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Nothing short of many prophets of that time. They were popular, nothing new.
Believing in fortune tellers and wish granting genie Gods is just not my thing, it was a sign of the times. It's interesting for sure, but as far as holding weight in the here and now, not a chance. For if it did, so would the millions of other historical pagan beliefs and prophets.
I don't believe in ghost whisperers either. Nor do I believe in exorcism. My point being it's hard to be selective when dealing with hear say prophecy. It just becomes your fancy. Take your pick.
I assume you've been through them all and have picked this one for your fav. I don't believe in any of them as fact, just historic practices, that is all. I'm currently into the Asian beliefs, simply fascinating, you should take a lookie, you might find some similarities.
unfortunatly neither i nor (as far as i know) any members on this board are fluent in aramaic, ancient persian or hebrew. If I had knowledge of those languages and how they have changed from century-to-century, I could read the original text and judge what period it was written in for myself.
Alas we have to rely on what the so called experts have written. Depending on their bias, some say Daniel was written in the style of the 6th century Bc and some say it was written later. If only we could judge the original document for ourselves, because i'm telling you now, if this document was written before the Persian-Greek war and Alexanders wars, it would be hard to argue against supernatural influence, which means the rest of the Bible as a divinly inspired document becomes more credable, which in turn means that alot of people may well be going to hell
Scottyr,
You have to rely on what your so called experts have written.
Even if you saw proof with your very own eyes that the Book of Daniel was
written Later, to look like a prophecy, you would still reject it in your mind.
you would look further, think of another reason, that is because you are a
religious person. There is no reason in religion.
Religion isn't logical.
You believe whatever you believe because you Want to believe it.
Pure and simple.
That is fine, whatever makes you happy.
Scottyr,
You have to rely on what your so called experts have written.
Even if you saw proof with your very own eyes that the Book of Daniel was
written Later, to look like a prophecy, you would still reject it in your mind.
you would look further, think of another reason, that is because you are a
religious person. There is no reason in religion.
Religion isn't logical.
You believe whatever you believe because you Want to believe it.
Pure and simple.
That is fine, whatever makes you happy.
No one has ever explained how the author of Daniel (presumably a Jew in Palestine in 164 B.C.) knew details about the end of the Babylonian Empire (hundreds of miles away and hundreds of years before) that were lost to history. The author apparently knew that Belshazaar was reigning when Babylon fell and that he was co-regent. NO other historical document or author... key word NONE... ever mentioned Belshazaar, not even the Greek historians that detailed the events around 400 B.C. and even visited Babylon. The information was lost because the Persians destroyed it when they sacked the city and effectively erased it from history. This was a huge argument AGAINST the book for many years as critics claimed that Belshazaar was made up by the author until 100 years ago they unearthed a stone in Babylon that recorded the name of Belshazaar and that he was co-regent with his father at the end of the Babylonian Empire. HOW the author of Daniel knew such an intimate detail of history that had been lost has never been explained... I guess maybe he did a google search and found out that info before he proceeded to create a false prophecy that ultra-religious Jews accepted as real because it gave them comfort during a time of extreme persecution by a Gentile monarch by telling a story of Jews ACCEPTING the customs of a Gentile culture and flourishing in it. That doesn't make sense.
No one has ever explained how the author of Daniel (presumably a Jew in Palestine in 164 B.C.) knew details about the end of the Babylonian Empire (hundreds of miles away and hundreds of years before) that were lost to history. The author apparently knew that Belshazaar was reigning when Babylon fell and that he was co-regent. NO other historical document or author... key word NONE... ever mentioned Belshazaar, not even the Greek historians that detailed the events around 400 B.C. and even visited Babylon. The information was lost because the Persians destroyed it when they sacked the city and effectively erased it from history. This was a huge argument AGAINST the book for many years as critics claimed that Belshazaar was made up by the author until 100 years ago they unearthed a stone in Babylon that recorded the name of Belshazaar and that he was co-regent with his father at the end of the Babylonian Empire. HOW the author of Daniel knew such an intimate detail of history that had been lost has never been explained... I guess maybe he did a google search and found out that info before he proceeded to create a false prophecy that ultra-religious Jews accepted as real because it gave them comfort during a time of extreme persecution by a Gentile monarch by telling a story of Jews ACCEPTING the customs of a Gentile culture and flourishing in it. That doesn't make sense.
Co regent with his father. Who was Belshazaar's father?
Just for fun, I'm going to assume that the chapter was written a few hundred years prior to the events and therefore seems prophetic. I would still not feel any rational need to accept the literal truth of the rest of the Bible, and I would still not see a rational need to posit the existence of a supernatural Divine Intelligent Creator, etc. Why not? Because so much of the rest of the Bible is so philosophically untenable that a dozen other explanations would still be more rational than the idea that the Bible as a whole is literal history. For example: Sheer luck on Daniel's part seems unlikely, but not impossible, and as unlikely as it would be, it would probably still be more likely than the Bible being literally true history. There are, however, plenty of other alternatives to sheer luck. We already know that we do not know a whole lot about the nature of time, and science has left open the possibility of alternative dimensions or timelines. Most ideas relating to alternative timelines, etc. are highly speculative (more sci-fi than science at this point), but frankly, I would be more likely to believe that Daniel somehow did manage to catch a glimpse of the future (or the future of a world with a timeline similar to our own), than I would to believe that the Bible is literal true history. Yes, in other words, I'm saying that a variety of speculative science-fiction scenarios would seem more rationally plausible to me than would a literal interpretation of the Bible. And even if I were to grant that Daniel's prophesy was based on some sort of "supernatural" or "paranormal" precognition, this still wouldn't lend much support for the idea that, say, a loving, all-knowing God created a bunch of conscious creatures, then wiped them all out in a massive flood because they pissed him off.
Of course, what I really think is that, most likely, the "prophesies" were written after the events.
Co regent with his father. Who was Belshazaar's father?
His father was Nabonidus; if you're trying to go after the whole "the text says that his father was Nebuchadnezzar" bit that is a tired argument. It only requires basic reading comprehension to understand that in ancient Hebrew culture as well as many other cultures up until this day terms in the original languages that usually translate to the English word "father" can mean "grand-father", "great-grand-father", or even "predecessor" especially in the case of royals. The English term "father" has a very narrow and restricted semantic range compared to its equivalent term in many other languages.
If you don't understand this I suggest that you lack basic reading comprehension skills. My qualification for saying this is that I am a polyglot and studied linguistics in school. I speak/read Spanish, French, Latin, Greek, and Hebrew at differing levels of proficiency and have also studied some Chinese, Arabic, and Russian.
Just for fun, I'm going to assume that the chapter was written a few hundred years prior to the events and therefore seems prophetic. I would still not feel any rational need to accept the literal truth of the rest of the Bible, and I would still not see a rational need to posit the existence of a supernatural Divine Intelligent Creator, etc. Why not? Because so much of the rest of the Bible is so philosophically untenable that a dozen other explanations would still be more rational than the idea that the Bible as a whole is literal history. For example: Sheer luck on Daniel's part seems unlikely, but not impossible, and as unlikely as it would be, it would probably still be more likely than the Bible being literally true history. There are, however, plenty of other alternatives to sheer luck. We already know that we do not know a whole lot about the nature of time, and science has left open the possibility of alternative dimensions or timelines. Most ideas relating to alternative timelines, etc. are highly speculative (more sci-fi than science at this point), but frankly, I would be more likely to believe that Daniel somehow did manage to catch a glimpse of the future (or the future of a world with a timeline similar to our own), than I would to believe that the Bible is literal true history. Yes, in other words, I'm saying that a variety of speculative science-fiction scenarios would seem more rationally plausible to me than would a literal interpretation of the Bible. And even if I were to grant that Daniel's prophesy was based on some sort of "supernatural" or "paranormal" precognition, this still wouldn't lend much support for the idea that, say, a loving, all-knowing God created a bunch of conscious creatures, then wiped them all out in a massive flood because they pissed him off.
Of course, what I really think is that, most likely, the "prophesies" were written after the events.
The problem with your argument is that it is ENTIRELY based upon your own subjective feelings about the issue.
"I would still not feel any rational need..."
"and I would still not see a rational need..."
"I would be more likely to believe..."
"would seem more rationally plausible to me"
"what I really think is that"
Thank you for expressing your entirely subjective, non-authoritative, and meaningless opinions about reality, but quite frankly, I don't care one bit about how you feel or what you might think is believable. Reality is reality. Everything is in the form of: "I don't feel this can be true, therefore..."
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