Does the Bible include some of God's prophecies?

[Paul of Tarsus]

I'd say that we can know that a prophecy is from God if a human cannot have come up with the prediction. Although people can predict future events, doing so becomes more difficult if the prediction has certain characteristics. These characteristics include but are not limited to:

1. The span of time from the prediction to the predicted event should be long.
2. The prediction should be clear and easy to understand so that the event it predicts can be readily identified as the predicted event.
3. If the predicted event has already taken place, then we should know that the prophecy was uttered before the event it has supposedly predicted.
4. The prophet could not have come up with the predicted event by extrapolating current events.
5. The predicted event should not be a self-fulfilling prophecy (the prophet or other people cannot simply take action to make the predicted event happen).
6. The probability that the predicted event can happen by chance should be very low (any person can predict that which is inevitable).
7. The time of the prophecy's fulfillment should be specified.
8. The prophecy should include important details like the names of people involved in the predicted events and places where the events are to happen.

The tougher these criteria are, the less likely a person can get a prophecy correct, but an omniscient God can presumably make the predictions despite the height of these hurdles.

So does any Biblical prophecy qualify as one readily recognized as God's prophecy?

[JoeyKnothead]

From The OP

I'd say that we can know that a prophecy is from God if a human cannot have come up with the prediction.

I'd say we can tell if a prophecy is from a human if it comes from a human. Given theists' inability to show their god exists to even offer up one utterance, the most logical conclusion is how bout that.

All are encouraged to show their favored god exists, and offers prophetics, for analysis.

Although people can predict future events, doing so becomes more difficult if the prediction has certain characteristics. These characteristics include but are not limited to:

1. The span of time from the prediction to the predicted event should be long.

And don't it beat all, so many Christians have been prophesying Jesus' return for about two thousand years.

2. The prediction should be clear and easy to understand so that the event it predicts can be readily identified as the predicted event.

It's pretty clear some Christians declare Jesus is him acoming any day now. For two thousand years.

3. If the predicted event has already taken place, then we should know that the prophecy was uttered before the event it has supposedly predicted.

Considering the lack of substantiating evidence for biblical claims, it's hard to tell who said what, and when.

Also, there's the whole issue of trying to prove that's there actually existed to have said it.

4. The prophet could not have come up with the predicted event by extrapolating current events.

Unless that prophet predicts theists will be incapable of supporting their claims regarding this OP, as here I am, I'm predicting. Then I reckon we gotta all get together and string me up on a cross.

5. The predicted event should not be a self-fulfilling prophecy (the prophet or other people cannot simply take action to make the predicted event happen).

Well dangitall, by challenging theists to show they speak truth regarding claims in this OP I done disqualified myself from predicting they can't.

I'm unlucky like that. Kinda like that time I got me married, only it was to Satan herself.

6. The probability that the predicted event can happen by chance should be very low (any person can predict that which is inevitable).

As in my prediction, theists will fail to show their god exists, and fail to show their god prophitigated anything.

7. The time of the prophecy's fulfillment should be specified.

I specify my prophesy will be fulfilled every time a theist fails to show their god exists, or has an utterer. From here on out, up til they do.

8. The prophecy should include important details like the names of people involved in the predicted events and places where the events are to happen.

Any theist, in this thread, with the candlestick.

The tougher these criteria are, the less likely a person can get a prophecy correct, but an omniscient God can presumably make the predictions despite the height of these hurdles.

So does any Biblical prophecy qualify as one readily recognized as God's prophecy?

The Bible fails to even confirm the very existence of the god it fails to show has an utterer, so no, the Bible does nothing more'n carry on. Like so many preachers.

[JehovahsWitness]

Does the Bible include some of God's prophecies?


https://www.jw.org/en/library/videos/#e ... 80_1_VIDEO

Please explain how any prophecy mentioned in that video has characteristics like I listed in the OP.

When you say "has characteristics" do you mean has "all" the characteristics you mention or "has any" of the characteristics you mentioned?



If you did watch the video you'll know that the speakers referenced several of the prophecies I mentioned in my post #2 and #3

POST #1 : Are bible prophecies specific and can any be proven to have been fulfilled?
viewtopic.php?p=1038643#p1038643

POST #3 When did the Gentile Times end?
viewtopic.php?p=1038644#p1038644

JW

To learn more please go to other posts related to ...BIBLICAL PROPHECY , MESSIANIC PROPHECY and ... LAST DAY PROPHECIES

[JoeyKnothead]

Does the Bible include some of God's prophecies?

Like I prophesied them Hayler twins'd come them around to a menage a there the three of us, it was just a matter of how much cocaine it'd take to make it happen.

Only it was I'd prophesied an eight ball, and come to tell, they'd just done them the first line.

Alas, not neither em the first one of em called me God. But in fairness, they did call me a few days later to ask me if I had me any more of the coke.

Praise be, I'd done just me right then reupped.


Conclusions?

Here thirty or some years later, I can tell me the tale. And how it was I knew me forehand it'd take me some coke to make it happen, only it was, I never considered me how little it'd take to do it. I mean, they weren't ugly nor nothing. But then again, it took em coke to make it happen, so maybe I was the uglyn. Naw, that ain't right - been told I look like Brad Pitts' dog.

Conclusions?

It shouldn't fascinate us that a book written decades after the 'fact' 'd stand up proud and swear it up and down, "As God is my witness", while offering to 'witness' for a god that can't be shown to exist.

Alas...

The preacher preaches, and the liar lies.

And stories written decades later can exclude the fact them twins was just cause I suffered me the double vision.,

[TRANSPONDER]

The way Biblical prophecy works (or so I argue) is by retrospect. How could someone writing in the 11th c BC predict the Exile and Captivity? He couldn't - unless divine knowledge was given. But if it was written during the captivity...not hard to explain at all. Also explains, btw, why the Moses in the bullrushes story bears an uncanny resemblance to the life -- story of \Sargon of Akkad.

I already mentioned (on another thread) the failure of the prophecies of Babylon and Tyre. They do rather require that the one writing them wasn't yet aware that the prophecies had failed, which requires nice timing. The one about Tyre requires that the attack by Alexander is recent history. Mainland Tyre is largely demolished and the rubble used to make the causeway to attack the island is indeed a 'place to spread nets'. But that the causeway would silt up, the city spread over the whole area and would become a thriving sea -port, was still in the future.

Still, it explains the failure of the prophecy and that the prophecy did fail is pretty inescapable.

It's rather the same with the prophecy of Daniel. It looks like a prediction of the future, written during the captivity. But if you argue that it was written at the time the 'Prediction' ends, then it all becomes clear - including the slips of historical interpretation. In fact a good argument has been made, matching the oracular predictions to the events of the Ptolemaic/Seleucid wars and their effect on the Jews at the time, and it can even be dated to the time the predictions of what would happen do not match history. About 206 B.C, I recall. That can be looked at, like where and how the Seleucid king died or (I recall) getting the Ptolemaic war -effort wrong, saying he'd win when he actually lost. Daniel actually seems to be a polemic document trying to gain support for the Maccabean revolt. The references to the 'messiah' are nothing to do with Jesus. 'Messiah' refers to any Jewish ruler or Authority, secular or priestly, and should be read as retrospective history with that context in mind.

The same sort of thing applies to the NT prophecies. They are retrospective, written to validate Jesus when the accounts were committed to paper. I mentioned elsewhere Mathew's daft mobile star and the plot -mechanism of Herod's threat to dislodge Joseph and family from their home in Judea and get them moved to Nazareth. Mathew can't resist linking this absurd (and unhistorical) massacre in Bethlehem to an OT passage which, when you read it, relates more to the fall of the tribes of Israel to the Assyrians than anything to do with Herodian Judea.

It's even more obvious when we take the 'prophecies' of the death of Judas. Matthew and Acts relate this to some bits of OT from here and there and indeed re-interpreted in order to fit what the writers wanted the OT text to say. The passage picked up by Matthew for his screenplay about tossing the silver at the priests is in the OT about a ruler or guide to the Jews who seems to lose patience with them and asks to be paid (thirty silver) which he throws to the potter in the house of the Lord (may refer to the clay offering pots of the temple treasury).

Ok - my claim or assertion, but I can go through the 'prophecies' and the OT sources and the quotemining of the OT to produce a 'prophecy' will become obvious, and so can anyone else if they want to look.

This business of using the OT to fit the Jesus -story or inventing story (Matthew's nativity) to fit the prophecy may explain a problem with John's gospel. We a know, don't we (or we should) that the Synoptics have no spear thrust or leg -breaking. The usual excuses of 'they didn't know about that' or 'they didn't think it worth mentioning' don't wash, but that is another discussion. The point is that John relates that to a 'Prophecy'. And like these borrowings from the OT, they only fit Jesus out of context. Read the whole passage in the OT and it's clear that the god -punished sinner of the OT doesn't fit Jesus very well at all. Did John rummage through the OT for something that would fit the actual details of the crucifixion? Or did he invent the details of the spear -thrust and leg -breaking, because it was part of the prophetic passage and so MUST have happened, even if the original crucifixion account (as in Mark, Matthew and Luke) didn't have any of that? I think it must be the latter as otherwise how could the synoptics not have the spear -thrust?

[JehovahsWitness]

... that the causeway would silt up, the city spread over the whole area and would become a thriving sea -port, was still in the future.

Still, it explains the failure of the prophecy and that the prophecy did fail is pretty inescapable.

To which particular verse are you alluding here? And what failure do you feel it illustrates?







JW


Does the bible accurately predict the fate of the Kingdom of TYRE?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 68#p871368

[JehovahsWitness]

... how the Seleucid king died or (I recall) getting the Ptolemaic war -effort wrong, saying he'd win when he actually lost. Daniel actually seems to be a polemic document trying to gain support for the Maccabean revolt.

DO you happen to recall which verse actually mentions "the Seleucid king", "the Ptolemaic war" and where the book of Daniel "wrongly" specified the outcome?

It is difficulty to respond to such a tsunami of vagueness



JW

[JoeyKnothead]

It is difficulty to respond to such a tsunami of vagueness

That's gold Jerry! Gold!

To make my post here more relevant - I do agree that if we can put us a bit more clarity or info into our posts, well how bout that.

But I'm here to tell it, laughter was laughed.

[Paul of Tarsus]

When you say "has characteristics" do you mean has "all" the characteristics you mention or "has any" of the characteristics you mentioned?

The more of those characteristics a prophecy has, the more assured we can be that the prophecy is from Jehovah God. You can show your faith in Jehovah by being so confident in him that you can judge prophecies as being so difficult that only he could utter them. Jehovah would not be pleased with anybody who foolishly accepts a prophecy made up by a man thinking it is from Jehovah.

[JoeyKnothead]

...
Jehovah would not be pleased with anybody who foolishly accepts a prophecy made up by a man thinking it is from Jehovah.

I challenge you to show you speak truth regarding any or all of the following...

1. Jehovah exists
2. He can be pleased

The liar lies, and the preacher preaches.

I dare say, "foolishly accepting" unproven claims is kind of a goofy way to go.

[JehovahsWitness]

The more of those characteristics a prophecy has, the more assured we can be that the prophecy is from Jehovah God. You can show your faith in Jehovah by being so confident in him that you can judge prophecies as being so difficult that only he could utter them. Jehovah would not be pleased with anybody who foolishly accepts a prophecy made up by a man thinking it is from Jehovah.

Thank you.


However I dont recall asking you for your opinion on my expressions of faith. I did however ask you for clarification on what you said. You asked

Please explain how any prophecy mentioned in that video has characteristics like I listed in the OP.

I asked for clarification as follows ...

When you say "has characteristics" do you mean has "all" the characteristics you mention or "has any" of the characteristics you mentioned?

Do you think you could simply answer the question? (Preferably without the sermon)




JW