What do you understand a FUNDAMENTALIST to be?

[Gofer Blue]

Apart from the appalling liar that is 'truthpaste' what do Christians on here think about regarding:

1.The Noah's Ark story mimmicking the Sumerian legend of Ziusudra, the subsequent Old Babylonian story of Atrahasisand the story of Ushnapistim. In those cases the world was flooded due to the gods being angry with human beings.

2. The story of Moses mimicking that of Sargon, who was put in a basket in the river.

3. The story of Job mimicking that of Ludlul-bēl-Numēqi.

4. The story of the Garden of Eden and having to leave it naked due to falling victim to temptation mimicking the story of Enkidu.

5. The story of Jonah mimicking that of Saktideva.

6. The story of the tower of Babel in preceding Hindu and Armenian culture?

7. The Moses story mimicking that of Dionysus.

8. Abraham offering up his son mimicking that of Harishchandra.

9. The Holy Trinity mimicking that of Brahma, Vishnu, And Shiva.

10. The Ten Commandments mimmicking much of the Egyptian Bookof The Dead.

11. The narrative of the Apocalypse largely mimicking the Zoroastrian stoty of the “Frashokereti”.

12. Jesus' compassion for the sick and poor and the creator of miracles mimicking the story of Asclepius.

13. The character of Samson mimicking the Sumerian Enkidu and the Greek Heracles.

14. The concept of the struggle of good against evil and demons mimicking the story of Zoroastrianism.

15. The virgin birth mimicking that of Zoroaster and Erichthonius.

16. The act of turning water into wine mimicking that of Dionysus.

17. The story of Abraham mimicking that of Harishchandra.

18. Jesus not being seduced by temptation mimicking the story of Siddhārtha.

19. The Book of Proverbs mimicking the Instruction of Amenemope.

On the other hand there is no proof whatsoever about the Biblical virgin birth, a talking snake, a talking donkey, anyone being turned to salt, Noah living until he was 950, the universe being created within a week, the ground under St David miraculously rising so that he could address a crowd, people rising from the dead (and there were lots of them described in the Bible), the parting of the Red Sea and a lot else.

Religions are fascinating folklore but that's exactly what they are - and how anyone can believe them as being literal in the 21st century when they were collated by people who had little or no idea about atoms, plate tectonics, bacteria, space-time, electricity, evolution and all the other things we know about now, I don't know. Well, I do really. It's down to indoctrination as a child.

I note you use the word mimicking in each of your examples.

I suppose my reply to all this supposed plagiarism would have to be…why? i.e. why would a Hebrew author need to do that? Indeed, would he have had knowledge of these examples as they were presumably written in different languages in different places at different times? Also should it be surprising that the recording of some of these different events may have happened elsewhere e.g. the flood – if this was a universal catastrophe then there may have been other survivors in other countries who would have recorded the same event? I bet Job was not the only person on the planet to be angry with God because he had a raw deal in life!

I wonder if any of the other writers of the events you list prophesised the coming of the Messiah, Jesus Christ, God in human form, as the writers of the book of Isaiah did? (I understand that there may have been several writers who contributed to this book). IMO this book is one of the most important in the OT as it points to the coming of Christ although it was written at least 400 years before that. This would beg the question what text did the author(s) “mimic” when this book was written if we follow the plagiarism line that you are proposing. I would be interested to know.

You ask…how anyone can believe these stories as being literal in the 21st century when they were collated by people who had little or no idea about atoms, plate tectonics, bacteria, space-time, electricity, evolution and all the other things we know about now, I don't know. Well, I do really. It's down to indoctrination as a child.

Well, modern man may know a lot about atoms, plate tectonics, bacteria, space-time, electricity, evolution and all the other things we know about now, but he has learned precious little about the basic but important things that Jesus spoke about like justice, self-control, selflessness, envy, greed, hate and aggression. Indeed we seem to be in reverse rather than "evolving" into perfection or maybe you haven’t noticed how things are going lately?

As to indoctrination of a child, that’s possible of course but children do grow up to be questioning teenagers/adults!