Did Both Thieves on the Cross Revile Christ?

Singalphile
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Re: Did Both Thieves on the Cross Revile Christ?

Post by Singalphile » Sun Sep 11, 2016 11:38 am

steve wrote:
Other "difficulties" can be easily harmonized and are irrelevant to the the general picture or point of the narrative and the skill and care of the authors. That is not true with this case, imo.
I do not see the basis for this judgment.
I think I explained my bases as well as I can (or care to, anyway). (Though I did cut out at least 3 times as much text in order to keep it as short as possible.)

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steve
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Re: Did Both Thieves on the Cross Revile Christ?

Post by steve » Sun Sep 11, 2016 8:30 pm

I think I explained my bases as well as I can (or care to, anyway).
I have no doubt that you did, and when I said I do not see the basis for the judgment you made, I did not mean that I missed those sentences in which you presented your basis. I simply don't think any books, other than biblical books, would ever be questioned (by anyone) on the basis of such inconsequential variations in parallel narratives—variations which in no way introduce any element of contradiction. Thus, though I did read your reasons, I am seeing nothing in them that forms a legitimate basis for the negative judgment.

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Re: Did Both Thieves on the Cross Revile Christ?

Post by morbo3000 » Mon Sep 12, 2016 8:31 pm

Isn't "one of them got it wrong," an adequate answer?


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steve
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Re: Did Both Thieves on the Cross Revile Christ?

Post by steve » Tue Sep 13, 2016 9:40 am

Isn't "one of them got it wrong," an adequate answer?
It would be a perfectly adequate answer—if there was a legitimate question requiring such an answer. I am saying it is entirely unnecessary. There is no basis for anyone to bring such gratuitous skepticism about the reliability of the accounts, which (as I said, and anyone can easily acknowledge) would never be questioned if such differences were found anywhere other than in the Bible.

I regard myself as a skeptical person—more skeptical than many here (and far more so than most unbelievers). I typically withhold my support for any proposition that anyone claims to be true about the Bible (or reality), until I can ascertain that the most cogent reasons for belief are on the side of those propositions. Where I count the evidence to be uncertain, I suspend judgment, and am content to live with uncertainties.

However, I extend to the biblical writers at least as much charity in my judgments as I would to other witnesses otherwise not known to be liars or incompetent. When someone says, "There is a contradiction between this-and-that passage," it amazes me how quickly many people will gullibly sign-on to such unsupportable and counterintuitive claims. For many, it seems only necessary for the presence of a difficulty to be suggested, and they are quick to say, "Yeah, by golly! There is a problem there!"

I am willing to acknowledge certain contradictions in the biblical records, as they stand today (e.g., How many stalls for chariot horses Solomon had—40,000, according to Kings; 4,000, according to Chronicles), but I am not willing to create contradictions and difficulties out of whole cloth.

Unfortunately. this is what too many people who style themselves "reasonable skeptics" do. They accept, without the slightest skepticism, the most gratuitous claims against the reliability of certain witnesses—so long as those witnesses wrote something in the Bible—and they never seem to ask themselves whether, if they were to encounter such differences in any other realm of testimony, they would find the slightest difficulty with them. Of course they would not.

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Re: Did Both Thieves on the Cross Revile Christ?

Post by steve7150 » Wed Sep 14, 2016 2:04 pm

Isn't "one of them got it wrong," an adequate answer?









But the accounts don't contradict each other so this answer does not fit these accounts. Luke's account simply adds one more conversation than the others but it doesn't render the other accounts untrue. Perhaps the other writers didn't consider what the converted thief said to be very significant. Looking back we now consider it important but at the time the other writers may not have given much weight to what a crucified thief had to say at his death. It really is like any deathbed conversion or confession which has happened millions of times throughout history except that Jesus was physically present and his response to the thief is significant. Of course it's possible the other writers simply were unaware of the incident but one account is good enough.

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