery, assassination, forgery, false testimony, mutiny, high treason, rebellion. Soldiers that deserted to the enemy and slaves who denounced their masters were also punished by death on the cross. From the Jewish point of view, the crime of which Jesus was convicted by the Jewish priests is greatly in doubt. If it was blasphemy, lapidation (stoning to death) should, according to Jewish law, have been the penalty, with suspension from the gallows after death Nor were any of the well-known measures taken which provide before execution for the contingency of a reversal of the sentence. Whether the Jewish law would have tolerated a threefold execution at one and the same time is more than uncertain.

  11. The Passover

  The Passover is the Jewish festival which commemorates the story of the Exodus, in which the Israelites were freed from slavery in Egypt. Passover begins on the 15th day of the month of Nisan in the Jewish calendar in the spring in the Norther Hemisphere. The celebration of Passover, also called the feast of unleavened bread, lasts for seven or eight days. The commandment to keep Passover is recorder in the book of Leviticus:

  Leviticus 23:5-8

  In the fourteenth day of the first month at even is the Lord’s pa ssover. And on the fifteenth day of the same month is the feast of unleavened bread unto the Lord: seven days ye must eat unleavened bread. In the first day ye shall have an holy convocation: ye shall do no servile work therein. But ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord seven days: in the seventh day is an holy convocation: ye shall do no servile work therein.

  The Passover was first mentioned in the Torah account of the Exodus from Egypt (Exodus 12:23). The Passover commemorates the last of the Ten Plagues of Egypt - when God ‘passed over’ the houses of Egypt, killing all the first-born. On the night of the plague the Israelites smeared their lintels and door-posts with the blood of the Passover sacrifice and were spared.

  12. Solar Eclipse

  As seen from the earth a solar eclipse occurs when the moon passes between the sun and the earth, and the moon fully or partially blocks the sun. This can happen only during a new moon, when the sun and the moon are in conjunction as seen from earth. In a total eclipse, the disk of the sun is fully obscured by the moon. In partial and annular eclipses only part of the sun is obscured.

  13. John 19:41-42

  Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden; and in the garden a new sepulchre, wherein was never man yet laid. There laid they Jesus therefore because of the Jews’ preparation day; for the sepulchre was nigh at hand.

  14. Flavius Josephus

  37CE–100CE. Jewish historian and general, born in Jerusalem. He became a Pharisee and commanded the Jewish forces in Galilee in their revolt against Rome from 66CE (which ended with the mass suicide at Masada). When captured, he gained the favour of the Roman emperor Vespasian and settled in Rome as a citizen. He wrote Antiquities of the Jews, an early history to 93CE; Jesus is mentioned twice, though scholars debate their authenticity. In the first passage, called the Testimonium Flavianum, it is written:

  Concerns have been raised about the authenticity of the passage, and it is widely held by scholars that at least part of the passage has been altered by a later scribe.

  The Testimonium’s authenticity has attracted much scholarly discussion and controversy of interpolation.

  15. Louis Harry Feldman

  Born 29 October 1926 in Hartford, Connecticut is an American professor of Classics and literature. Feldman is a scholar of Hellenistic civilization, specifically the works of Josephus Flavius. Feldman’s work on Josephus is widely respected by other scholars. He cites 87 articles published during the period of 1937–1980, The overwhelming majority of which question its authenticity in whole or in part.

  16. Alice Whealey

  An independent historian specializing in the intellectual history of Europe, she received an M.A. in history in 1988, An M.A. in Demography in 1992, and a Ph.D. in history in 1998 from U.C.Berkeley. In 2003 she published Josephus on Jesus, The Testimonium Flavianum Controversy from Late Antiquity to Modern Times, critically analyzing the Testimonium Flavianum, the disputed passage from Josephus that mentions Jesus Christ. Judging from Alice Whealey’s 2003 survey of the historiography, it seems that the majority of modern scholars consider that Josephus really did write something here about Jesus, but that the text that has reached us is corrupt.

  Chapter Three

  17. Isaiah’s Prophecy

  Isaiah 9:6 For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.

  Chapter Four

  18. Salvation verses:

  John 3:16-18

  For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.

  John 14:6

  Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

  Romans 10:9-10

  That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

  There are other verses which clearly state that salvation is through the belief in Jesus as the Son of God.

  19. T
he New Testament

  27 Books - Matthew to Revelation

  20. The Old Testament

  39 Books - Genesis to Malachi

  21. Adolf Hitler

  Adolf Hitler believed that he was doing God’s work:

  ‘I believe today that I am acting in the sense of the Almighty Creator. By warding off the Jews I am fighting for the Lord’s work.’ - Adolf Hitler, Reichstag speech 1936

  Chapter Five

  22. Josephus

  Antiquities of the Jews, Book xv

  Chapter Six

  23. The planet earth only 6,000 years old

  As calculated by James Ussher (sometimes spelt Usher 1581 - 1656) an Irish scholar and Anglican Archbishop and Primate of all Ireland between 1625 and 1656. He published a chronology that purported to establish the time and date of the Creation as the night preceding Sunday, 23 October 4004 BCE, according to the Proleptic calendar.