Note to Bob

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I will answer your comment next Monday. I decreed to just make it the main blog piece.

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Where did Jesus say "It is better to give than receive?"

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A visitor to the CADRE site recently sent a question about Paul's statement in Acts 20:35 which records Paul as saying, "And remember the words of the Lord Jesus, that He said, 'It is better to give than to receive'." The reader wanted to know where Jesus said this. This was my answer: You are correct in noting that this saying of Jesus quoted by Paul is not found anywhere in the four Gospels. My own study Bible says "This is a rare instance of a saying of Jesus not found in the canonical Gospels." Does the fact that it isn't stated in the Gospels mean that it isn't reliably from the lips of Jesus? I don't think so. The Apolstle John said at the end of his Gospel (John 21:25): "Jesus did many other things as well.If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written." Obviously, this is exaggeration for the sake of making a point, but it means that Jesu
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Exodus 22:18 - Are Followers of God to Kill Witches?

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A few days ago I stumbled upon an article published on a website named Haaretz which appears to be a news site for Israeli news. The article entitled " Thou Shalt Not Suffer a Witch to Live: A Murderous Translation ," discussed the correct understanding of Exodus 22:18. According to the Haaretz article (authored by Elizabeth Sloane), the word "witch" may have been an erroneous translation. And, to read into Ms. Sloane's argument just a bit, the erroneous translation contributed to the deaths of many innocent witches. Specifically, she notes: This quote, found in the King James Version of the Bible, has been widely held responsible for the witch burnings that plagued Europe, and later America, in the Early Modern Period (1450 C.E. – 1750 C.E.). But the murderous practice may have all been the result of a Biblical mistranslation. Now, as I am not an expert on ancient Hebrew, I need to approach translation issues such as this by accessing sources readily
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Revamping and New Articles at the CADRE Site

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We have changed the Christian History page at the CADRE site from the old design to the new one. The focus of the revamped page has expanded, with many new articles: This page provides links to websites and articles relating to Christian history, including theological development, notable figures, contributions of Christianity to society and culture, and the archaeological evidence for the facts of the Bible. We have also added four new articles by Darin Wood, PhD: John Chrysostum: His Life, Legacy, and Influence Dr. Wood provides an informative sketch of Chrysostum's life, as well as an exploration into his writings and impact on church evangelism. The Righteousness of God in the Pauline Corpus Dr. Wood examines the crucial role that righteousness plays in understanding Paul's perspectives on justification, propitiation, expiation, and covenant. The Structure of the Apocalypse Dr. Wood provides an in-depth analysis of the structure (or structures) behind the Boo
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The Bogus Gandhi Quote

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I first made this post in 2012, and since then I've made a sort of mini-career out of tracking down bogus quotes like this one (including a video version below). It's a sort of fun microcosm of the way information is mishandled in the Information Age. ** I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ. – Mahatma Gandhi A Christian can probably expect to get this quote thrown at them at least once in their lifetime, and waved in their face many more. I had it put to me recently, but my experience with this sort of thing immediately led me to wonder -- is it real? The evidence at this point seems to be no. The first signal of a problem was that anywhere I found it, no source was given. That's often a sign that something is being passed around uncritically. Whether online sources or books, no one seemed to have a source for this quote. A second warning was that the quote has been given more than one context. As
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Discussing Embryonic Stem Cell Research

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Stand to Reason has published a list of "talking points" that can be used as a quick reference sheet for answering questions about embryonic stem cell research and why people ought to oppose this procedure. The piece, entitled "Are you against stem cell research and cloning?" give good, concise answers to some of the questions that arise concerning why Christians would oppose this procedure when it supposedly holds such great promise. For example, consider the following from the "talking points": Where do we get human embryonic stem cells? We can only derive human embryonic stem cells by killing a human embryo. Removing its stem cells leaves it with no cells from which to build the organs of its body. What is the embryo? An embryo is a living, whole, human organism (a human being) in the embryonic stage. All the embryo needs to live is a proper environment and adequate nutrition, the very same thing all infants, toddlers, adolescents, and adults ne
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Why Christian Theism Is Almost Certainly True: A Reply to Cale Nearing

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Some days ago at the Facebook group "Reasonable Faith Debunked" atheist Cale Nearing [1] laid out what he calls "A positive argument for atheism." The basic idea behind the argument, as I see it, is that since the evidence for theism is compatible not only with theism but with any number of coherent and mutually exclusive hypotheses explaining the origin and life-permitting structure of our universe, the probability of theism being the one true hypothesis is very low; and, since atheism is simply the negation of theism, the probability that atheism is true is very high. Or as Nearing asserts, "Any rational inductor will conclude that Theism is almost certainly false, and therefore that Atheism (the negation of theism) is almost certainly true."   Now the argument as Nearing presents it appears quite sophisticated, making extensive use of the probability calculus generally and Bayes' Theorem in particular. Despite this apparent sophistication, ho
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How Many Children in Bethlehem Did Herod Kill?

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A couple of months ago, I wrote a post about the Gospel of Matthew’s account of the slaughter of the innocents. Therein, I argued that some of the skepticism about the account was unjustified. One argument I made was that the number of children killed in Bethlehem would likely have been no more than 20. Though obviously an act of great evil, the killing of 20 children would be much less likely to be noticed by historians of the time than the slaughter of thousands as later traditions speculated. In response to the post, Peter Kirby asked a few questions. He has patiently waited my response, continuously delayed by work, family, and the completion of my Acts article . Two of the questions had to do with how the amount of 20 was determined. Others with the omission of the account by Luke and the reliability of the tradition recounted by Macrobius. Peter also mentioned that there were other reasons to doubt the story's historicity beyond just the silence of other sources.
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Scientifically Documented Miracles

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Study: The Miracles: A Doctor says "Yes" by Richard H. Casdorph.(Logos International, 1976) Richard H. Casdroph collected medical evidence, x-rays, angiograms, and other data from 10 cases associated with the Kathryn Kulhman ministry. Now it will of course strike skeptics as laughable to document the miracles of a faith healer. Ordinarily I myself tend to be highly skeptical of any televangelists. I am still skeptical of Kulhman because of her highly theatrical manner. But I always had the impression that there was actual documentation of her miracles and I guess that impression was created by the Casdorph book. The Casdroph book goes into great detail on every case. Since these were not the actual patients of Casdroph himself, there are three tiers of medical data and opinion; Casdroph himself and his evaluation of the data, several doctors with whom he consulted on every case (and they vary from case to case), and the original doctors of the patients themselves. The p
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The Criteria of Embarrassment and Jesus' Baptism in the Gospel of Mark

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Scholars frequently pronounce the baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist as one of the firmest historical facts about Jesus’ life. See, e.g. , James D.G. Dunn, Jesus Remembered , Vol. I, pages 350 (“This is one of the most securely grounded facts in all the history of Jesus.”); Robert H. Stein, Mark , page 55 (“Jesus’s baptism by John is one of the most certain historical facts we possess concerning the life of Jesus.”). This post will focus on the account of Jesus’ baptism in Mark and a challenge to its historicity from Neil G. at Vridar . Here is the relevant passage. John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. And all the country of Judea was going out to him, and all the people of Jerusalem; and they were being baptized by him in the Jordan River, confessing their sins. John was clothed with camel's hair and wore a leather belt around his waist, and his diet was locusts and wild honey. And he was preaching, and
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The Meaning of the Manger

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The manger in which Jesus was laid has colored our imagery of Christmas. A manger, "[i]s a feeding-trough, crib, or open box in a stable designed to hold fodder for livestock.” Nelson’s Illustrated Bible Dictionary , page 674. Usually, we associate the manger with the animals in the story of Christmas or with Jesus’ perceived poverty. I have several nativity sets which include the manger, along with barn animals. Although I am a nativity set enthusiast, there is a much deeper meaning in the manger. The manger is mentioned three times in Luke 2. Mary lays Jesus in the manger, the angels tell the shepherds that they will find the Savior by seeking the baby lying in a manger, and then the shepherds in fact find Jesus lying in a manger. Obviously, the repetitive references to the manger are indicative of its significance in Luke’s narrative. As Bible scholar N.T. Wright comments: [I]t was the feeding-trough, appropriately enough, which was the sign to the shepherds. It told them
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