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Published by Jeff
on Wednesday, August 29, 2007 at 8:55 AM. 
Previously, I explored the reliability of Scripture in regard as Truth. I came at it from a secular, legal angle. Would there be enough evidence in court for a jury to deem it true? My answer was yes and outlined why. It can be read or reviewed with my post "Jesus the Key."
Previously, I explored the reliability of Scripture in regard as Truth. I came at it from a secular, legal angle. Would there be enough evidence in court for a jury to deem it true? My answer was yes and outlined why. It can be read or reviewed with my post "Jesus the Key."I came across a story today that gives the other side of how convincing the the New Testament, particularly the Gospel Accounts, ring as true. This account illustrates how the Gospels stand by themselves. I found it interesting:
___________________________________________________________________
Dr. E. V. Rieu was a classical scholar and translator for many years. He rendered Homer into very modern English for the Penguin Classics. Rieu was 60 years old and a lifelong agnostic when the same firm invited him to translate the Gospels. His son remarked: "It will be interesting to see what Father makes of the four Gospels. It will be even more interesting to see what the four Gospels make of Father."
The answer was soon forthcoming. A year later, Rieu, convinced and converted, joined the Church of England. In an interview with J. B. Phillips, Rieu confessed that he had undertaken the task of translation because of an "intense desire to satisfy himself as to the authenticity and spiritual content of the Gospels."
He was determined to approach the documents as if they were newly discovered Greek manuscripts. "Did you not get the feeling," asked Canon Phillips, "that the whole material was extraordinarily alive?" The classical scholar agreed. "I got the deepest feeling," he replied. "My work changed me. I came to the conclusion that these words bear the seal of the Son of Man and God." (from a daily devotion, originally from J. B. Phillips, The Ring of Truth. quoted by R. Kent Hughes in 1001Great Stories and Quotes.)
Labels: apologetics, debate, impressions
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Published by Jeff
on Wednesday, August 08, 2007 at 10:20 AM.
Previously, I discussed how Jesus was the key to discovering God. I will continue from there. I am not going to spend time re-hashing WHY Jesus is key. If you want to explore that more, then visit my original post here. I will now investigate Jesus being the key at another level. He is central in discovering what God has to say to mankind OUTSIDE of the words of Christ, Himself.
The Gospel writers have Jesus referring to Noah, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob - all of which are historical figures found in the book of Genesis. The Gospel of Luke even traces Jesus' lineage all the way back to Adam.
Showing previously the reliability of the New Testament, I will now explore the Old Testament from the credible standpoint OF the New Testament. First of all, there are only five Old Testament books not mentioned in the New Testament: Ezra, Ecclesiastes, Ester, Nehemiah, and Song of Solomon. The rest of the 39 books are accounted for there.
The Gospel writers have Jesus referring to Noah, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob - all of which are historical figures found in the book of Genesis. The Gospel of Luke even traces Jesus' lineage all the way back to Adam.Jesus talks about Moses as the lawgiver on a number of occasions. Moreover, Matthew, Mark, and Luke all described the transfiguratation (represented at the left from a painting by Carl Bloch) where Moses and Elijah came to commune with Jesus on a mountain. Jesus often mentions Moses and the prophets in his teachings.
We can conclude here that if Jesus was/is the Son of God, He would know whether or not these Old Testament stories were false. Instead of discrediting them, He affirms the Old Testament as Truth. This is ironic when one considers the beliefs of the Jews. The Jews do not recognize Jesus as Messiah, yet Jesus provided the most credible evidence to date that the Jewish scriptures are legitimate.
I don't spend too much time here hammering out evidence after evidence. If there is any reason to disagree with me, I welcome it in the "comments" section. Other than that, I will explore how the Old and New Testaments tie together as an overall love letter from God to man; the ultimate Good News to the human race.
Labels: apologetics, comparing religions, finding God, Jesus, origins
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Published by Jeff
on Friday, June 22, 2007 at 3:19 PM.
What we know about Jesus comes mainly from the New Testament of the Bible. Already, some of the critically minded are thinking, "Yeah, those are real objective sources." I admit that on first blush, it doesn't sound very objective. What if the sources of history were a group of documents - some letters, some accounts by historians and other manuscripts that were from different authors in different times. Would that be an objective way to uncover historical facts? That IS how the written history is determined for antiquity. That is also what makes up the New Testament of the Bible. Later, after they were written, those in authority put them together and declared them Scripture. Before that, they were just a number of independent documents.
In these documents, there are accounts of Jesus' life and many direct quotes from Him. There are also accounts and letters on the effect that Jesus had in the lives of people many years after his death.
In these accounts, Jesus was a teacher, a miracle worker, and a prophet. Jesus also proclaims his deity and by these accounts, backs that claim up. He announced that He will be killed, but asserts that He will rise from the dead. By these New Testament chronicles, He does it - a humble man from the family of a carpenter claims he is God (i.e. Son of God) and then backs up the claim. If these documents were not in the Canon of Scripture, nonbelievers may be a little more hesitant about their disdain. However, these documents are all from believers so the credibility (rightly or wrongly) comes into question.
What about the historical accounts of nonbelievers? What kind of clarity can be added to the equation? In my other blog, Psychosomatic Wit I wrote a post about Jesus and Easter called Easter, By Any Other Name:
I am reminded at this time of the year how miraculous the Christian faith really is. A fairly large group of individuals followed their spiritual leader only to watch him miserably and shamefully die. From all accounts, they and their new belief system took a large blow. This execution also killed the new religion of these men and women. They went back to their old lives with their tails between their legs.
Then, something happened. The new faith surged! There was talk of this man Jesus actually be seen – returning from the dead as He said He would and talking and teaching to His followers. Even though the tomb was empty and there was no sign of the body, that doesn’t mean he resurrected, does it? Many of the skeptics accused Jesus’ followers from bribing the soldiers guarding the tomb and stealing the body. There were all kinds of theories.
Yet, something happened that took these dejected followers from their hopeless lives and brought them back to preaching Jesus resurrected. They, by the hoards, were willingly dying for this new belief system. Non-believing historians such as the Roman Tacitis and the Jewish Josephus recorded the unlikely events of this new Christian group - that they grew from nothing and hopelessness, to zealots in the name of this Jesus who was rumored to have conquered death. The disturbing query was this: why would these people come back to this faith, preaching a resurrected Jesus if they merely stole and hid the body? Why would they willingly die for a cause they knew was a lie? They knew if they really saw Him. They knew if they really hid his body? What would they gain but death?
These were not the only nonChristian sources. Others include Suetonius, Thallus, Pliny the Younger, Lucian of Samosata, and the Babylonian Talmud. When all these non-believing sources are pieced together, they are very much compatible to the documents now contained in the New Testament.
Unlike the other religions that I looked into, Christianity stood alone in both reliability, and the number of sources available to check the reliability. An intelligent Creator who wants to commune with his creation, for me, found "the Way" and provided it for us.
This one is overdue. My apologies for those who checked for it and kept checking and kept checking . . .
The prerequisites for this entry are as follows:
1. The Search
2. The Search Continues
3. Whittling Down the Choices
If you read (or re-read) these in this order before continuing to the rest of this post, it will make good, logical order sense. I know that no one does it, but I have to urge that anyway.
____________________________________________________________________
The prerequisites for this entry are as follows:
1. The Search
2. The Search Continues
3. Whittling Down the Choices
If you read (or re-read) these in this order before continuing to the rest of this post, it will make good, logical order sense. I know that no one does it, but I have to urge that anyway.
____________________________________________________________________
What we know about Jesus comes mainly from the New Testament of the Bible. Already, some of the critically minded are thinking, "Yeah, those are real objective sources." I admit that on first blush, it doesn't sound very objective. What if the sources of history were a group of documents - some letters, some accounts by historians and other manuscripts that were from different authors in different times. Would that be an objective way to uncover historical facts? That IS how the written history is determined for antiquity. That is also what makes up the New Testament of the Bible. Later, after they were written, those in authority put them together and declared them Scripture. Before that, they were just a number of independent documents.
In these documents, there are accounts of Jesus' life and many direct quotes from Him. There are also accounts and letters on the effect that Jesus had in the lives of people many years after his death.
In these accounts, Jesus was a teacher, a miracle worker, and a prophet. Jesus also proclaims his deity and by these accounts, backs that claim up. He announced that He will be killed, but asserts that He will rise from the dead. By these New Testament chronicles, He does it - a humble man from the family of a carpenter claims he is God (i.e. Son of God) and then backs up the claim. If these documents were not in the Canon of Scripture, nonbelievers may be a little more hesitant about their disdain. However, these documents are all from believers so the credibility (rightly or wrongly) comes into question.
What about the historical accounts of nonbelievers? What kind of clarity can be added to the equation? In my other blog, Psychosomatic Wit I wrote a post about Jesus and Easter called Easter, By Any Other Name:
I am reminded at this time of the year how miraculous the Christian faith really is. A fairly large group of individuals followed their spiritual leader only to watch him miserably and shamefully die. From all accounts, they and their new belief system took a large blow. This execution also killed the new religion of these men and women. They went back to their old lives with their tails between their legs.
Then, something happened. The new faith surged! There was talk of this man Jesus actually be seen – returning from the dead as He said He would and talking and teaching to His followers. Even though the tomb was empty and there was no sign of the body, that doesn’t mean he resurrected, does it? Many of the skeptics accused Jesus’ followers from bribing the soldiers guarding the tomb and stealing the body. There were all kinds of theories.
Yet, something happened that took these dejected followers from their hopeless lives and brought them back to preaching Jesus resurrected. They, by the hoards, were willingly dying for this new belief system. Non-believing historians such as the Roman Tacitis and the Jewish Josephus recorded the unlikely events of this new Christian group - that they grew from nothing and hopelessness, to zealots in the name of this Jesus who was rumored to have conquered death. The disturbing query was this: why would these people come back to this faith, preaching a resurrected Jesus if they merely stole and hid the body? Why would they willingly die for a cause they knew was a lie? They knew if they really saw Him. They knew if they really hid his body? What would they gain but death?
These were not the only nonChristian sources. Others include Suetonius, Thallus, Pliny the Younger, Lucian of Samosata, and the Babylonian Talmud. When all these non-believing sources are pieced together, they are very much compatible to the documents now contained in the New Testament.
Unlike the other religions that I looked into, Christianity stood alone in both reliability, and the number of sources available to check the reliability. An intelligent Creator who wants to commune with his creation, for me, found "the Way" and provided it for us.
Labels: apologetics, comparing religions, finding God
1 Comments
Published by Jeff
on Monday, June 11, 2007 at 11:55 AM.
In the last post, I reduced all valid beliefs in God to the big three: Judaism, Islam, and Christianity. Of course if they all come to a dead end, that would open things up to others.
When examining Judaism, I found SOME evidence. The Jewish scriptures were kept remarkably well over the centuries. The scribes painstakingly made sure that they remained accurate generation after generation. Even when the Dead Sea Scrolls were found in the mid 1900's, they were found to be faithful to the book of Isaiah and Habbukuk. Still other books were hard to find verification. When comparing the Genesis story to contemporary science theory concerning the origins of the Universe, there appears to be some conflict there.
Because Christianity accepts the Jewish Bible (for lack of better term), I jumped to examining it. The basic difference between Judaism and Christianity is the figure of Jesus. I found that Jesus was the central key to comprehending the standing of all religion. It all fell on him or it was back to the drawing board. That, however, is a post all in itself.
When I examined Islam, I found it faulty and unsubstantiated. Basically, we have to have faith that the prophet Muhammad was who he said he was without any sound proof. The main thing that I found and tested this claim was examining what he said about the Bible. He claimed that the Bible was God's book, but it had been corrupted. Since there was hundreds and thousands of copies from different sources and different regions of the Earth, the evidence just doesn't support this. As I mentioned above, the Scribes were too careful and serious about their work - and they were all unbelievably consistent. Plus, finding the Dead Sea Scrolls and discovering it consistent with the other manuscripts, one has to conclude that there is just no evidence of this universal tampering that Muslims claim.
There is also some inconsistancies about the personality of God (Allah). On the Earth, people are to refrain from sex (except with the spouse), but as a reward, God can give a large number of virgins for Muslim men to have sex with? It just doesn't make sense. God prepares us HERE for a holy life in heaven. There has to be a reason God wouldn't want us to be promiscuous here. He is not merely a cosmic killjoy. Because of these major reasons (the lack of evidence of Bible corruption, the total reliance on one man's testimony, and the obvious inconsistency of the personality of Allah), I must conclude that Islam can not be trusted. I state this with no malice to my Muslim brothers and sisters, I am just following a path to its logical end.
I will look closer at Christianity and Judaism next.
When examining Judaism, I found SOME evidence. The Jewish scriptures were kept remarkably well over the centuries. The scribes painstakingly made sure that they remained accurate generation after generation. Even when the Dead Sea Scrolls were found in the mid 1900's, they were found to be faithful to the book of Isaiah and Habbukuk. Still other books were hard to find verification. When comparing the Genesis story to contemporary science theory concerning the origins of the Universe, there appears to be some conflict there.
Because Christianity accepts the Jewish Bible (for lack of better term), I jumped to examining it. The basic difference between Judaism and Christianity is the figure of Jesus. I found that Jesus was the central key to comprehending the standing of all religion. It all fell on him or it was back to the drawing board. That, however, is a post all in itself.
When I examined Islam, I found it faulty and unsubstantiated. Basically, we have to have faith that the prophet Muhammad was who he said he was without any sound proof. The main thing that I found and tested this claim was examining what he said about the Bible. He claimed that the Bible was God's book, but it had been corrupted. Since there was hundreds and thousands of copies from different sources and different regions of the Earth, the evidence just doesn't support this. As I mentioned above, the Scribes were too careful and serious about their work - and they were all unbelievably consistent. Plus, finding the Dead Sea Scrolls and discovering it consistent with the other manuscripts, one has to conclude that there is just no evidence of this universal tampering that Muslims claim.
There is also some inconsistancies about the personality of God (Allah). On the Earth, people are to refrain from sex (except with the spouse), but as a reward, God can give a large number of virgins for Muslim men to have sex with? It just doesn't make sense. God prepares us HERE for a holy life in heaven. There has to be a reason God wouldn't want us to be promiscuous here. He is not merely a cosmic killjoy. Because of these major reasons (the lack of evidence of Bible corruption, the total reliance on one man's testimony, and the obvious inconsistency of the personality of Allah), I must conclude that Islam can not be trusted. I state this with no malice to my Muslim brothers and sisters, I am just following a path to its logical end.
I will look closer at Christianity and Judaism next.
Labels: apologetics, comparing religions, finding God, Islam, Jesus, Judaism, Muhammad
4 Comments
Published by Jeff
on Wednesday, June 06, 2007 at 10:04 AM.
Discovering that there was a reason to believe in God (from the previous post), I set out to determine which god could it be? It only made sense to me, that if an intelligent being created the Universe and set the world in motion, He would want us to know Him. Everyone is built with an inclination to believe in God. Atheists call it a "god gene". They think it explains away God, but I think it supports the opposite. If I would send my sons and daughters out in the world, I certainly would like to plant a homing device on them so I could continue my fellowship with them.
Discovering that there was a reason to believe in God (from the previous post), I set out to determine which god could it be? It only made sense to me, that if an intelligent being created the Universe and set the world in motion, He would want us to know Him. Everyone is built with an inclination to believe in God. Atheists call it a "god gene". They think it explains away God, but I think it supports the opposite. If I would send my sons and daughters out in the world, I certainly would like to plant a homing device on them so I could continue my fellowship with them.So I decided to examine the giant religions. I looked at Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism.
Truthfully, I kind of tabled Hinduism and Buddhism. Hinduism makes way too many claims that can't be confirmed. All the mess about reincarnation just can't be substanciated. Buddhism doesn't really hold to a god, so that kind of eliminated itself. However, I do think that there are elements of both those religions that has truth to it. Just another example of the Bible's claim that God has written on the hearts of man.
Judaism and Christianity are basically the same religion with Christianity opening a new chapter on what was built by Judaism. Islam, in a sense, does the same thing with Christianity with Muhammad coming along 700 years of so after Jesus. I will address how all this stacked up to me soon.
Labels: apologetics, comparing religions, finding God
1 Comments
Published by Jeff
on Friday, June 01, 2007 at 3:40 PM.
Prerequisite: Beginnings
Somewhere around high school, I drifted from my belief in God. I wasn't the flaming atheist, but everything I thought about as it related to my life was absent of God or a god. School filled me up with Evolution which replaced Creation as fact in my life. There was also plenty of situational ethics and no absolutes. I lived a godless life without even thinking about it.
Slowly over time, I started considering the issues of God. I knew I had to make a decision in some way. I wanted God to prove Himself to me, but He wouldn't. You can't come to know God on your own terms but only on His. I took a leap of faith and believed. "Now will you show me, God?"
With "Pascal's Wager" in mind and beholding all the wonders of the world, I set out to allow God to confirm Himself to me. I found interesting tidbits such as the moon is exactly the right size and distance from the Earth to allow the Earth to sustain life. By chance? I don't think so. Shoot just believing that life came from nonlife takes more faith than to just believe in a Creator.
Getting to the point where it was becoming obvious that there is a God. How can we know who or what god is correct? An answer for another time.
Labels: apologetics, childhood, finding God, origins
1 Comments
Published by Jeff
on Thursday, May 03, 2007 at 9:28 AM.
In my church this week, they launched a new series that they like to call "Star Wars". It is a discussion of evolution and creation - I guess a battle over who created the stars. This first week, the discussion was confined to "old Earth" vs. "new Earth".
Of course, the atheists believe it is an old earth that some how miraculously appeared from nothing (with a big bang, etc.) I don't have enough faith in that to give it much press here. That is for another post. For today, I am just thinking in terms of God.
The Old Earth theory dictates that the Book of Genesis can easily be interpreted in a way that allows for each of the "days" of Creation could be something other than 24-hour periods. Some of the terminology in Hebrew (the language of the Old Testament) provides for this possibility. Therefore, depending on the amount of time for each day, the Earth could be billions of years old which would satisfy the contemporary scientific age estimates of rocks, fossils and the expanding Universe.
On the other hand, the New Earth theory states that the Bible states it took six days to create the Earth. The new Earthers reason that if God said it, then by golly, it took six days to create (and one day to rest). God understood that we (in this case contemporary Americans) know that a day is a 24-hour period and that was the word He chose to use in this account. Therefore, why should we try to put words in God's mouth in order to pacify the pagan scientists anyway? After establishing that one can conclude that since the creation of man was at the end of the first week, one can figure out the age of the Earth by tracking each generation up to Jesus through out the genealogy that the Bible provides. It even gives the age of death of each ancestor (or most) of Christ. Add all that together and calculate the new era dates and you can figure out that the Earth is only 6000 to 8000 years old.
One attached theory to the OET, is that God created the Earth in six days, but made it appear to be mature and old (millions of years old) just as He did the first man (Adam) by creating him to "appear" to be about 16-18 years old - even though his actual age was one day old. I will let that theory just stand alone as an FYI for this entry.
At any rate, it would appear that the "Old Earth Theory" is the most reasonable of the two original theories presented here. First blushes are often deceiving, though. Since one supporting piece of evidence suggests that the plants and animals took care of multiplying themselves with God's direct action in Genesis 1:12 "And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good (KJV)."
However, on further examination, all this happened on Day 3 - according to Genesis. But on Day 4, God created the sun and the moon. The problem is that the plants and grasses couldn't multiply on their own without the sun. So, it would be logical to assume that everything had to be in place before life could spontaneously replenish itself.
In addition, there is evidence that some things that appeared to happen over millions of years actually could have happened in a matter of days if certain dramatic events were present (i.e. a world wide flood, earthquakes, etc.) The Grand Canyon is one example.
I am not going to come to a conclusion here. I think both scenarios are possible. The Bible states that all things are possible with God. I guess the lesson is to not get married to any explanation. There is just too much still to examine and learn.
In my church this week, they launched a new series that they like to call "Star Wars". It is a discussion of evolution and creation - I guess a battle over who created the stars. This first week, the discussion was confined to "old Earth" vs. "new Earth".Of course, the atheists believe it is an old earth that some how miraculously appeared from nothing (with a big bang, etc.) I don't have enough faith in that to give it much press here. That is for another post. For today, I am just thinking in terms of God.
The Old Earth theory dictates that the Book of Genesis can easily be interpreted in a way that allows for each of the "days" of Creation could be something other than 24-hour periods. Some of the terminology in Hebrew (the language of the Old Testament) provides for this possibility. Therefore, depending on the amount of time for each day, the Earth could be billions of years old which would satisfy the contemporary scientific age estimates of rocks, fossils and the expanding Universe.
On the other hand, the New Earth theory states that the Bible states it took six days to create the Earth. The new Earthers reason that if God said it, then by golly, it took six days to create (and one day to rest). God understood that we (in this case contemporary Americans) know that a day is a 24-hour period and that was the word He chose to use in this account. Therefore, why should we try to put words in God's mouth in order to pacify the pagan scientists anyway? After establishing that one can conclude that since the creation of man was at the end of the first week, one can figure out the age of the Earth by tracking each generation up to Jesus through out the genealogy that the Bible provides. It even gives the age of death of each ancestor (or most) of Christ. Add all that together and calculate the new era dates and you can figure out that the Earth is only 6000 to 8000 years old.
One attached theory to the OET, is that God created the Earth in six days, but made it appear to be mature and old (millions of years old) just as He did the first man (Adam) by creating him to "appear" to be about 16-18 years old - even though his actual age was one day old. I will let that theory just stand alone as an FYI for this entry.
At any rate, it would appear that the "Old Earth Theory" is the most reasonable of the two original theories presented here. First blushes are often deceiving, though. Since one supporting piece of evidence suggests that the plants and animals took care of multiplying themselves with God's direct action in Genesis 1:12 "And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good (KJV)."
However, on further examination, all this happened on Day 3 - according to Genesis. But on Day 4, God created the sun and the moon. The problem is that the plants and grasses couldn't multiply on their own without the sun. So, it would be logical to assume that everything had to be in place before life could spontaneously replenish itself.
In addition, there is evidence that some things that appeared to happen over millions of years actually could have happened in a matter of days if certain dramatic events were present (i.e. a world wide flood, earthquakes, etc.) The Grand Canyon is one example.
I am not going to come to a conclusion here. I think both scenarios are possible. The Bible states that all things are possible with God. I guess the lesson is to not get married to any explanation. There is just too much still to examine and learn.
Labels: apologetics, origins
2 Comments
Published by Jeff
on Friday, April 27, 2007 at 9:35 AM.
It is strange writing in this blog. I mean, I am writing but I know that no one is reading it - or hardly anyone. My other blog started the same way, but that was a year ago. When one is used to having a semblance of community, it is hard to hear the echos of his voice in an empty room like this. Oh well.
I have yet to hear anyone defeat Pascal's Wager. Skeptics tend to cite that the argument is, indeed, "Pascal's Wager" like it is self-defeating, but I really haven't heard anything that actually deals a death blow to it. Pascal's Wager is like this (paraphrased):
If person "A" does not believe in God, and it turns out that God doesn't exist, then he was correct and nothing happens at death other than nonexistence. However, if "A" does not believe in God, yet God does exist, then "A" may suffer dire circumstances in eternity.
Conversely, if person "B" DOES believe in God, and God does exist, then person "B" may be rewarded in eternity. However, if "B" believes in God, but God does NOT exist, then person "B" gets the same result as person "A", i.e. nothing happens but nonexistence.
So, in this small scenario, it makes no sense to be in the position of person "A" because there is nothing to gain and everything to lose. Person "B", conversely has nothing to lose and everything to gain for being a believer.
Of course there are subsequent issues such as "intellectually believing" may not be enough, or what if person "B" believes in the wrong god, etc., but the root of it is hard to refute.
I have yet to hear anyone defeat Pascal's Wager. Skeptics tend to cite that the argument is, indeed, "Pascal's Wager" like it is self-defeating, but I really haven't heard anything that actually deals a death blow to it. Pascal's Wager is like this (paraphrased):If person "A" does not believe in God, and it turns out that God doesn't exist, then he was correct and nothing happens at death other than nonexistence. However, if "A" does not believe in God, yet God does exist, then "A" may suffer dire circumstances in eternity.
Conversely, if person "B" DOES believe in God, and God does exist, then person "B" may be rewarded in eternity. However, if "B" believes in God, but God does NOT exist, then person "B" gets the same result as person "A", i.e. nothing happens but nonexistence.
So, in this small scenario, it makes no sense to be in the position of person "A" because there is nothing to gain and everything to lose. Person "B", conversely has nothing to lose and everything to gain for being a believer.
Of course there are subsequent issues such as "intellectually believing" may not be enough, or what if person "B" believes in the wrong god, etc., but the root of it is hard to refute.
Labels: apologetics, blog
