By: LARRY SITES Re: THE DETESTED BIBLE DON WARD to ALL on 03-12-95 09:10 re: THE DETESTED

By: LARRY SITES
Re: THE DETESTED BIBLE

DON WARD to ALL on 03-12-95 09:10 re: THE DETESTED BIBLE

DW>Do you know what's really crazy about the war on Christianity and bibli
DW>values? You would think that even the humanist, the non-beleiver would
DW>acknowledge some of the good things and ideas the Bible has inspired. I
DW>was, after all:

Deal with this, thief:

Area # 233  HOLYSMOKE               02-26-95  13:44     Message # 6
From    : LARRY SITES
To      : All                                             RCVD
Subj    : Bible Bunk

I am in the process of putting together a file that will show through a
convergence of evidence that christianity is bunk. It is currently over 70k
so I will summarize only the lines of evidence without too many supporting
examples below. I can, however, document them.

Contrary to believers claims, the bible is not unique nor original. History
records a multitude of civilizations and religions that precede those
described in the bible.  The Genesis creation account is nothing but an
un-evidenced boast that the Hebrew god created the objects that other
religions already considered deities. The flood is copied from earlier
sources. Bible based morality is nothing but a copy of preceding religious
virtues. The oft quoted homosexual prohibitions of Leviticus chapters 18
and 20 are nothing but part of a general condemnation of the practices of
Molech worshipers who had appropriated sex as a religious practice before
the Hebrews could. Resurrected savior gods were plentiful before Paul made
this claim for Jesus. They are nothing more than specific personalizations
of the annual death and rebirth of the sun. In fact, there is a perfectly
logical and reasonable explaination for the development of gods. They are
nothing but the misinterpretation of ignorant peoples dreams and acts of
nature capitalized upon by those that would make their living off others as
priests.

The bible, a supposedly perfect document, is filled with inconsistencies.
While the ingenuity of believers creates a never ending list of how they
MIGHT be interpreted in an obscure way to appear to eliminate the obvious
contradictions, a truly perfect book could simply state things in an
unambitious manner. The supposedly divine book condones cruelty and
injustice violating its own rules. The bible promotes magic and
supernaturalism over reality. In fact, many of the bible's statements are
consistent with the general ignorance of reality by people of that age.
History clearly records the beliefs in an earth centered universe, flat
earth, and fixed heavenly spheres. Believers have consistently quoted the
bible in defense of ignorant conceptions of reality.

The bible claims fulfilled prophecy as evidence of its reliability yet it
is full of false prophecy, thus failing its own test of divine origin.
Additionally, it is clear that believers read prophecies into the bible
after the fact. More than once, this passage from the crucifixion: Mat
27:34  "They gave him vinegar to drink mingled with gall:" has been cited
to me as fulfillment of this supposed prophecy: Psalms 69:21  "They gave me
also gall for my meat; and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink." Yet
when questioned, not one believer has been able to explain why other verses
in Psalm 69 such as 2, 3, and 5 are not also prophecy regarding Jesus.

We have no "original" copies of the bible and the earliest people to attest
to it are documented liars. There are only a couple of dozen fragments
representing the first 300 years of christianity. The oldest gospel
document is dated at the earliest 125: Papyrus 52: parts of John
18:31-33,37-38. This document is no bigger than a man's thumb and there
isn't even agreement if it really is part of the book of John. The next
date from around 200-225: Papyrus 64: parts of Matt; Papyrus 66: parts of
John; Papyrus 75: parts of Luke & John, Papyrus 45: parts of Matt, Mark,
Luke, and John. And later still, around 300: P1, P4, P5, P22, P28, P39,
P53, P69, P70, P80, #0171, #0212(Diatessaron). It isn't until after
christianity was openly supported by Roman emperor Constantine around 325
that there are complete sets of the gospels via the Codex Sinaiticus and
Vaticanus. Before that are only the 20 or so fragments listed above. In
almost 300 years only a couple of dozen fragments testify to the contents
of the gospels.

Lies relating to the formative period of the gospels show the attitude of
the men responsible for faithfully passing on the gospel books. Stories,
now discredited, relating to Simon Magus, mentioned in Acts 8:9-24 serve as
the basis for the otherwise unsupported traditions regarding Peter and Paul
in Rome.

These same pious liars were quick to vouch for the miraculous origin of the
Greek Septuagint Version, so-called because of the legendary Seventy-(two)
translators. This translation was in the grossest manner inaccurate. While
it was most likely made haphazardly over the years by a number of Greek
speaking Jews, a miraculous story for its origin was invented and
elaborated upon by succeeding generations of christians. At its peak it
claimed that 72 INDIVIDUAL translators working INDEPENDENTLY came up with
EXACTLY IDENTICAL manuscripts.

Forged Oracles of Sibyl were perhaps the most potent and popular "proofs"
of the early Church for the divinity of Jesus Christ and the truth of the
Christian religion. The Christian Fathers and their followers made
themselves so ridiculous by their fatuous faith in the Sibyls that they
were derisively called "Sibyllists" by the Pagans. Because ancient Greek
writers testified to the existence of Sibyl books, the fathers lyingly
cited these references as "proof" of the authenticity of their new
fakeries. It was not until 1696 that a Dutch Anabaptist minister, Van Dale
initiated christian recognition of their false nature. The impact of this
lie can not be understated because Lactantius appealed extensively to them
in his efforts with Constantine, the first Roman emperor to support
christianity.

These same fathers testified to the divine nature and truth of the book of
Enoch, even speculating how it survived the flood; the reality of the
resurrection of the Phoenix; and the reality of devils and their abilities.
Augustine claimed to have preached to a race of headless people.
Tertullian, after asserting that christianity must be true because it is
impossible, went on to accept that Montanus was the Holy Spirit of the
Comforter incarnate! The earliest of those fathers who supposedly
faithfully passed along christian religion are now generally agreed to have
either never existed or left no authentic writings. This includes:
CLEMENT OF ROME, IGNATIUS, POLYCARP, BARNABAS, HERMAS. Others testified
that the newly created story that Jesus was crucified at an early age were
false and explained why.

There is clear evidence to show that the gospels we do have have been
tampered with to enhance the christian concept of the divinity of Jesus.
The virgin birth was added. Paul never mentions it and aspects of the
gospels stories make no sense otherwise. References to Jesus' parents have
been changed. The claimed prophecy is based on the Septuagint's known
mistranslation of Isaiah. The famous revelation to the "rock" Peter and a
similar one at Acts 8:37 that recognize Jesus as divine are proven
tamperings. Likewise, Luke 3:22 has been altered to enhance the supposed
eternal nature of Jesus. Lastly 1 John 5:7 is an insertion that attempts to
make the trinity nonsense biblical.

Lastly, I will briefly mention the uses the bible has been put to. It has
been the justification for the Crusades, the Inquisition, and the
destruction of every native culture that its believers have encountered. It
has been used to prevent scientific progress in sanitation and disease
prevention, to promote slavery, and to suppress the rights of women. To
protect its followers from temptation, every contrary writing its followers
could get their hands on has been destroyed: the Gnostic writings, the
library of Alexandria, Mayan and Easter Island holy books. Why should
supposed truth have to be protected from error by violence? Even the
bible's own Jesus said that a tree is known by its fruit. The bible's fruit
is rotten, no better evidence of its true nature could be found.

Much of the above is discussed at length in Joseph Wheless' _Forgery in
Christianity_.