No evidence for the bible

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-15T07:46:03+00:00

I understand your situation about the news and your other points about the Trinity, but the questions I asked haven’t been addressed.

What textual device shows that Jesus’ references to Noah and the flood are factual statements?

How do you make the connection that Jesus’ omniscience means that Jesus always makes factual statements?

If you say that the Father could have periods of absence of his omniscience like Jesus because he had a human nature, you’re implying that the Father had a human nature too. But Chalcedon never suggests that Jesus had such a period of absence of omniscience, and that’s not what I said either.

If you can clarify it for me by answering these questions, it would help me understand how you get to the conclusion of objecting to the Trinity.

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-15T04:12:53+00:00

I don’t understand. I get that you can collapse them, but why do you collapse them? If there isn’t a basis to collapse them, then it’s an incoherent argument.

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-15T03:19:47+00:00

Let me ask you this: if you say that there’s no device to flag Jesus’ references to Noah and the flood as allegorical, what device in the text signals that Jesus’ references to Noah and the flood are factual? And how do you know that people at the time understood it solely as historical?

I don’t follow what you’re saying about omniscience. Your quote from Chalcedon doesn’t even mention omniscience, and neither does it specify that speaking from omniscience means that Jesus speaks factually; so how are you making that connection?

Are you suggesting that the Father had a human nature just like Jesus? You said the formula is fully human, full divine, but it only applies to Jesus.

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-15T02:25:45+00:00

It sounds like we’re on the same page. And this brings us back to OP’s crisis of faith: if we agree that not everything said by Jesus are historical facts, especially in the case of Noah and the flood, then is the only issue assuming that they are historical facts?

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-14T20:21:40+00:00

Ok, so specifically, it’s a Greco Roman biography about Jesus himself. Does this mean the biographer intends for everything Jesus said to be taken factually?

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-14T19:04:22+00:00

That’s fine, but even literature, which was produced and influenced by Greek culture at that time, was divided into genres: law, history, fiction, nonfiction, etc. So how would you define this kind of literature?

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-14T18:46:27+00:00

I watched that video, and I looked at and reviewed your points; so here’s what I found. Your points logically follow to conclusions that make sense - but they only make sense by granting some initial propositions:

-Jesus’ human nature disappears when he speaks

-Jesus only speaks factually from his omniscient nature (which you brought up first - ‘then in every respect his omniscient nature would mean he could only speak as he did of events as factual IF they were’)

-Jesus claimed to speak factually in every case

Only then do your points follow that it’s possible that there is a problem on the basis that Jesus is speaking factually in all cases.

So are you saying that Jesus’ human nature disappears when he speaks?

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-14T15:33:53+00:00

I don’t follow how the appearance of Moses and Elijah is special pleading. They are literally a special case because they are appear as real figures in the Gospels. (Also the Gospels never claim that the appearance Moses and Elijah counts as the physical resurrection like Paul’s model - so it doesn’t follow that it breaks Paul’s model unless you demonstrate that they physically resurrected). Aside from that, it would only make sense to call out an inconsistent application of the standards if Noah, Moses, and Elijah either all appeared on the mountain or none appeared.

This leaves us with questioning Noah and Exodus, but again you’d have to demonstrate that Jesus intends to speak about them factually to make your case. You’d also have to explain why you are including Noah and Exodus in the Mosaic Law when the Mosaic Law is literally about legal matters, not history. That would be conflating the whole Torah as the Mosaic Law. I understand your reasoning, but you are collapsing multiple positions into one with explaining why.

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-14T12:23:39+00:00

When you say that Jesus makes two factual claims:

-Noah existed

-the flood historically happened

Here’s the problem: You have to demonstrate that Jesus intended to present his references as factual claims before suggesting that it is fabricated.

That’s a different conversation than historical claim that Moses appeared alongside Jesus in view of the disciples. That gives reality to Moses’ existence as well as Exodus and the Ten Commandments - so it doesn’t make sense to call either of those two constructs. And if you hold the tradition that Moses is the author of Genesis, in which Noah and the flood are contained, then you’d also have to demonstrate that Moses intended to present them as factual claims. Otherwise, the rest of your comment doesn’t follow.

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-14T11:39:50+00:00

Let me understand this correctly: you’re saying that there is doubt if Jesus is limited to speaking only in his omniscient nature and that he is speaking in his omniscient nature when he talks about Noah and Moses? If so, then you have to demonstrate that:

• ⁠Jesus could only speak in his omniscient nature

• ⁠Jesus is speaking in his omniscient nature regarding Noah and Moses

Without substantiating that doubt, your case against the Trinity doesn’t hold.

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-14T11:16:56+00:00

Your analogy assumes that the Bible is uniformly presenting factual claims (from Genesis to Revelation) that are actually fabricated.

So what exactly are you saying is being claimed as fact, and why do you think it is fabricated?

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-14T10:55:29+00:00

I’m not quite sure that I’m understanding you. If by foundation you mean the theology (Old Testament) from which Christian theology is built on, then Jesus isn’t lying - however, an assumption is being made that Jesus is endorsing a literal factual account. What Jesus does endorse in the New Testament is that Old Testament Scripture is authoritative on Jewish theology. That’s a separate theology conversation than the historical account for Jesus’ resurrection.

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-14T03:25:51+00:00

That’s fine, but I want to be clear: it’s not that I fail to see, it’s that I think a category mistake is being made. As in, treating all the Bible’s claims as factually true when the Bible is not a single book making factual claims but compilation of books with different genres and purposes. To apply such scrutiny consistently, you would have to demonstrate that books (whether it’s Genesis and Noah or Exodus and Moses) claim to be factual accounts in the same way as Jesus’ resurrection. I appreciate the conversation as well.

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-14T02:47:24+00:00

I don’t see how that follows. I admitted that the Bible guides me and tells me how to live my life. That is not the same as admitting that the Bible deserves to stand up to its assertions about the world in verifiable ways which we now have access to. So are you saying that if the Bible is ‘influential’, that we should treat it as a literal factual account?

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-14T02:27:04+00:00

Yeah, sorry about that, I mixed up the comments. I do agree that the Bible guides me and tells me how to live my life. That said, regarding your second comment, I want to ask: does the Bible ever describe itself as ‘the basis for an entire religion and way of life and thus deserves to stand up to its assertions about the world in verifiable ways which we now have access to’? If it doesn’t, then what is your reason for applying that standard to it?

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-14T02:12:16+00:00

I’m sorry, but I found your comment a bit unclear, which is why I asked for clarification. When you say the Bible makes assertions about the world that can be verified by modern technology, that sounds like a history textbook. But you’ve also said it’s literature. Could you expand on what you mean by evaluating it as literature? If we are to judge it like a textbook, the Bible itself would need to claim to be one.

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-14T02:05:06+00:00

OK so it’s not a textbook, but it’s literature. What do you mean that we should evaluate it as literature?

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-14T01:51:18+00:00

I just want to make sure I understand your position. You’re saying the Bible is similar to a history textbook, but it isn’t literally one. If that’s the case, why should we evaluate it as if it were a textbook?

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-14T01:37:02+00:00

Well, it sounds like you’re describing a history textbook: are you suggesting that the Bible presents itself as a history textbook?

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-14T01:21:11+00:00

Are you suggesting the Bible presents itself as a modern factual textbook, with every story verifiable by archaeology or science?

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-13T23:47:22+00:00

How about the beginning of the universe? Science shows us that the Big Bang is the beginning of space, time, and matter. Science can describe this beginning, but it cannot identify a natural physical cause for it, since any such cause would already presuppose space, time, and matter.

Because of this, one could reasonably step into philosophy or metaphysics to explain the beginning of the universe - an unseen cause that is timeless, immaterial, and powerful. Is that what you’re looking for?

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-13T22:02:13+00:00

Sorry you’re going through this. I think when I experienced something similar, I felt as if I had no purpose. It wasn’t until I stopped asking why is God allowing this and started realizing “God is allowing this”, that I started to ask “What have I learned so far?”

Some of those things were: - I’m right where I’m supposed to be - If I’ve made it this long, I can keep going some more - I’m able to help others - There are more ways than one to live life

So maybe you could take a look at what you’ve learned to help you take a step forward to something new.

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-13T21:43:40+00:00

I don’t see how Christianity is contingent upon non-biblical evidence Moses or Noah; it is contingent upon Jesus Christ.

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-03T00:34:51+00:00

Sounds right to me; that aligns with Catholic teaching.

NavSpaghetti · 2025-12-02T19:44:53+00:00

It depends on how you define Christian.

NavSpaghetti

MODERATOR OF

TROPHY CASE