This is what Ken Ham and other young-earth creationists would stand for if they were at least trying to be consistent Biblical literalists. This is not a parody, it is a genuine argument for the flat and fixed Earth viewpoint. To any young-earth creationist reading this, I would like to know whether or not you accept the argument in the video, and if you don’t, why not, since to someone who is not (or like me, is no longer) a young-earth... Read more
The blog Unreasonable Faith shared this: I think that really what it is getting at is the fact that some people do not think the truthfulness of their position is as self-evident as their rhetoric claims, since otherwise they would not be opposed to their children and those under their influence thinking and exploring freely. As someone who is religious but who prioritizes truth above all else, I would say that the search for truth should take priority over any... Read more
Chris Keith and Anthony Le Donne have created a blog, which focuses not only on the upcoming conference about the criteria of authenticity, but more generally on their scholarly research about the historical figure of Jesus. It is called The Jesus Blog. Read more
Most readers will immediately realize that this post is not going to be about who or what Kindles worship, but is about the fact that my book The Only True God: Early Christian Monotheism in Its Jewish Context is available for Kindle, and for much less than even the cost of the paperback edition. Read more
Praising the Bible is not acceptance of the Bible, and idolatrously attributing the divine attribute of inerrancy to the Bible, when the Bible itself condemns idolatry, most certainly isn’t acceptance of the Bible. Only accepting what the Bible actually says, even if it doesn’t agree with your claims, assumptions, and doctrines about the Bible, is accepting the Bible. Before we can discuss the Bible, work on such matters as Hebrew linguistics are crucial. Most people who discuss the Bible nowadays... Read more
In a comment on my post in which I shared a quote from Fred Clark about how various leaders of the “Religious Right” are similar to/different from Rev. Sun Myung Moon, I was asked for evidence to support those claims. Fortunately, Ken Ham was kind enough to provide it on his Facebook page. Ham described my blog and/or Fred’s as “secularist,” never mentioning once that we are both Christian critics of his fraudulent claims and demagoguery. And as for his seeking... Read more
This past Sunday in my Sunday school class, we talked about Revelation chapter 7. Given my sense of humor, you won’t be surprised that I mentioned that Revelation 7:2 doesn’t mean this: We also talked about how the chapter illustrates problems with both literalism and inerrancy. With literalism, not just because someone reading in English might think of the above when the read of an angel holding the seal of God, but also because the author makes reference to the... Read more
Here’s what Fred Clark had to say in a post today: I think…Moon is the last of his kind. Today, there are many easier paths to the same goals — more respectable and potentially more lucrative means to the same ends. Consider Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, James Dobson, Ken Ham or Ralph Reed. They’re chasing the same dreams as Moon chased — money, power, deference. But they’ve found a way to do it that doesn’t result in their being shunned... Read more
I saw this on Facebook, and thought I’d share it here, even though I don’t really like it – for reasons I’ll comment on below. Why am I not delighted? It isn’t because I object in principle to science fiction doing potentially irreverent things with religious material – after all, I previously shared these. It is the actual execution that I was disappointed with. For instance, if you are going to have fezzes and bow ties be forever, even though... Read more
The MandaeanNetwork.org web site (connected with one that bears the title “The Eyes Encyclopedia of Knowledge“) has a number of useful items on it, including an Arabic translation of the Book of John and bilingual Mandaic and Arabic editions of other texts such as the Haran Gawaita, which can be read online. Read more
Select your answer to see how you score.
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In