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RCC -> RE: the earth (1/10/2008 6:53:58 PM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: unclemonkey ORIGINAL:RCCquote:
OK. So the ultimate authority accepted by YECs is their interpretation or understanding of what the Bible says? It is known as a hermeneutic interpretation. It allows the Bible to interpret itself rather than relying on the ever-changing whims of science. Setting aside for the moment the question of what it might mean to “allow the Bible to interpret itself,” the fact remains that to come to any conclusions about what the Bible means or what God has said through the Bible, you have to do some thinking and make some decisions. For example, YECs believe that God has said through the Scriptures that He created the world and everything in it in six literal days. Many other people, including most Christians, disagree (see the two-paragraph statement in the link). Obviously, both YECs and non-YECs have thought about what the Bible means, have used their reasoning abilities in various ways, and have reached different conclusions about what the Bible means and what, if anything, God has said (and not just about creation). So the YEC position, as I understand it, is apparently as follows: (1) Human reason, in general, is inherently error-prone and fallible. Even the seemingly firmest conclusions of science are questionable, despite the methods science has developed to reduce error (peer review, statistical methods, independent replication of results, double-blind tests, etc.). (2) Exceptionally, human reason is infallible in the special case when YECs are using their reasoning faculties to reach their conclusions concerning what God has said through the Bible. It follows from (1) and (2) that: (3) If what modern scientists say conflicts with what YECs believe God says through the Bible, it is 100% certain that science is wrong in this case and the YEC beliefs are correct. Have I got it right? Otherwise I don’t know how you get (3). quote:
If Jesus was not truly dead then the gospel is predicated on a lie. Please cite the observational evidence that a person can be put to death by crucifixion, lay dead in a grave for three days and then come back to life. Doesn’t favoring science over what the Bible plainly says about origins but rejecting science when it comes to the resurrection seem just a tad bit inconsistent? I don’t think science has anything to say about the possibility of miracles such as the Resurrection; that’s outside science’s domain. But if scientific reasoning did say that miracles are impossible, just as it says that the earth is billions of years old, I would have to use my human reasoning abilities as best I could to decide what to believe. Maybe someday we will know the truth about these matters directly, but in this vale of tears we have to rely on our human reasoning faculties that are presumably the gift of God.
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