Physical, Incontrovertible Proof of God

Above and beyond what Eon said is the simple point of the thread: Why can't you believe in God without Faith? Is it impossible to believe in God with proof?

I propose that you don't so much believe God exists than you HOPE God exists.

BELIEF requires evidence and proof. INCONTROVERTIBLE proof.
 
Eon said:
James, I think you may have missed the start of this thread - the one where both DV and myself tell you that this is what we tried to do, but with no success.
Click to expand...
You're right I suppose I did miss that point. Let's then dispense with all of this other stuff and cut right to the heart of the matter...

Why did you lose faith?
 
EH? That's not what this thread is about!

Let me repeat, "Why can't you believe in God without Faith? Is it impossible to believe in God with proof?" This thread is about incontrovertible proof, not why we lost faith.

However, if that's something you'd like to know, by all means, start up a new thread, please don't derail this one. Unless, of course, you can tie it into the topic.

I just ran across this...

"We may define "faith" as the firm belief in something for which there is no evidence. Where there is evidence, no one speaks of "faith." We do not speak of faith that two and two are four or that the earth is round. We only speak of faith when we wish to substitute emotion for evidence."
Click to expand...
Robert Ingersoll

"If you think your belief is based upon reason, you will support it by argument rather than by persecution, and will abandon it if the argument goes against you. But if your belief is based upon faith, you will realize that argument is useless, and will therefore resort to force either in the form of persecution or by stunting or distorting the minds of the young in what is called 'education.'"
Click to expand...
- Bertrand Russell
 
Last edited:
Dark Virtue said:
EH? That's not what this thread is about!
Click to expand...

Then I propose that you make a new thread where we can discuss that issue; because it is much more important than this endless debate, and I would much rather discuss why you lost faith then to engage in a silly argument as to why faith isn't needed (when God clearly states the contrary).

And if you don't feel comfortable making another thread about it then I would be happy to discuss it privately in PM's or on Yahoo IM, even.
 
Last edited:
Without faith it is impossible to please God, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.
(Hebrews 11:6)
 
Please take a look at that verse in context.

The people discussed in that verse include Abel, Cain, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Sarah, Esau, Moses, etc.

What do all these people have in common? They each had INCONTROVERTIBLE proof that God existed.

The verse you cited goes as follows, "6And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him."

Guess what? Those people already believed He existed because they had PROOF. God spoke directly to them and interacted directly in their lives. Verse 6 says, without faith it's impossible to PLEASE God, it doesn't say without faith it's impossible to BELIEVE in God.

Still sound silly to you?
 
The people discussed in that verse include Abel, Cain, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Sarah, Esau, Moses, etc.

What do all these people have in common? They each had INCONTROVERTIBLE proof that God existed.
Click to expand...

But they are not mentioned because they believed that God existed. They are mentioned because they had the faith necessary to follow their God.

Do you think it was easy for Moses to believe that he saw a bush that burned, but was not consumed? He must have thought that he was hallucinating at some point. Yet, he followed God's commands because of his faith that they were true.

Abraham was told by God to go sacrifice his son through whom God's promise would be fulfilled. Who, when following the wisdom of this world, would sacrifice their only rightful heir? Yet, Abraham was rewarded for his faith, and the promise was fulfilled.

Try looking at that passage again. Each of these people had a choice to follow God or to follow their own wisdom. They chose to follow God, defying their own wisdom, on faith alone. Then, God revealed that they had done rightly.
 
But it was not until after Abel made his offering to we read that there was any interaction between him and God. In looking over the list, it would appear that those in the list had faith before God interacted with them
 
I don't believe that what you said is true. They chose to follow God based on faith ALONE? You used Moses as an example. How was the burning bush not incontrovertible proof? The bush was burning but wasn't consumed. Sounds like a textbook miracle to me. And if that wasn't enough, IT SPOKE. Moses didn't follow God because the bush was on fire, but because of what GOD TOLD HIM through the bush.

How many miracles did God perform right in front of Moses? More proof.

Moses had faith in God because of his interaction with God. Moses didn't have to rely solely on faith to believe in God. There's a huge difference there.

Abraham didn't rely on his faith alone to believe in God because according to the Bible, God interacted with Abraham long before he ordered Abraham to sacrifice his son. Correct?

So maybe YOU need to look at the passage again. What OT character was required to believe in God without incontrovertible proof?
 
Genesis1315 said:
But it was not until after Abel made his offering to we read that there was any interaction between him and God. In looking over the list, it would appear that those in the list had faith before God interacted with them
Click to expand...

Look at Moses as an example.

If Moses relied solely on his faith to follow God, why did God use the burning bush to convince him? Why, after all that, did Moses STILL question God?

Why don't you believe Abel had any interaction with God prior to his offering?

Who told him to make the offering in the first place?

Look at these verses in Gen:3

Now Abel kept flocks, and Cain worked the soil. 3 In the course of time Cain brought some of the fruits of the soil as an offering to the LORD. 4 But Abel brought fat portions from some of the firstborn of his flock. The LORD looked with favor on Abel and his offering, 5 but on Cain and his offering he did not look with favor. So Cain was very angry, and his face was downcast.

6 Then the LORD said to Cain, "Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? 7 If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it."
Click to expand...

Sounds like they had SOME sort of interaction with God prior to the sacrifice.
 
Last edited:
Dark Virtue said:
How was the burning bush not incontrovertible proof? The bush was burning but wasn't consumed. Sounds like a textbook miracle to me. And if that wasn't enough, IT SPOKE. Moses didn't follow God because the bush was on fire, but because of what GOD TOLD HIM through the bush.

How many miracles did God perform right in front of Moses? More proof.
Click to expand...

So there's your proof. Why are those historical accounts not enough for you? I will ask again, why did you lose faith to begin with?
 
Because they aren't historical accounts, they are STORIES, MYTHS. There is no historical evidence to back up the existence of a burning bush or any of the other miracles in the bible. What makes historical accounts HISTORICAL is the fact that you can back them up. The Bible is as "historical" as the Enuma Elish or Homer's Odyssey.

As to your second question, I don't believe that I LOST my Faith. Instead, I put it away.

1Cor 13:11 "When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me."

I put Faith/hope away and adopted reason and evidence to guide my way.

To quote Isaac Asimov, "Properly read, the Bible is the most potent force for atheism ever conceived." I believe this to be the truth. Read objectively and with a historical eye, the Bible reveals itself to be myth, not truth.

I echo the words Dan Barker spoke, "Faith is a cop-out. It is intellectual bankruptcy. If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can't be taken on its own merits." "I am an atheist because there is no evidence for the existence of God. That should be all that needs to be said about it: no evidence, no belief."

I followed the words in 1 Thes, "Prove all things, hold fast that which is good". I could not prove what was written in the Bible, they didn't hold up to logical, reasonable scrutiny.

So there you have it. I didn't lose my faith, I put it away. It was a clear choice, an honest decision.
 
Last edited:
You haven't put away your faith at all, you have simply redirected it into atheism. You ask for proof that God exists, yet it also cannot be proved that He doesn't exist.

People have gone around and around with this; the debate will never cease because there will always be those that doubt and would refuse to believe regardless.

However, I do feel obligated to point out that to someone who is as fact and proof oriented as yourself, there is no basis on which to dismiss the Bible as a myth; you also have no proof that it is false... Something you should think about.
 
James said:
You haven't put away your faith at all, you have simply redirected it into atheism. You ask for proof that God exists, yet it also cannot be proved that He doesn't exist.
Click to expand...

There is a difference between having faith my car will start in the morning and having Faith in God. That's why I capitalize Faith, to distinguish. I have put Faith away. I still have the regular ole faith. I do not have faith in atheism because faith doesn't come into play. I dont rely on Faith or faith, I rely on proof, reason and evidence. You don't need faith to be an atheist, just like you don't need faith to be a scientist.

As far as proving God doesn't exist, I have stated time and time again that this can't be proven, one can not prove a negative, it's illogical. Nor do I claim that God doesn't exist. Please don't confuse weak and strong atheism. I think strong atheism is just as illogical as theism because it can't be proven. I don't have disbelief, I LACK belief.

People have gone around and around with this; the debate will never cease because there will always be those that doubt and would refuse to believe regardless.
Click to expand...

Now you're just jumping the gun. Before we can make the decision to follow God, we need that evidence, that proof. Remember, this thread is to discuss whether or not belief in God can exist WITH incontrovertible proof and not just on faith alone.

However, I do feel obligated to point out that to someone who is as fact and proof oriented as yourself, there is no basis on which to dismiss the Bible as a myth; you also have no proof that it is false... Something you should think about.
Click to expand...

You're making an assertion without backing it up with evidence. How do you prove the Bible is the word of God? Again, look at it from an objective point of view. You want me to believe it's the word of God, but Christians can't even come to a unified belief in it. Is it fully literal? Figurative? What is literal and what is figurative? How do you tell the difference?

If you'd like to discuss the Bible, it's going to take a whole other thread I'm afraid. Suffice it to say that there is NO incontrovertible proof to support the Bible as an infallible book from an omnimax being.

Since you are pointing out facts and proofs, what is your evidence to support the Bible as something more than a collection of myths? It would also be helpful for you tell us what exactly you think the Bible is (ie infalilble, purely historic, etc).
 
I believe the Bible is the inerrant Word of God... That is one of the requirements for being a Christian. I do not believe every single translation of the Bible is accurate or right. (KJV, NIV and ESV are mostly correct, but when in doubt I go to the original text and study it out).

As for evidence of the Bible accounts being accurate, simply take a look at Archeology. Both Christian and non-Christian archaeologists have discovered quite a few findings that support the accounts of the Bible.

Now honestly, I am not an archaeological expert; and I also hate linking to outside sources, yet because the hour is late I will (for now) refer you to this site which was created by people who are much more familiar with Archeology than myself.

http://www.myfortress.org/archaeology.html
 
I believe that the bible is largely a written form of a tribe's oral history. Of course you are going to find corroborative data in archaeology - in much the same way that the Illiad has corroborative archaeological data supporting it.

But finding the shattered walls of Troy doesn't mean that we now accept on faith the stories of Achiles' invulnerability, does it?
 
Not at all.

The archeological findings concerning the Bible are unique in that they are much more specific than just the walls of a city.
 
Well, I offered a general argument with a general example - if you have specifics in mind, can you offer them for consideration?
 
I don't believe that what you said is true. They chose to follow God based on faith ALONE? You used Moses as an example. How was the burning bush not incontrovertible proof? The bush was burning but wasn't consumed. Sounds like a textbook miracle to me. And if that wasn't enough, IT SPOKE. Moses didn't follow God because the bush was on fire, but because of what GOD TOLD HIM through the bush.
Click to expand...

Moses still had to believe that what his eyes saw was true. Let me ask you, DV... let's say after a long, hard day at work, your computer starts typing out instructions for you on it's screen, even though it's not plugged in. The message states that Jesus is Lord, and that you must go and preach to the local Atheists group at their next meeting. Then, after the message has been delivered, the screen goes blank.

You'd probably think you had hallucinated, and that you really needed to stop arguing with those wacky Christians so much. ;)

Essentially, that's what happened to Moses. That proof would not pass as "incontrovertible" because it could have been passed off as a hallucination or a mirage. A person who saw an image like that in today's society would be Baker Acted and hauled off to the nearest sanitarium.

So, by claiming that Moses had received incontrovertible proof, which is certainly not the case (as I have provided a logical, non-supernatural conclusion to the whole burning bush incident), you're admitting that "incontrovertible" is a subjective standard. What is incontrovertible for me may not be for you. By logical extension, if we have the logical capacity to reject evidence as invalid, then no evidence is incontrovertible for everyone. Incontrovertible evidence cannot exist concurrently with the ability to reject said evidence.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top