Is there anything in the Bible that DID happen ?

Question

Or is it really just a big book of faerie tales and lies ?

Answer 1

The second half of your statement.

Answer 2

--WHERE DO you get these ideas of fairy tales?
--WOULD YOU BELIEVE the honesty of the following persons or will you reject them for the bizaar idea of made up stories?
--JUST ON JESUS EXISTENCE & his activities , please note:

The historian H. G. Wells said that a man’s greatness can be measured by ‘what he leaves to grow, and whether he started others to think along fresh lines with a vigor that persisted after him.’ Wells, although not claiming to be a Christian, acknowledged: “By this test Jesus stands first"

***A Historical Person
--Yet, strangely, some say that Jesus never lived—that he is, in effect, a creation of some first-century men. Answering such skeptics, the respected historian Will Durant argued: “That a few simple men should in one generation have invented so powerful and appealing a personality, so lofty an ethic and so inspiring a vision of human brotherhood, would be a miracle far more incredible than any recorded in the Gospels.”

*** gm chap. 1 p. 8 Why Read the Bible? ***
**A Book With Influence
--8 The New Encyclopædia Britannica calls the Bible “probably the most influential collection of books in human history.”2 The 19th-century German poet Heinrich Heine confessed: “I owe my enlightenment quite simply to the reading of a book . . . the Bible. It is quite rightly called Holy Scriptures. He who has lost his God can rediscover Him in this book.”3 During that same century, antislavery activist William H. Seward proclaimed: “The whole hope of human progress is suspended on the ever-growing influence of the Bible.”4
--9 Abraham Lincoln, the 16th president of the United States, called the Bible “the best gift God has ever given to man . . . But for it we could not know right from wrong.”5 British jurist Sir William Blackstone highlighted the influence of the Bible when he said: “Upon these two foundations, the law of nature and the law of revelation [the Bible], depend all human laws, that is to say, no human laws should be suffered to contradict these"
*** jd chap. 1 p. 5 par. 3 Jehovah’s Messages for Then and Now ***
--English author Charles Dickens noted about the Bible: “It is the best book that ever was or will be known in the world . . . because it teaches you the best lessons by which any human creature . . . can possibly be guided.”
*** ba p. 3 A Book to Be Read ***
--“I owe my enlightenment quite simply to the reading of a book.—A book? Yes, and it is an old simple book, modest as nature itself, and as natural . . . And the name of this book is quite offhandishly the book, the Bible.”—Heinrich Heine, 19th-century German writer.3

--IS THERE A POSSIBILITY that you might give heed to these testimonies?
**OR DO YOU NEED hundreds more testimonies by people who made history?--THEY DO EXIST!

Answer 3

Well, the Babylonian captivity of the Canaanite tribes who called themselves Hebrews is fairly well-documented, I've heard.

Pretty much everything BEFORE that in the OT is either an outright fabrication, or recorded oral traditions; i.e., cultural mythology.

As for the NT, we may never really know. People believe what they want to believe . . . the literal truth is that the "gospels" were 4 of almost 200 written anywhere from 50 to 200 years *after* the events they claim to describe, and that most of events of Jesus's ministry can be found in earlier pagan godman myths, just as most of his purported words can be found in rabbinical texts which *predate* the texts by as much as 600 years, and the "gospel" containing them by half a millennium.

The closest thing we have to an authentic early xian document is the Pauline epistles . . . well, some of them, anyway. And read absent the gospels they *predate,* the one remarkable thing about them is they make absolutely no mention of an earthly ministry or any of the events or even teachings in the gospels . . . even the crucifixion is placed in a spiritual realm, not an earthly one.

Answer 4

There WAS a flood. There WERE famines, natural disasters and plagues. There WERE persecutions and pogroms. There WERE migrations. There WERE idolaters. There ARE many things that are hard to believe, same as the Koran or other writings from other cultures, like Beowulf, etc. An ark with 2 each of EVERY animal? I doubt it. Take the good and forget the rest...kinda like how to read the white man's version of American history. Some true, some not. It's up to YOU to be a detective, o ye of little faith.

Answer 5

A very wise woman, who happens to be a Methodist pastor, told me that the Bible is the written record of the experiences of the people of God. In other words, it is what they believed happened based on their frame of reference, which was the time that they lived in. If you don't understand something (like why women aren't treated equally), look at it based on the social system of their time period and it will become clearer. (Also, on women's topics, keep in mind that the original word in the Bible for "man" should have been more correctly translated as "human". What a difference a word makes.)

This has helped me tremendously.

Answer 6

Jesus happened.

If I may suggest, let's start there. Let's not start with Garden of Eden, Flood, sodom & Gomorah.

Let's start with Jesus. Was He a real person. Just simply one question. Once you see, Jesus really lived...then you can say.."ok ...big faerie talk with one true moment."

And then we'll take it from there. Promise it can be a very interesting journey...so whatcha say...ready to start walking it, one objection at a time?

Always happy to answer emails.

Answer 7

Well this is tricky.
There are many people and things in the bible (NT) that happened. The thing that can't really be proven is "Was Jesus involved with said things." I have read really good, scholastic essays on both sides.

Answer 8

Yeah there were probably Kings of Israel that existed, much of what was happening in Palestine of 2,000 years ago is probably reported in spirit. But its just another mythology for the most part, rather like Homer there was a real Troy but probably not a real Achilles.

Answer 9

Well, they have found some proof of Jesus. There is archaeological proof of a global flood. They even proved that there could have been a parting of the sea at one time. So, I guess some of it is true, The rest you have to take on faith.

Answer 10

Well, the jewish tribes did slaughter and take over the area that's now palestine -- the OT is all about the jewish tribes using their deity (Yahweh/God) to support their actions in this. It's probably true that a dude named Jesus existed -- none of the things he said and did are true but his message of love is probably true (the other negative stuff is pure ego stuff and probably put in there by those who made up the rest of the sillyness).

Answer 11

I'm not Christian, but I'm open to the suggestion that maybe Jesus did exist. That doesn't mean I believe in every word uttered by him.