Evidence of omniscience in the bible?

[powlette]

I asked this question in another thread and it was never answered. Simple question: if the bible was written by an omniscient god, why doesn't it contain any information that wasn't known to the people who physically wrote it?

For example, it could easily describe how germs are spread which would have saved millions of lives between 100AD and 1800AD. Or even better, a description of how to create antibiotics from mold. Why wouldn't a loving god share this nugget with us when it could prevent untold suffering and instead make us figure it out ourselves?

Some other examples that would authenticate the bible as divinely inspired:

• It could have said the earth was round and included its circumference or a description of North America or a description of the solar system
• Could have accurately described the natural phenomenons that have frightened mankind for thousands of years such as lightning, volcanos, hurricanes, earthquakes and eclipses
• Could have included physical constants that weren't computed at the time, such as PI to a 6 digits or some large prime number. A few digits alone would indicate some greater intelligence since the fraction 355/113 to approximate PI wasn't found until the fifth century.

Don't you think it's odd that in the entire bible we don't find any information that wasn't known to the people who wrote it? I mean something big - something that could only have come from a greater intelligence.

[forum lurker]

There are prophets in the Bible, such as Daniel, who didn't know about the future before it was shown to them. Maybe this isn't the kind of information what you meant.

If we were told with detail about virii and bacteria, would there be any point in the existence of diseases?

Instead, we have science and technology. And free will.

[Athanasius]

I asked this question in another thread and it was never answered. Simple question: if the bible was written by an omniscient god, why doesn't it contain any information that wasn't known to the people who physically wrote it?

For example, it could easily describe how germs are spread which would have saved millions of lives between 100AD and 1800AD. Or even better, a description of how to create antibiotics from mold. Why wouldn't a loving god share this nugget with us when it could prevent untold suffering and instead make us figure it out ourselves?

Some other examples that would authenticate the bible as divinely inspired:

• It could have said the earth was round and included its circumference or a description of North America or a description of the solar system
• Could have accurately described the natural phenomenons that have frightened mankind for thousands of years such as lightning, volcanos, hurricanes, earthquakes and eclipses
• Could have included physical constants that weren't computed at the time, such as PI to a 6 digits or some large prime number. A few digits alone would indicate some greater intelligence since the fraction 355/113 to approximate PI wasn't found until the fifth century.

Don't you think it's odd that in the entire bible we don't find any information that wasn't known to the people who wrote it? I mean something big - something that could only have come from a greater intelligence.

It could have included prophecy... Oh, wait

The Bible isn't a book about preventing suffering in this life (think Job. Scripture even tells you that if you follow Christ you'll be more persecuted). The Bible is about returning to God the Father and eternity in the next life. There's quite a bit in the Bible that was written down by the authors who couldn't have known, short of revelation, what they were writing down - I'll put my stock in prophecy as one of the major sources of this knowledge.

There's a lot in the Bible to suggest it's inspired (and that's is a reasonable and warranted belief to believe the Bible is inspired). I don't get why it has to be tailored made 'evidence' for 'X,' 'Y,' and 'Z' person who doesn't like what is already there. You take any of those things if they were included in scripture and you'd explain it away. I mean, you've already done that with a great many things people already claim to have been revealed by God to a people who couldn't possibly have known what they wrote.

[apothanein kerdos]

I asked this question in another thread and it was never answered. Simple question: if the bible was written by an omniscient god, why doesn't it contain any information that wasn't known to the people who physically wrote it?

For example, it could easily describe how germs are spread which would have saved millions of lives between 100AD and 1800AD. Or even better, a description of how to create antibiotics from mold. Why wouldn't a loving god share this nugget with us when it could prevent untold suffering and instead make us figure it out ourselves?

Some other examples that would authenticate the bible as divinely inspired:

• It could have said the earth was round and included its circumference or a description of North America or a description of the solar system
• Could have accurately described the natural phenomenons that have frightened mankind for thousands of years such as lightning, volcanos, hurricanes, earthquakes and eclipses
• Could have included physical constants that weren't computed at the time, such as PI to a 6 digits or some large prime number. A few digits alone would indicate some greater intelligence since the fraction 355/113 to approximate PI wasn't found until the fifth century.

Don't you think it's odd that in the entire bible we don't find any information that wasn't known to the people who wrote it? I mean something big - something that could only have come from a greater intelligence.

So describing humanity as humans are, our nature, why we do things, when nothing else (including science) has ever been able to wasn't enough?

Notice how you're using an empirical model to evaluate the Bible. Likewise, you're assuming that human knowledge had nothing to do with the Scriptures. There's a lot of false assumptions you're making.

Likewise, how is anything you mentioned pertinent to the purpose of God? The Bible is the story of God's love and purpose for humanity - you're essentially saying, "Why didn't God reveal more knowledge?" Why should He? What would be the purpose?

[powlette]

"Why didn't God reveal more knowledge?" Why should He? What would be the purpose?

Well the purpose in the example I gave would be to prevent the needless suffering and death of millions of people due to transmittable disease.

When I was touring the Panama Canal, the tour guide told us how the work camps kept basins of water near their tents not knowing that malaria spreads from mosquitoes who breed in the stagnate water. Thousands died constructing the canal because they didn't know this simple fact.

If we were told with detail about virii and bacteria, would there be any point in the existence of diseases?

Are you suggesting that the purpose of diseases that kill us, is so we can learn about them and prevent many of them with childhood immunization (provided you're lucky enough to live in a country with good health standards)? It's that kind of thinking that leads to "AIDS is a curse from god against the gays".

I guess that's another topic altogether. If you believe in creationism, why did God create viruses? Specifically why viruses that ONLY infect humans and serve no other purpose such as gonorrhea.

I suspected you'd point out the biblical "prophecies". But if you're going to predict something to demonstrate your authority, why not something less ambiguous and more definitive. Such as, there will be a total solar eclipse visible from Jerusalem on the following date far in the future. I'm not looking for evidence or science from the bible. I'm just pointing out that there isn't anything in it (correct me if I'm wrong) that wasn't known or knowable by the authors. You're claiming it's divinely inspired and inerrant, but it reads as a very primitive book to me lacking not only in any insight about the natural world, but containing grievous errors that would be made by its contemporaries (firmament, four corners, see all kingdoms, stars will fall to the earth, etc). You can claim these errors are all hyperbole or metaphor, but I think it's more likely they are simply the product of a first-century intellect.

[apothanein kerdos]

The purpose of Scripture isn't to give you a better life or a disease free life. It isn't to present exhaustive knowledge. It covers God's story to humans, His interaction with us.

This idea that, "Well, it doesn't speak about technology so it can't be true" could only be an objection from someone in the 21st century who worships technology.

The Bible shows us how to be better people. How to be truly human. Technology doesn't do this - thus it would be utterly superfluous to include it in the Bible.

You're also assuming the deaths were needless or that they didn't serve a greater purpose.

Again, do you not see how your argument is based far more on faulty assumptions than actual content?

[powlette]

The purpose of Scripture isn't to give you a better life or a disease free life. It isn't to present exhaustive knowledge. It covers God's story to humans, His interaction with us.

This idea that, "Well, it doesn't speak about technology so it can't be true" could only be an objection from someone in the 21st century who worships technology.

The Bible shows us how to be better people. How to be truly human. Technology doesn't do this - thus it would be utterly superfluous to include it in the Bible.

You're also assuming the deaths were needless or that they didn't serve a greater purpose.

Again, do you not see how your argument is based far more on faulty assumptions than actual content?

I don't worship technology, but I do question the authority of an ancient book that claims to be from god, but doesn't contain any insights to the natural world that a first grader wouldn't already be aware of.

But you're right, I'm beginning with the assumption that an all-knowing and all-loving god who writes a book would have provided instructions on how to live a healthy, disease free life. If you or I lived 2,000 years ago, we could write such a book with a high school education, why didn't God?

I take issue with your assumption that the deaths from disease, that continue to this day, aren't needless. In my opinion, every death from a treatable illness is needless. But let's talk actual content. Can you provide any content from the bible that demonstrates a supernatural intelligence was imparting some insights to the world by revealing something not known to the authors? If the book is solely about God's interactions with humans, why is there no mention of the civilizations in the Americas which predate the NT? That would be an amazing insight if the biblical authors were aware of a people 10,000 miles away. But instead, I maintain, there's nothing in it that couldn't have been written by any educated first-century man.

[Dani H]

He DID. It's all in there.

"Eat this ... not that". Don't eat scavengers and other such animals because you eat what they eat and you will get sick.

When you see mold growing ... scrub it and watch it. If it doesn't grow, good for you. If it grows, then tear that piece of wall out, discard it and rebuild it.

If somebody has menstrual flow ... stay separated until you're done bleeding.

And so on, and so forth.

Powlette, did you actually read Leviticus? I would encourage you to do so. Many of those laws are common sense, geared towards survival and quality of life in a desert-based society that had no hospitals nor doctors to fall back on.

If God had come to those people spouting off about immune systems and viruses and the finer actions of the human body, when their lives was mostly geared toward day to day survival in primitive environments with harsh weather conditions, He would have been met with the proverbial "deer in the headlight" look, so He instead made it straightforward, practical, and relatable to all who care to look. It's all in there.

"I'm sorry but God isn't catering to my intellect."

I'm sorry, but people's intellect varies greatly and you have to keep your audience in mind and gear it towards the lowest common denominator and make it simplistic and easy to understand so everyone can follow it.

Think about it, really.

[apothanein kerdos]

I don't worship technology, but I do question the authority of an ancient book that claims to be from god, but doesn't contain any insights to the natural world that a first grader wouldn't already be aware of.

But you're right, I'm beginning with the assumption that an all-knowing and all-loving god who writes a book would have provided instructions on how to live a healthy, disease free life. If you or I lived 2,000 years ago, we could write such a book with a high school education, why didn't God?

Assumption, assumption, assumption, assumption!

When will you address the fact that you're assuming quite a bit without exploring the purpose of the Bible first? You're saying, "This is how the Bible should have been written, this is what its purpose should have been," when you lack the proper authority to claim what it should or should not have covered.

You're ignoring the analysis given and sticking to the same (absurd) point.

Now, I am constantly trying to be a man of patience, but I must apologize as I fear mine is quickly running out. I don't mean that in a rude way, but it's quite frustrating to have someone ask the same question over and over again when the construct of your question has, itself, been brought into question. You can't just brush that off to the side - you have to deal with the fact that your question has within it a faulty premise.

I take issue with your assumption that the deaths from disease, that continue to this day, aren't needless. In my opinion, every death from a treatable illness is needless. But let's talk actual content. Can you provide any content from the bible that demonstrates a supernatural intelligence was imparting some insights to the world by revealing something not known to the authors? If the book is solely about God's interactions with humans, why is there no mention of the civilizations in the Americas which predate the NT? That would be an amazing insight if the biblical authors were aware of a people 10,000 miles away. But instead, I maintain, there's nothing in it that couldn't have been written by any educated first-century man.

Here you are again, asking for empirical means to prove a non-empirical entity.

They aren't needless. Some disease has a purpose. It can keep the population in check, it can serve as God's punishment, but most of all it reminds us that we're fallen and we brought this on ourselves. For every cure we find to a disease, more diseases pop up.

The reason there is no mention of it is that He didn't interact with other civilizations. He's God, He can interact with whomever He chooses.

Now, how about you PROVE your position? You claim any well educated 1st century man could have written the Bible, so now it's up to you to show us how every single concept and teaching in the Bible was replicated and around prior to the Bible. Not just one, not just a few, not a lot, but every single one. Good luck.

[powlette]

They aren't needless. Some disease has a purpose. It can keep the population in check, it can serve as God's punishment, but most of all it reminds us that we're fallen and we brought this on ourselves. For every cure we find to a disease, more diseases pop up.

I will reply to all your points - don't have a lot of time right now, but let me ask if God had a purpose for disease, then in vaccinating our children, are we circumventing God's punishment? In America, there's no reason to die from a communicable disease. 100 years ago you might argue that polio was God's punishment or to remind us we've fallen, but it's almost eradicated today. So is modern medicine allowing us to overcome God's will?

[apothanein kerdos]

I will reply to all your points - don't have a lot of time right now, but let me ask if God had a purpose for disease, then in vaccinating our children, are we circumventing God's punishment? In America, there's no reason to die from a communicable disease. 100 years ago you might argue that polio was God's punishment or to remind us we've fallen, but it's almost eradicated today. So is modern medicine allowing us to overcome God's will?

Not at all. Good question though.

Disease reminds us of our fallen nature. The vaccines reminds us that we are made in God's image and are intelligent enough to explore the world around us and come up with ways to defeat disease. We'll never defeat death or disease - it will always be with us, it will always remind us that something isn't right with this world, it will always evolve and find ways past our vaccinations. However, pursuing the vaccinations is also doing the work of the Lord as He loves us and does not want to see us suffer.

[powlette]

However, pursuing the vaccinations is also doing the work of the Lord as He loves us and does not want to see us suffer.

This is the dichotomy I don't understand and it's probably related to the problem of evil. God created disease so that we would always remember that we've "fallen", but he doesn't want us to suffer. Does a three year old dying of malaria in Africa need reminding that we've "fallen" but the three year old in the UK who has ready access to antibiotics and clean water doesn't need reminding? Can you see why this is a problem for a nonbeliever?

You're right, I've been making assumptions that the bible should have some evidence of omniscience if it was written by god. Let's say I wanted to test this. I disagree that I would have to show that everything in the bible predates it - much of it does (creation, resurrection on the third day, virgin birth, son of god, consuming god's flesh, etc), but that's probably an impossible task. Instead I would look for just one piece of information in the bible that indicates a super-intelligence was responsible for its content - and I have yet to see such evidence and I hope you can provide it rather than attacking my question.

In fact, when the bible speaks of anything related to the natural world, it often gets it wrong:

"the stars will fall from the sky", God created night and day before the earth or the sun, the firmament, "After this I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth", "Now the whole earth had one language and one speech", "All fowls that creep, going upon all four, shall be an abomination unto you" (no such thing), I could go on.

Now you can say these are hyperbole or symbolic, but thinking bats are a type of bird (Leviticus 11:13-19 & Deuteronomy 14:11-18) is not a mistake the creator of the universe would make, but it is a mistake that a first century man would make. So, can you point me to something illuminating in the bible that wouldn't be known in the first century? Something simple like the moon orbits the earth would be a good example, but instead when I search for "moon", I find this: "So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, till the nation avenged itself on its enemies, ..." which only makes sense if, like a first century man, you don't understand the relationship between the earth and the moon.

[daughter]

You're right, I've been making assumptions that the bible should have some evidence of omniscience if it was written by god.

I believe that your assumption is that God should demonstrate His omniscience by tailoring His answers to your understanding. I don't know if you've read the Bible yet, or just portions of it... but even if you've read the whole Bible, you've obviously missed the fact that there is much evidence of omniscience there. I discussed the sanitary issues covered in the Torah in an earlier post, so I'll not go back there. But the Bible directly inspired many scientists to explore nature... the hydro cycle was discovered because someone took Solomon seriously, the first year text used in universities to this day to introduce oceonography to the science was written by a Bible believing Christian who decided to go and prove the Bible correct, when it talks of channels in the ocean. The whole ancient world believed the bottom of the ocean was flat, apart from land masses... the Bible talks about mountains and valleys in the ocean.

Your assumption that the Bible contains nothing of scientific worth is not in fact based on evidence.

Let's say I wanted to test this. I disagree that I would have to show that everything in the bible predates it - much of it does (creation, resurrection on the third day, virgin birth, son of god, consuming god's flesh, etc), but that's probably an impossible task. Instead I would look for just one piece of information in the bible that indicates a super-intelligence was responsible for its content - and I have yet to see such evidence and I hope you can provide it rather than attacking my question.

Something that has happened in recent years is that the education system has stopped educating people on how to recognise and read different texts. For some reason absolute literalness is prized above any other literary form, and people increasingly approach poetry, metaphor and parable with disdain, because they have been taught to prize the "scientific." If you attempt to read the Bible while forcing it into whatever preferred world view or literary framework pleases you most, then you'll miss what the Bible actually is.

I used to approach it from an opposite but equal error by the way... I thought the whole book was nothing but poetry, myth, etc. It does take something beyond ourselves for us to actually read it without prejudice. So don't be offended, I'm not having a go at you specifically. All of us have a tendency to impose our cultural mores on it. This is what I see you doing here... the Bible is not, primarily, a science book.

In fact, when the bible speaks of anything related to the natural world, it often gets it wrong:

"the stars will fall from the sky", God created night and day before the earth or the sun, the firmament, "After this I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth", "Now the whole earth had one language and one speech", "All fowls that creep, going upon all four, shall be an abomination unto you" (no such thing), I could go on.

Now you can say these are hyperbole or symbolic, but thinking bats are a type of bird (Leviticus 11:13-19 & Deuteronomy 14:11-18) is not a mistake the creator of the universe would make, but it is a mistake that a first century man would make. So, can you point me to something illuminating in the bible that wouldn't be known in the first century? Something simple like the moon orbits the earth would be a good example, but instead when I search for "moon", I find this: "So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, till the nation avenged itself on its enemies, ..." which only makes sense if, like a first century man, you don't understand the relationship between the earth and the moon.

To first century man, a bird was simply a non insect that flies. It is only because of the ways in which we define and label animals that we consider them not to be birds. In other words, you classify nature differently from early man... that doesn't mean that he was wrong, or that you are wrong. It just means that the perameters which you, as opposed to early man, use to define animals, are different.

You say you need just one "simple thing", like the moon circling the earth. What about a simple thing, "He hangs the earth upon nothing", Job 26:7 ?

[forum lurker]

Are you suggesting that the purpose of diseases that kill us, is so we can learn about them and prevent many of them with childhood immunization (provided you're lucky enough to live in a country with good health standards)? It's that kind of thinking that leads to "AIDS is a curse from god against the gays".

I believe the purpose of diseases is in general to show us our mortality and weakness, that we need help.

I suspected you'd point out the biblical "prophecies". But if you're going to predict something to demonstrate your authority, why not something less ambiguous and more definitive. Such as, there will be a total solar eclipse visible from Jerusalem on the following date far in the future. I'm not looking for evidence or science from the bible. I'm just pointing out that there isn't anything in it (correct me if I'm wrong) that wasn't known or knowable by the authors. You're claiming it's divinely inspired and inerrant, but it reads as a very primitive book to me lacking not only in any insight about the natural world, but containing grievous errors that would be made by its contemporaries (firmament, four corners, see all kingdoms, stars will fall to the earth, etc). You can claim these errors are all hyperbole or metaphor, but I think it's more likely they are simply the product of a first-century intellect.

Have you studied Daniel's prophecy of the Grecian empire? It's not vague at all. I remember someone doing the math to make a correct prediction like that, and if I remember right the odds were something to billions.

[Dani H]

The Law describes specific steps to take in the face of mold and disease ("clean" and "unclean" isn't just "rituatlistic" or "spiritual" terminology, by the way).

Just thought I'd toss that little tidbit out there.