3 Card Monty
I can remember, years ago, seeing a documentary on “Card Sharks”. These were street smart “card sharks” who ripped people off...big time. They had a little cardboard box and on it they had three cards. For the sake of the story I will say 2 kings and a queen. The object of the game is to pick the “queen”. So the dealer shows the person the queen the turns it over and shuffles the three cards. Then comes the time where the person has to guess where the queen is. These guys will build a persons confidence and then comes the big con. The player bets a good chunk of coin on picking the “queen” and all of a sudden realizes that they got it wrong. The documentary showed that these “sharks” have a special way of throwing the cards in such a way that it looks one way but in reality it is another.
This is what the unbeliever does when he questions the believer about his faith. He shuffles the conversation in such a way that the onlooker actually believes that “this guy” is open to know the truth...he is really seeking for truth, but like 3 Card Monty, unless you know how to watch his “sneaky” shuffle...your gonna get burned.
Here is one “trick” move of the unbeliever. He wants you to show him “evidence” to prove your faith. But what he is trying to do, at the same time, is bring you over into his “unbelieving” outlook on the who he [the unbeliever] is.
He is saying the only reason why he doesn’t believe is because there isn’t “any” or “enough” evidence pointing to the existence of God or that Jesus Christ was Divine...poor guy.
But who is the believer going to trust, the unbelieving skeptic’s “self definition” or the bibles definition of the unbeliever?
The Bible says that all men know “the” God to such a clear extent that they are without excuse.
The Bible shows us case after case where men saw miracles and these didn’t change their hearts. They saw Jesus heal the sick, open the eyes of men born blind, and even raise the dead, and these same men crucified the Lord of glory.
Even when Jesus arose from the grave these men paid the guards, who heard the angels declaration that Christ had arisen, and saw the empty grave, to keep their mouths shut.
This is called suppression of the evidence.
The Bible teaches that “fallen” man’s heart is...well...fallen.
The unbeliever...denying the Bible...at the same time denies the “fall”. If he denies the fall then there is nothing wrong with man’s reasoning power, nothing wrong with man’s volition, man is normal.
But God doesn’t say that man is normal, he is fallen, his heart hates God and God’s truths. He doesn’t understand the things of God because he thinks their foolish. He refuses to submit to God...as a matter of fact, he can’t [without God’s intervention]. God says the unbeliever is not seeking after God [truth]...but is running full blast away from truth.
If you answer the unbeliever according to his view of reality then you too will become a fool.
The unbeliever doesn’t believe in God because he is a rebel...and he simply refuses to submit his knee to Christ.
I’ll let you in on a secret...when the unbeliever says that he would trust Jesus if only you could give him more information...he’s lying to you [and to himself].
The only thing that will change his rebellion is God giving him a new heart. And God renews men’s hearts through His Word...so keep sharing the truth...and praying for those who are heading for destruction.
posted by Dale Callahan at 7:10 PM
24 Comments:
How clever! You can't answer an unbeliever according to his view of reality and the unbeliever doesn't share your view of reality because he is a rebel and a fool.
Pretty much isolates you from any need to acknowledge a reality outside the narrow confines of your worldview and makes it clear that you consider yourself better than everyone else that doesn't share your "view of reality".
It's arrogant, dismissive, exclusivist, and unscientific. Doesn't sound much like the Jesus of the gospels, but I'm sure you have a convoluted explanation of that as well.
Thats right DL both the unbeliever and believer are within "a circle" or a belief system, or a worldview.
Both interpret evidence with the presuppositions of their world view[the unbeliever actually "says" he does this but in reality has to borrow from the Christian...then uses a real cheezy, useless argument saying thats just how things are, or everyone assumes these thing...oh brother].
Both sides want to use logic, science and morality, even though both sides try to discount the othersides use of them...that is what you are an expert at DL.
So then does this lead us to a place that each side just hangs around in their own circle...calling the other side names?
Not at all...instead it brings us to another kind of argument...a indirect type of argument.
What are the "pre-conditions" for logic, science, man's dignity, free will, morality?
If a person consistently followed their naturalism and materialism could they really give a "reason" for "why" they use "concepts" that are immaterial. Can the human eye observe a "universal"? We can observe a particular cow in the field but do we observe the universal of cowness that allows us to class these animals?
In a random chance universe where "evolution" reigns supreme and "mutations" are a part of the order of things...how can a man assume that the future is going to be like the past. If he can't assume uniformity of nature then by what standards is he guaging his experiments by?
In the end what I am saying is each side needs to be able to justify why he can get along in this world.
The Christian claims a supernatural order, the unbeliever a natural order.
Each one should be able to philosophically justify their worldview.
But if you have been reading this blog you will notice that DL hasn't even begun to try to do this.
In his naturalism he has also shown an arrogance, dismissive and exclusivist attitude [excluding those who disaree with him].
He has isolated himself so much that he refuses to try to explain the narrow confines of his own worldview.
He just says thats the way it is.
Do notice that this level of argument may work on the playground but it shouldn't be used among grown ups.
By you coming on to my blog and trying to dissect my beliefs...without ever a thought that you have to even explain how your beliefs "work" in a consistent mannner with your worldview shows you have a lot to think about.
There's a psychological defense known as projection. That's when a person projects his/her own feelings and ideas onto another. You may notice that you are accusing me of being arrogant, exclusivist and dismissive while not acknowledging that you are arrogant, exclusivist and dismissive.
You claim that I have not tried to justify my "natural" worldview, but fail to acknowledge that you have not made an attempt to justify your "supernatural" worldview.
In your post you make it clear that you do not, cannot and will not engage in a reasonable discussion on neutral terms with someone who does not share your point of view. If that's not isolating yourself, what is?
Would you accept or even consider an explanation of how my beliefs "work" in a consistent mannner with my worldview? Of course you wouldn't! It would be an unbeliever led by Satan to try to undermine your faith or whatever and you would dismiss it out of hand.
A wise man once said that one should remove the beam from one's own eye before trying to remove the speck from another's. Good advice, Dale.
Whats funny DL is that you labeled me as all those things and now are getting defensive because I brought it back in your face, lol. Too funny dude!
Ask me then man, and I will, but I want the same in return.
I agree with you on one point...I cannot argue on neutral terms because there is no such thing. Its a myth...and you have swallowed it hook, line and sinker.
Refusing a supernatural presuppositon from the outset...this is also isolating yourself.
I agree with you I believe that your beliefs flow from Satanic sources because the bible says that if you don't belong to Christ's kingdom then you belong to Satan's.
I guess we will never know what I would do because you don't even try.
Did He say that? I believe He did.
I also don't believe I am falling into what Jesus spoke against.
Dale,
Refusing to accept a supernatural explanation is not isolating, it is intelligent. If you felt drops of water seeping through the ceiling of your house, would you believe that a cosmic cat was taking a pee? No you would think you had a leaky roof. You would then look for evidence to sustain that assumption and perhaps you would find it, or perhaps you would find that a jug of water had overturned in the attic. That's exactly the sort of reality-based, rational, logical thinking you engage in every day -- as long as religion is not involved.
If I presented you with a collection of ancient texts that described a sun God who came to earth in the form of a raven and was responsible for all the material world we now see, you would not believe it. You would demand that I prove these old books were true. In fact you would assume they were false unless I did prove otherwise. When the bible is the collection in question however, you make the opposite assumption. You assume it is literally true and do not entertain any evidence to the contrary. Which attitude is rational? The former, of course.
I know, God dictated the Bible and hand-corrected all the translations and made sure the bishops included the right books in the canon and therefore... It's the same problem with any lie. Once you tell a little one, you have to pile on bigger and bigger and more and more outlandish whoppers to cover up the first.
Let me see if I can pick up a few of DL's debating tricks...they are pretty deep.
Oh ya, DL... Refusing to accept a natural explanation is not isolating, it is intelligent.
A man who cannot even explain why he uses logic, science or anything for that matter is really a fool.
As he looks up at the leaky roof he is reminded of his own system of thought...it just doesn't hold water.
So I notice you don't deny that you use reason, look for evidence and base decisions on this process - you merely belittle my analogy. If you're honest with yourself, you will realize that you use the rational method of comprehending the world every day. You don't assign supernatural otherworldly causes to normal life, only to ideas that threaten your religious worldview.
If you complain that reason and deduction based on evidence are unsuited to an examination of God then you would be correct. By any reasonable definition, God must be beyond the limit of human reason or God is not God. However, the idea that the Bible is literally true and internally consistent has nothing whatever to do with the nature of God or of Jesus. In fact, propping up this ridiculous doctrine obscures the nature of God and Jesus while leading believers down such idiotic paths as opposition to teaching evolution.
This is really getting quite tiring. In your analogy you are assuming many things about the world...and you have said that the world just works...thats why you have logic, knowledge, experience...etc. I am saying that is not the case...the world works in this way because the God of the Bible created it and governs it.
You say no go. I say yes so.
You then use these above things to try to disprove and I use them to prove.
The reason why I am not getting into the evidence game is because I am going to the last chapter of the book...I know your game.
I know that your heart is running from God and not truly seeking the truth.
So I am continuing to try to pull the covers off your hatred of God and your holding down of the truth that you do know.
It may frustrate you but I will tell you now that I am not going to get sucked into your game. I will continue to press the antithesis. You interpret the world according to your unbelieving presuppositions...now justify how you use logic, science, morality in a consistent form to your materialistic, naturalistic metaphysics. No answer will be forth coming.
If you want to give up, go ahead. You clearly can't make a valid argument so you might as well.
I can see why you would want to encourage the Christian to give up...seeing that you haven't even begun to give a phiolosophically justifying argument.
I've been reading your comments on democracy lover. i say don't waste your time. I find these types all over the blog and they prove by their comments they are void of a intelligent debate when it comes to God or politics. they allow dolts like Michael Moore and the rest of the Hollywood ilk to speak for them.
they never have ever entertained themselves with an original thought.
these types question the ethics of a man like Bush because they disagree with a particular view in a debate but they continue to supprt people like Clinton and Kennedy who have taken their errors far beyond a different point of view.
Clinton raped and lied. Kennedy murdered and Byrd promoted bigotry but they are reelected by these types over and over.
they are not worth the arguement. They don't vote and if they did they only make up a small percentage of the electoriate.
they are only good for stirring their pot. Before i enter a debate with them i write down what talking points they are going to use. and they rarely surprise me.
Pirate,
You'd be well advised not to make judgments about other people based on your stereotypes rather than facts. I find it difficult to believe how an individual could claim to be a follower of Jesus of Nazareth and a supporter of George W. Bush and the radical Republican agenda. I see them as diametrically opposed. That doesn't keep me from thinking you are sincere - even if misguided.
Yes Pirate,
You shouldn't do like DL does to me...me the "perverted" religion holder.
DL is standing with Jesus now?
Jesus of Nazareth has a new spokesman...Democracy Lover.
Unlike some people, I don't claim to be a spokesperson for God or Jesus. I merely expressed my difficulty in reconciling the teachings of Jesus with support of the Bush administration and the right-wing political agenda. I don't claim to be a spokesperson for the right-wing either by the way.
One doesn't have to "believe in" Jesus in the same way you do in order to find him a great teacher.
I do believe Jesus was a great teacher...I don't believe that he was a great liar though. His greatness isn't just in His words but in the character behind those words.
Jesus said that He was the Almighty God and that if you didn't believe this that you would die in your sins.
Could Jesus be a great teacher and yet be the one of the biggest deceivers in history? I think not.
Again Dale, as I have suggested before, you need to read more scholarly books on the New Testament if you want to understand this stuff. Did Jesus say that he was the almighty God in the flesh, or did some gospel writer attribute a statement to Jesus that justified a belief of the community he belonged to?
There aren't any easy ways to get at what Jesus may have really said rather than words placed in his mouth by gospel writers. One pretty good method is to look at the statements that make people uncomfortable, that argue against organized religion, that appear to be too extreme for people to actually carry out -- those are generally more likely to be ipsissima verba.
As for the assertion that Jesus was great because of the character behind his words, that almost goes without saying. I cannot think of any great teacher who was not also a great man or woman. However, you should be aware from your studies that the gospels are not reliable histories of Jesus actions or his life. They were not meant to do that and they do not agree on the specifics.
DL,
You, an autonomous bipedal carbon unit, do not suppose to be a mouthpiece for God or for Jesus. Good plan. Perhaps if you stopped being a witness...oops, I mean mouthpiece for other preachers...oops again, I mean scholars and your religion...oops yet again, I mean humanism long enough, the din would calm and you could listen and engage your oh-so-open mind to hear what any purportedly closed-minded Christian who stands alone on the Word of God is saying. I realise that you are going to say, "Look who's talking!" But here we stand: Christains on one side, standing firm on our Foundation, that is, Christ; you on the other side, picking up rocks to throw, trying to engage us in a rock-throwing fight.
You can hack at this tower with all your might, you can lay siege to it, you can pile up wood around the bottom and light it up, but it is all just dust, and the tower stands. Sadly, you are not unlike some dwarfs I know of who are in a dark stable.
You seem to be suggesting that the Bible is a fetal pig that we should disect. Don't eat any though, because that would be gross. The Bible is not a fetal pig. It is bread and meat and milk and wine. Take your gloves and mask off, put the scalpal down, open your mouth and eat, bend your knee. Then, blinded dwarf, you will realise that what you think of now as stable bedding is actually the most beautiful and sumptuous feast you could ever hope to have.
Gee, Des
I would never have thought to compare the bible with a fetal pig - that's inspired!
I simply treat the bible like what it is: a collection of translations of copies of ancient documents written by several unrelated autonomous bipedal carbon units.
Watch very closely how the unbeliever shuffles the cards in 3 Card Monty everyone! DL is an experienced "street worker".
He likes to deal from both sides of the deck...top and bottom to make his argument.
Watch carefully now...I will talk you through his trickery of hand.
Here is DL's quote
"I merely expressed my difficulty in reconciling the teachings of Jesus with support of the Bush administration and the right-wing political agenda."
And
"One doesn't have to "believe in" Jesus in the same way you do in order to find him a great teacher."
Notice that when it suits his agenda that DL presupposes that the gospel writers ARE actually writing Jesus' words. If he didn't presuppose this then why would he say that the Bush Admin cannot be reconciled with 1st century tax collector, physician, fisherman...oopps...he doesn't say that does he, he says that he has a hard time 'reconciling the teachings of JESUS' with Bush.
And why would anyone consider Jesus a great teacher when you didn't believe that His words were unknown?
What did Jesus teach DL? By what words or teachings are you judging Him to be great by?
Then when someone bets a large sum of money...trying to corner DL by saying
"I do believe Jesus was a great teacher...I don't believe that he was a great liar though. His greatness isn't just in His words but in the character behind those words.
Jesus said that He was the Almighty God and that if you didn't believe this that you would die in your sins.
Could Jesus be a great teacher and yet be the one of the biggest deceivers in history?"
Then DL does his special deal of the cards...off the bottom of the deck...and he says
"Did Jesus say that he was the almighty God in the flesh, or did some gospel writer attribute a statement to Jesus that justified a belief of the community he belonged to?
There aren't any easy ways to get at what Jesus may have really said rather than words placed in his mouth by gospel writers."
On one side of the deck DL speaks like he knows what Jesus said [by comparing Bushes admin to Jesus teachings and saying Jesus was a great teacher]...but when the words go against his beliefs [teaching that Jesus as the Almighty God] then he uses the argument that we really don't know what Jesus said...how convenient.
Watch out for DL shuffle...the stakes are very high indeed.
In my last comment I meant to say;
And why would anyone consider Jesus a great teacher when you didn't believe that His words were knownable?
Dale,
A number of very well trained and qualified scholars have gone over the gospels very carefully for many years, using the best available tools at their disposal. If you would read some of the real scholarship on Jesus, you might learn something.
Let's first of all be clear that no one can say with absolute certainty that this or that phrase in Matthew, Mark or Luke was definitely spoken by Jesus. The most ambitious attempt only gets as far as estimating which are most likely and least likely to be his actual words.
We certainly have enough agreement on key phrases to realize that Jesus was a great teacher.
The premise that holds that if one error is found in the gospels means that Jesus was a deceiver is simply ridiculous. Jesus lived and taught in Galilee decades before the first gospel author sat down to write about him. If that author reported legends as fact, or placed ideas he strongly believed into Jesus' mouth, he did not turn Jesus into a deceiver. In fact, by doing so he was well within the normal literary style of his time. The deceived are those who hold to a literal interpretation of the Bible - a position that is both unnecessary and illogical.
Since you claim such special knowledge of Jesus, do you find right-wing politics consistent with his teaching as you read them? That I would be interested to hear.
LOL, Monty, monty, monty...answer the question that is brought to you...I am accusing you of speaking through both sides of your mouth...and you do not respond to this accusation.
By what standard do you judge one man "really" scholarful and another not?
Is this by your same "neutral" standard that says " However, you should be aware from your studies that the gospels are not reliable histories of Jesus actions or his life."
But the Gospels are reliable histories of Jesus. What other histories are you comparing them to?
And when you give me the answer then I am going to ask you by what standard you judge the one history to be more reliable then the Gospels? Because they were written by a "neutral" unbelieving historian...neutral like...you?
Were you there? How can you prove that men didn't make up their histories about Jesus? I ask you the same questions that you put us on the hot seat with.
Just because you can't say with certainty doesn't mean that "no-one can". With the Bibles teachings of God's sovereignty I can know with certainty that Jesus spoke what is revealed in the Scriptures...and if you don't know with certainty how can you refute one who does know with certainty?
You have your well trained scholars, who have studied for many years..."call the media"..."stop the presses", there are some well trained scholars who discredit the Bible...man that is old news.
I notice you never mention that there are well trained scholars who have equally studied the gospels for years and come to opposite conclusions...why?, they have different presuppositions by which they credit or discredit evidence by. Which leads me back to the foundational questions you have never answered. If you talk about scholarship then you must believe that there are universal, absolute laws of thought by which we judge men's thoughts by. How do you justify the use of these laws?
And on Monty's end of the phone line...silence.
Daley, Daley, Dale...
So arrogant there, but let me try to help you out. You ask "by what standard you judge the one history to be more reliable then the Gospels?" Answer: No history written in the 1st Century AD should be taken to be reliable on its face. First you look for independent sources for the same material. If that is insufficient (as in the case of the gospels), then you look at the style of writing prevalent at the time, the community to which the writer belonged, the objective of the writer and his audience. The same techniques should be used for the gospels that are used for Josephus, for example.
"With the Bibles teachings of God's sovereignty I can know with certainty that Jesus spoke what is revealed in the Scriptures..." So in other words, because you approach the bible with the unproven assumption that it is God's word and literally true, you can "know with certainty". If I read Aesop's fables with the absolute certainty that Aesop spoke with the authority of God, then I would know that every tale was literally true.
A scholar, to be worthy of the name, must approach a subject without a set of unproven assumptions, or at least with the willingness to throw aside those assumptions if they are not consistent with the evidence. There are not "universal, absolute laws of thought by which we judge", there are theories developed by observation, study and reason that are tested over and over again. Sometimes they are proven correct, sometimes not - that is how we humans have come to know what we know about the universe.
You see Dale, you are the one that needs a universal absolute law to tell you how to think and you are unwilling to entertain ideas that violate it. We once had a period of time when such ideas held sway - we now refer to that time as the Dark Ages.
DL said, "A scholar, to be worthy of the name, must approach a subject without a set of unproven assumptions". This means that if the scholar is an unbeliever then he must first prove His unbelief before he continues on. If he is asked to "justify" his unbelieving use of reason, science and morality he shouldn't just say they work and then move on...right?
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