James White just doesn't get it. It's sad to see this quality in a man. He will label others as blind yet fails to the see (pardon the pun) his own blindness.
James fails to see what Muslims see when he starts talking about the additions in the NT. James White feels his mere pronouncement of an addition (i.e. a forgery) to the NT coupled with some background information concerning the manuscripts in question is 'a tremendous amount of the light of truth'. The information he presents on Luke 23:34, the last 12 verses of Mark and the periscope in John (7:53-8:11) is essentially a mere luxury addition to what the lay man can find by looking at the footnotes of the NT.
What James White is not doing is pondering upon 'the light of the truth'. 'The light of the truth' outlines that there are forgeries in the NT. However, James White and his followers are not benefitting from this light.
Think about it, prior to the 18th century when Dr Von Tischendorf discovered the Codex Sinaiticus the James Whites of the time (i.e. conservative Christians) believed they had the inerrant and inspired word of God. They believed they had the Holy Spirit dwelling in them and guiding them through Christian scripture. They really believed this. They also really believed that the last 12 verses of Mark were inspired parts of scripture, they really believed in that version of Luke 23:34 and they really believed in that periscope in John. What happened?It turned out they believed in forgeries. Additions that were not supported by their most ancient 'witnesses' (manuscripts). Christians nowadays effectively believe their co-religionists of that bygone era were believing in forgeries. Yet those Christians of the past sincerely trusted the NT and sincerely believed the Holy Spirit as guiding them through the NT.
I think you can see where I'm going with this. James, to me, for some reason does not deign to reflect openly upon this?! For him his outward enunciation of what we all know coupled with some surplus manuscript information is 'the light of the truth'. In reality, this is not the light of the truth but merely a lamp which has not been switched on yet. It gets interesting when you switch it on - you switch the lamp on by following the thought pattern outlined above.
James, if you do decide to turn on that lamp you will also come to the question; how can you be sure there is no manuscript discovery around the corner which will wrench whole chunks from the NT just like what happened to John 7:53-8:11 and Mark 16:9-20 in the 18th century? You have no guaranty. Thus you will see that your NT is not reliable as the precedent has been set - another discovery (similar to Codex Sinaiticus) would mean you would have to pronounce other parts to be forgeries. Another discovery cannot be discounted. It's happened before to such an extent that the Bible-believing Christians prior to the 19th century are now considered to have believed in NT forgeries!
James when you sincerely turn that lamp on you will realise it to be faith shattering.
I invite you and your followers, after switching the lamp on, to Islam - the direction the light leads to.
If you are a James White supporter PLEASE think. Really. It's insufficient for him to basically pronounce the forgeries we all know about and not even ponder upon the SIGNIFICANCE of such forgeries. This is a huge problem within Christian apologetics today. The absolute unwillingness to go beyond the mere text book apologetics.
I understand why James considers the mere pronouncement of these forgeries as a big deal as there is a closed-ear approach within certain sectors of the Christian community when it comes to textual criticism. Today I came across a Christian who began to abuse me and claim I was presenting nonsense (in a crude fashion) at the mention of the last 12 verses of Mark being forgeries. Thus there are still Christians out there who don't even have the lamp never mind being at the point of contemplating on nudging that 'on' switch.
For the record, here's Prof Bart Ehrman confirming those verses in Mark being additions:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gt78TFDLdOc
James White's 'Arabic' Pride
Jesus taught people to do the Will of God (according to Mark 3:35) in order to become his brothers, mothers or sisters. A Muslim means one who submits to the Will of God. Do you want to become a brother of Jesus? If yes, become a Muslim. Now is the time.
Learn about Islam:
http://www.thedeenshow.com
Email: yahyasnow@yahoo.co.uk
4 comments:
So you have 2 or 3 passages that you suppose are "forgeries" and yet I am sure you can find any number of other passages from other books written by other authors, in the Bible to back-up what is said in thes few passages.
The miracle of God's Holy Word, (aka the Bible) is that it was written by 44 different authors, both Old and New Testaments, written over thousands of years, and yet is so tightly integrated that it flows from beginning (Genesis) to ending (Revelation)'and has one central theme throughtou - God's redemption of man.
On the other hand, Islam has in its teachings man redeeming himself, which is what Jesus warned the Pharisees against when He told them "You have the law and the prophets, in which you think you have SALVATION, but in reality they speak about ME!" In other words, the Law (Sharia) of Moses was not meant to be the means of salvation but rather the means to show that we need God to redeem us from our sins, and that theme runs throughtout both the Old (there is no remission of sin without the shedding of blood - see Cain vs. Ables sacrifice) and New Testament
What is Islams solution to sin? You have to TRY to stack up your good deeds higher than your bad ones. If you steal $1,000 from someone its okay as long as you give $1,001 to charity! Does this sound like a god of "justice" to you? A person can get away with wronging you as long as they balance that out with helping someone else. Thats not a very fair god, in fact that sounds more like Robin Hood. In fact, isnt that what Muhammad did, stole from the Meccan caravan so his followers who fled to Medina could be taken care of by ill-gotten gains.
Test
Robert ,
Can the word of God contain forgeries? 44 different authors means that 44 different people wrote the bible , ie. word of men - not God.
The law and the prophets is not salvation in Islam. Where did you get this idea from? Can you explain.
What do you mean there is no remission of sin without shedding of blood? There is a concept of repentance.
If you donate $1001 to charity comprising of $1000 of stolen money , you only get the 'good deed' from the $1. You are still -999 in 'bad deeds'. Your argument is flawed.
Why shouldn't Prophet Muhammad(saw) loot the meccan caravans? After all , their (the muslims) properties were confiscated by the meccans when they fled mecca.
'... Ibn Ishaq writes that ”[t]he emigrants [Muhajirun] followed one another to join the apostle [in Medina], and none was left in Mecca but those who had apostatized [under duress?] or been detained.” [34] Their “houses in Mecca were locked up when they migrated…and sold” by the Quraysh [35], prompting Muhammad to reassure one of his followers about the “property which [they] lost in God’s service”: ...'
Source
In addition , it was a strategy of war , ie. commerce raiding (or guerre de course). This is a strategy of the weaker side in any conflict. The US war of independence employed such strategy.
Robert did Jews believe in a trinity ?
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