Is there proof or not?

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boatsnguitars
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Is there proof or not?

Post #1

Post by boatsnguitars »

Help me understand this.

Christians will claim they have ample evidence of the Holy Spirit, or God based on the feelings they get, or what they call evidence., or, "He'll prove himself to you when you believe.".

But, they also say God can't be tested for, and you can't prove God's existence because it would take away Free Will, or "God doesn't work that way".

These two ideas - that are probably mentioned a million times on this forum - are contradictory.

Can a Christian please explain, for once and for all, the rules on how God can be detected, but not proven, but proven and not detected, or whatever.

It makes no sense to me, but I'm an idiot, so maybe I don't get the simple logic.
“And do you think that unto such as you
A maggot-minded, starved, fanatic crew
God gave a secret, and denied it me?
Well, well—what matters it? Believe that, too!”
― Omar Khayyâm

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Re: Is there proof or not?

Post #31

Post by boatsnguitars »

1213 wrote: Fri Mar 31, 2023 6:29 am
boatsnguitars wrote: Thu Mar 30, 2023 5:29 am Oh, I read it and noticed you were very clear about not being able to prove your God. Noted.
I noted that Muslims feel they HAVE proved their God using the same vague statements that you claim give you a slight reason to believe in God. Yet, both are the same: nonesense.

So, it's very clear you do accept nonsense, since you called the Muslim version of your nonsense, nonsense. Yet, you seem to suggest your nonsense is persuasive to you.

I doubt you see the problem, so I'll try to be clear. Your nonsense is still nonsense. It doesn't add to any argument, yet you seem to suggest that if you pile enough nonsense (BS) together, you get a beautiful temple of truth.

Whereas the rest of us see it for what it is: a massive pile of BS.
You liked that, eh? Wanted to enshrine it?
“And do you think that unto such as you
A maggot-minded, starved, fanatic crew
God gave a secret, and denied it me?
Well, well—what matters it? Believe that, too!”
― Omar Khayyâm

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Re: Is there proof or not?

Post #32

Post by 1213 »

boatsnguitars wrote: Thu Mar 30, 2023 5:29 am Oh, I read it and noticed you were very clear about not being able to prove your God. Noted.
I said not being able to prove anything. But, I think the same is with you, you can't prove anything.
boatsnguitars wrote: Thu Mar 30, 2023 5:29 amI noted that Muslims feel they HAVE proved their God using the same vague statements that you claim give you a slight reason to believe in God. Yet, both are the same: nonesense.
I can understand why you call those Muslim claims vague. I would call them even illogical. But, what was vague about my words?

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Re: Is there proof or not?

Post #33

Post by boatsnguitars »

1213 wrote: Fri Mar 31, 2023 6:57 am
boatsnguitars wrote: Thu Mar 30, 2023 5:29 am Oh, I read it and noticed you were very clear about not being able to prove your God. Noted.
I said not being able to prove anything. But, I think the same is with you, you can't prove anything.
You said it, not me. I am quite happy to accept some level of proof for somethings, like my own existance, the existence of the physical universe, etc.

If you want to argue Solipsism, then go ahead. That would make you God, though, which is lightyears away from your claims that God exists and Jesus rose from the dead, etc.

So, here you are claiming you can't prove anything, yet, you seem so happy to claim such things as fact, Truth, and Goodness, and willing to bet your life on it, etc.

What value is your Faith, then, if you can't even prove anything? It's just a man wishing for eternal life - and you can't even prove life exists in the first place... A pitiful place to be, IMO.
boatsnguitars wrote: Thu Mar 30, 2023 5:29 amI noted that Muslims feel they HAVE proved their God using the same vague statements that you claim give you a slight reason to believe in God. Yet, both are the same: nonesense.
I can understand why you call those Muslim claims vague. I would call them even illogical. But, what was vague about my words?
What was vague? All of it.
But, for example God said He will scatter Jews, if they do wrong things and He will gather them back, if they do right things.

I will scatter you among the nations, and I will draw out the sword after you: and your land will be a desolation, and your cities shall be a waste.
Leviticus 26:33

Yet for all that, when they are in the land of their enemies, I will not reject them, neither will I abhor them, to destroy them utterly, and to break my covenant with them; for I am Yahweh their God; but I will for their sake remember the covenant of their ancestors, whom I brought forth out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations, that I might be their God. I am Yahweh.'"
Leviticus 26:44-45

It shall happen, when all these things are come on you, the blessing and the curse, which I have set before you, and you shall call them to mind among all the nations, where Yahweh your God has driven you, and shall return to Yahweh your God, and shall obey his voice according to all that I command you this day, you and your children, with all your heart, and with all your soul; that then Yahweh your God will turn your captivity, and have compassion on you, and will return and gather you from all the peoples, where Yahweh your God has scattered you. If any of your outcasts are in the uttermost parts of the heavens, from there will Yahweh your God gather you, and from there will he bring you back:
Deuteronomy 30:1-4
Deuteronomy 30:1-4 speaks of the Israelites being dispersed among the nations, and then returning to God and being gathered from all the nations where they were scattered. The passage does not explicitly mention the formation of the modern state of Israel, nor does it mention any specific timeframe for this gathering of the Israelites.

Some scholars interpret this passage as referring to the Babylonian exile, when the Israelites were taken captive and forced to live in Babylon for several decades. After this period of exile, some of the Israelites returned to their homeland and began to rebuild their community and worship at the Temple in Jerusalem. This event is sometimes referred to as the "restoration" of Israel, and is seen as a fulfillment of the prophecy in Deuteronomy 30:1-4.

Others interpret this passage as referring to a future restoration of Israel, either as a spiritual or a physical entity. Some believe that this restoration has already occurred, while others believe it is yet to come.

Ultimately, the interpretation of Deuteronomy 30:1-4 and its relationship to the formation of Israel is a matter of religious and scholarly debate, and there is no single, universally accepted answer.

If it weren't vague, scholars wouldn't be arguing about it today. (And, Israel formed because of men deciding to make it happen, not God. But, that's obvious. The real problem is that all of this was written after the fact of Israelites being expelled then after they returned. Hardly a prophesy. Quite the opposite. At least the Muslim claims, vague as they are, talk about the future.)
“And do you think that unto such as you
A maggot-minded, starved, fanatic crew
God gave a secret, and denied it me?
Well, well—what matters it? Believe that, too!”
― Omar Khayyâm

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Re: Is there proof or not?

Post #34

Post by TRANSPONDER »

[Replying to boatsnguitars in post #33]

The Israel 'prophecy' is of course a favorite 'proof'. Because on the face of it, it looks pretty good. But there are arguments. The very nature of Judaism and the Jewish people has included a desire to return to Jerusalem and be a nation again. Without going into the whole Balfour plan -thing, it can be explained as more than just a happenstance occurrence that happens to fit prophecy, but a self - fulfilling one. It was likely to happen.

When we look at other 'prophetic proofs' we find they are wrong, like so much in the Bible (faithbased denial aside) and so it is not unreasonable to suppose that the Israel proof, is not prophetic proof but self - fulfilling prophecy.

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Re: Is there proof or not?

Post #35

Post by boatsnguitars »

TRANSPONDER wrote: Fri Mar 31, 2023 8:37 am [Replying to boatsnguitars in post #33]

The Israel 'prophecy' is of course a favorite 'proof'. Because on the face of it, it looks pretty good. But there are arguments. The very nature of Judaism and the Jewish people has included a desire to return to Jerusalem and be a nation again. Without going into the whole Balfour plan -thing, it can be explained as more than just a happenstance occurrence that happens to fit prophecy, but a self - fulfilling one. It was likely to happen.

When we look at other 'prophetic proofs' we find they are wrong, like so much in the Bible (faithbased denial aside) and so it is not unreasonable to suppose that the Israel proof, is not prophetic proof but self - fulfilling prophecy.
Yep, and think how weak that is for a God. Do Christians really think that's a powerful reason, let alone some amazing thing that some 'birds of a feather, continued to flock together'?

I mean, C'MON!, this is the Creator of the Universe! The Omnipotent Force of All Things! And the prophecy is: The Jews organized after being dispersed.

Call me extremely underwhelmed. This is what is so pathetic about it.

What's sad is that they simply don't have any good prophesy, so they clutch for anything. It's pathetic. like Paul said, literally pathetic.

Why not something written in the OT that says, "2,000 years from now, on this day, an asteroid will orbit the Earth with the cure for cancer written in the scientific terminology of the day. It will include all the details needed to eradicate all forms of cancer, and once Humanity has written it all down and preserved it, it will bifurcate with one half falling into the Sun, the other landing on Mars and will seed that planet with all the needed organic matter to support Life, and, in a miracle, the atmosphere with form over three days and I, the Lord, will give each person the knowledge of how to fly to Mars using only their minds".

Now that's a God!
“And do you think that unto such as you
A maggot-minded, starved, fanatic crew
God gave a secret, and denied it me?
Well, well—what matters it? Believe that, too!”
― Omar Khayyâm

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Re: Is there proof or not?

Post #36

Post by TRANSPONDER »

[Replying to boatsnguitars in post #35]

I hate to 'Just Post a Video' without comment, but this explains very well what Jesusgod should do to provide proof of his existence...but didn't.



But of course we have to remember that God cannot actually prove that he exists or that would nullify Free Will without which faith is invalidated and we are just believers on evidence which any secularist can do. It is Faith in spite of the 'proof' that is what saves.

Which doesn't prevent the Bible Apologists trying to claim that they can prove God, Jesus and the Bible, when of course the doctrine of Faith demands that they can't.

But, of course (this rabbit hole gets ever deeper) what is proof for the believer ought to be Proof for the one who gets into a faith posture and takes Jesus into their hart. Only Secularists, in the Dark Power of Satan demand really good evidence, saying, in their worldly and deluded way 'It is not the unbeliever who needs to demand less evidence, but the believer needs to ask more'. But these critical blinkers do not understand how proof-by-Faith works.

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Re: Is there proof or not?

Post #37

Post by Purple Knight »

If this is all real (I don't think it is, but) then divine hiddenness is part of the plan. If God showed himself to you and told you to be a good person or you'd go to Hell, you'd just do it whether you were so inclined or not. And you don't want to be just a Pavlovian dog, do you? Humans can reach higher than that, right?

IMO, Christians, mostly, don't believe any of it either. You don't see Catholics killing newborns because it gets the newborns into Heaven, for example.

And the kicker is that if any of this is real, they're not intended to believe any of it. If they did, their good acts wouldn't mean anything.

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Re: Is there proof or not?

Post #38

Post by AquinasForGod »

[Replying to boatsnguitars in post #1]

I don't know any Catholics that say things like that. It is pretty silly.

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Re: Is there proof or not?

Post #39

Post by boatsnguitars »

[Replying to AquinasForGod in post #38]

This is a bug, not a feature that all you Christians can't agree. I mean, how many more thousands of years do you need while we all suffer the inanity?
“And do you think that unto such as you
A maggot-minded, starved, fanatic crew
God gave a secret, and denied it me?
Well, well—what matters it? Believe that, too!”
― Omar Khayyâm

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Re: Is there proof or not?

Post #40

Post by 1213 »

boatsnguitars wrote: Fri Mar 31, 2023 7:09 am ...
What value is your Faith, then, if you can't even prove anything? It's just a man wishing for eternal life - and you can't even prove life exists in the first place... A pitiful place to be, IMO...
I want to be loyal (faithful) to God, because I think His will is good. But, is it valuable? Probably not for you. Is it about eternal life? No, I don't believe eternal life can be earned in any way. If I would get eternal life, it would be unexpected bonus round.
boatsnguitars wrote: Fri Mar 31, 2023 7:09 am Some scholars interpret this passage as referring to the Babylonian exile, when the Israelites were taken captive and forced to live in Babylon for several decades....
But the scriptures are speaking of many nations, not just one, like Babylon. That is why it is not reasonable to think it would be about Babylon.

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