The Book of Daniel

by SwedishChef 50 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

  • heathen
    heathen

    seey3- I don't buy that at all .Just can't see some poet being thrown in with noah and job.Both of which endured great suffering for the sake of righteousness .As far as I can see Ezekiel was writing what God was saying to him not making stuff up from his own observations.

  • SwedishChef
    SwedishChef

    You think critics would learn from their mistakes and give the Bible the credit it deserves.

    If it were not for studies and excavations, seedy, you would be ignorantly spouting off the same arguments that critics in the past have used - until they were stuck putting their foot in their mouth when they were proven wrong.

    Many false claims by "scholars" have later been proven to be just that. And yet when they are defeated they turn around and blindly accuse the genuineness of this book again. This is called delusion. Are these the kind of people you trust, seedy?

    Some my ask what sort of prophecies have been fulfilled in the book of Daniel. The four world-kingdoms - Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome, and the "personalities" of each - also giving the way each one fell. (Including Rome which could not have been known even to a forger.) The prophecies concerning the Messiah, the destruction of Jerusalem, and the time of the beginning of the church age would also be impossible for even a forger to know.

    Example of the credibility of the book of Daniel:

    For centuries critics accused the writer of Daniel for making up the historical figure Belshazzar, until records of him were found in excavations. This is always the kind of "proof" that critics offer. Mind telling how a forger would know about this figure in history before the records of him were found? This adds only to the authenticity of the book.

    The entire depth and understanding of the Babylonian culture portrays and indicates an eye-witness account - especially when the information could not have been accessible to the "forger", and there are absolutely no inconsistencies. It is a flawless record.

    The bumbling circles of critics have yet to give one piece of sufficient evidence to say that the book of Daniel is not a genuine work. So far all their major arguments have only been thrown back in their face and reinforced the credibility of the book.

    Every time an accusation is refuted, it makes the critics look worse and reaffirms the authenticity of Daniel.

    Judging by the "refutations" you have given, seedy, it seems that the "hard evidence" has fled away at the sight of the truth. None what you have presented carries any weight in light of evidence supporting the book.

    In conclusion, the only reason why Daniel is under constant attack is because it is so accurate. No other book has undergone so much scrutiny for this sole reason. The motivations of these critics is obviously dishonest. To admit Daniel is authentic would be to admit the Bible is true. And we all know this cannot be done.

    I don't believe you are aware of the implications and absurdities of your claims, seedy.

  • Farkel
    Farkel

    : It is not impossible, for instance, that an event so marvelous as the coming of the Divine into humanity in the person of Jesus Christ should be predicted. So far from being impossible, it seems to common sense exceedingly probable; and furthermore, it seems not unreasonable that a prophet predicting a great and far distant event, like that indicated above, should give some evidence to his contemporaries or immediate successor that he was a true prophet.

    Utter bullshit. That's not an argument. That's mere speculation.

    Your arguments sir, are a grand joke.

    Farkel

  • pseudoxristos
    pseudoxristos

    Seedy,
    Your claim that Daniel is bogus goes unsupported. This article refutes many of the false claims against it.
    Face it, Daniel was extremely accurate in his predictions and thats the only reason why you don't believe it.

    The suggestion that "Daniel was extremely accurate in his predictions" is somewhat misleading. A more honest approach would suggest that writer of Daniel was extremely accurate in his writings concerning the period around 167-164BCE. His writings concerning the centuries prior to the second century BCE are less and less accurate. This is what has lead scholars to believe that it was written during the second century. If it was written in the second century, the author would have been more familiar with the current history and would of course recorded it more accurately then the history of the past centuries.

    The writer's suggestion that new books would be opened in the last days, helped Daniel to quickly gain acceptance in a period of time when the Jews truly believed that they were in the last days. The second century BCE saw the development of many apocalyptic works very much like the book of Daniel. The simple explanation suggests that Daniel was indeed compiled in this time period.

    pseudo

  • Nathan Natas
    Nathan Natas

    So, uhhh... how do you make those little meatballs so tasty?

  • onacruse
    onacruse

    seedy, your post caught my eye, and I consulted The Abingdon Bible Commentary (1926). The Introduction to Daniel comments (p. 747):

    Among the many considerations that have led scholars to [the conclusion that Daniel was written during the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes] the following may be mentioned:

    (1) The book is not included among the "Prophets" in the Jewish canon of the OT, but is placed with the later collection called the "Writings."

    (20 The language of the book, both the Hebrew and the Aramaic, is of a much later date than the Exile.

    (3) The use of Persian and Greek words in the book suggests a date much later than the Exile.

    ...

    Linguistic analysis is particularly useful in dating a given manuscript, since the evidence can be cross-referenced to disparate cultures and time-lined according to the semantic development of those languages.

    It is worth consideration, I think, that even these later dates place the writing of Daniel well before the time of Christ, so the 490 weeks prophecy would still be in play.

    Craig

  • seedy3
    seedy3

    SwedishChef,

    So far I have only quoted from bible scolars, I mean ones who support the bible, no critics yet, I will soon, but all the quotes I have used so far have been Christian Theologians not critics. So don't go there, I really do not believe you have read any of the quotes I have made, and who they are from. You quoted one dead person and expect everyone to accept it, I quoted one dead, one old (although this guy may have kicked the bucket by now too) and one living.

    The idea of Daniel being a forged book is not unusual for the bible at all, many book are forged or psudopigraphically written, there is much evidence to that.

    onacruse is quite correct, the way they date many writings is by linguistics, and Daniel is dated to around the 3rd century BC (BCE if your a JW) and not into the 5th century BC. The fact that it was not part of the LXX in the 2nd century is another evidence that it was not part of the Hebrew writings in that day, WHY? Because it was not part of their holy writings then. It was added later on. WHY? Because it was FORGED or psudopigraphically written.

    You so far have not shown why there is any reason to not think it was, you have only stated I have no faith in the bible and that is quite true, it is a forged book much of it written by zelious christians, like Irenious, and Papyous to control the masses (refering to the NT) much of the OT is the same.

    I will make a few more quotes about this tomorrow when I have my references (they are all at work).

    Seedy

  • seedy3
    seedy3

    Farkel,

    Utter bullshit. That's not an argument. That's mere speculation.

    I love your posts, straight and to the point LMAO.

  • onacruse
    onacruse
    The fact that [Daniel] was not part of the LXX in the 2nd century

    Now, this is news to me! Can you please elaborate?

    To be fair, as far as the linguistic analysis is concerned, NIV Study Bible comments :

    Linguistic evidence from the Dead Sea Scrolls (which furnish authentic samples of Hebrew and Aramaic writing from the second century BC...) demonstrates that the Hebrew and Aramaic chapters of Daniel must have been composed centuries earlier. Furthermore, as recently demonstrated, the Persian and Greek words in Daniel do not require a late date. Some of the technical terms appearing in ch. 3 were already so obsolete by the second century BC that translators of the Septuagint...translated them incorrectly.

    Craig (of the researching-as-I-go class)
  • seedy3
    seedy3

    onacruse

    b) There is no proof that the book of Daniel was included in the original Septuagint (LXX):
    "Behind the legends lies the probability that at least the Torah (the five books of Moses) was translated into Greek c. 250 B.C. for the use of the Greek speaking Jews of Alexandria. NIV study bible

    I stated wrong, it was the third century BC 250 was not 2nd, my mistake, forgive me ok I'm getting old and senile LMAO

    Seedy

    Edited by - seedy3 on 7 January 2003 5:27:8

Share this

Google+
Pinterest
Reddit