So the argument goes…
What if a ruler wrote a religious text covering 500 years of his rein.
He is religious and invents acts of god and angels to add to the events in his book.
Question: Does this prove god exists.
“NO.”,
Once again…
1,000 years ago a ruler, in Israel, wrote a historical record of preceding centuries.
There is absence of evidence of the divine.
He introduces divine elements into the story - without evidence.
The book becomes popular.
Did I miss the difference between these two? The response is still NO!
I think your two scenarios are exactly alike. Did I miss something? What did you see as the difference between the two questions?
Now… What if the first book was actually written about a god? A god the king personally knew and interacted with. A god that waggled his fingers and created the Grand Canyon, The pyramids, Separated the contents, and made the earth rotate around the sun. Because this god used no modern machinery, had no tools, and because he only used magic, he did not leave evidence behind. The king faithfully told the truth about all the divine interactions, the angels, the demons, and all other characters and events that once appeared on Earth. Because he wrote the truth, does that make the Bible a true account?
LOL - No! As Sheldon clearly stated…
A truth claim and a fantasy claim are held to the same standard of evidence. Even if everything the ruler wrote was 100% true, we would have no reason to believe such claims. And finally, the fault for us not believing such claims would lie directly with the god thing. He is, after all, a god thing and could easily provide evidence for his existence.
Once the evidence was provided, then people would have a choice to love and believe in the god thing or not. If it was a god thing like that of the Old Testament, I am quite sure many people would opt out of any kind of relationship with such an asshole.