Would they become Mormons if I could show them cases where Joseph Smith referred to people and places that actually existed in the northeastern US in the 1820’s?

It’s actually kind of funny you would say that, because we have historical documents indicating that a case was brought against Joseph Smith by the state of New York for defrauding people, and pretty strong indications that he ended up getting kicked out of the state because of it.

Clearly, Geisler and Turek are only moments away from becoming Mormons; after all, by their own argument, they don’t have enough FAITH to be CHRISTIANS.

Wow, that’s a hefty assumption about a couple of guys who have spent years in the Christian apologetics realm. I’m amazed at how you unearthed such a statement from a couple of paragraphs.

It’s a suspicion, not an assumption, and it’s partly based on my own experience spending years evangelizing and defending Christianity. I know from personal experience how unconfessed doubts can serve as a motive for making an energetic defense of one’s faith.

Plus, by their own admission, they have enough experience in apologetics to realize that at least some of the Bible’s weaknesses can only be explained and defended by declaring that the “infallible and inspired revelation of the Word of God” is really just “a human book with human characteristics.” If that doesn’t provoke doubts in their hearts, then they’ve got serious issues with either their intelligence or their integrity.

That’s a pretty dishonest accounting of the author’s point in their hightlights of the book of Luke in both his gopsel and the book of Acts. I get your cynicism, but even your hyperbole here pushes the limits of run-of-the-mill sarcasm.

Well, you may have a point. Geisler and Turek repeat the same errors with such monotonous regularity that it gets hard to address them without falling into the same monotony. Hence the attraction of a more “creative” response.

But you’re right, I do need to bear in mind that some people may be reading this as their first post, and might not have the background of the earlier chapters. My facetious summary is a bit over the top, in substance at least. Though in my own defense, if you read back over the list of mundane and irrelevant details they cite as proof of Luke’s infallibility, my comment is not far off as regards the spirit of their argument. Would they become Mormons if I could show them cases where Joseph Smith referred to people and places that actually existed in the northeastern US in the 1820′s? Christian Scientists if Mary Baker Eddy knew how to get from Philadelphia to Washington DC? Scientologists if L. Ron Hubbard knew who was president in 1966?

My point was that though they claim to base their conclusions on reliable factual evidence, their own book plainly shows that they have no consistent and reasonable standard of evidence that they apply impartially to all cases. When they reject Darwin’s evidence, they do so because it conflicts with what they assume the Bible teaches, and when they embrace Luke’s evidence, they do so because they assume his accounts are inspired Scripture. The flimsy excuses they present as “evidence” of Luke’s reliability are just that—excuses. Any other religion could offer the same “proof” of their own reliability, but Geisler and Turek won’t accept that and convert to those other religions. Because they’ve already assumed that only their Bible is the Truth.

“Geisler and Turek are merely confronting their own uneasy suspicion that the Bible does indeed look like the product of human effort rather than the divine revelation they want it to be. So to buttress their faith, they argue that, even though people can be wrong some times, they can also be right.”

Wow, that’s a hefty assumption about a couple of guys who have spent years in the Christian apologetics realm. I’m amazed at how you unearthed such a statement from a couple of paragraphs.

“Meanwhile, Luke reports that Paul crossed the Mediterranean Sea by getting into something called a “boat,” and that’s proof beyond a reasonable doubt that all of the claims of the New Testament writers are historically reliable.”

That’s a pretty dishonest accounting of the author’s point in their hightlights of the book of Luke in both his gopsel and the book of Acts. I get your cynicism, but even your hyperbole here pushes the limits of run-of-the-mill sarcasm.

Cheers.

Actually, I wouldn’t fault them for suggesting the possibility of a human writing a bit of prose, similar in length to some of the NT books, without making any errors. Given sufficient (and sufficiently reliable) quality control and fact checking, errors should be detectable and correctable prior to publication. No guarantees, but it doesn’t sound inconceivable that at least some percentage of published literature manages to get published without significant error.

Where fundamentalists err is in (a) pronouncing the Bible not just inerrant but infallible (as in “we don’t even need to check”) and (b) trying to rationalize away the errors in the Bible instead of acknowledging them and downgrading its presumed reliability accordingly.

Do they give examples of such error-free human-produced books? I dare say there’s not one; not one without error the way Fundamentalists claim the Bible is. And if they were to find one, would they then regard it as ultimately authoritative as the Bible? If not, then what characteristic of the Bible makes it so indubitably authoritative? Seems to me that they’ve accomplished zilch with the silly claim that humans can produce error-free books, even if it could be proved true. It’s just a sidetrack that leads to nowhere.