Re: Pour vous, encore
I do not like the turn in your attitude. I tried to explain myself, but I must not have done very well. I do not think you are one of those people who say you can have faith in anything, and I do not think you are a Pagan. Actually, I guess the last couple sentences of my response were a little off topic, and they weren't meant to be directed at you. Sorry for the miscommunication.
Anyway, what I was meaning to say is "the Bible isn't exact, but the meaning is there" reminds me of "you can have faith in anything". I don't even mean that you in particular are heading that way or you're going to end up like that . . . that all came out wrong last time. I just mean not trusting in God and/or his word tends to lead in that direction and . . . I really can't explain this. It sounds right in my head, but the words don't fit. Bottom line is this: I do not think you are a Pagan, nor do I think you are on the road to becoming one. I'm very sorry for making it sound that way; it's just that I couldn't explain myself correctly, and I am still unable to do so.
Next! I did say, "The overall message is there," but then I added, "just like the rest of it," and what I meant by that is the overall message is there, of course, and everything else is there as well, just like it was to begin with. I was not at all hypocritical. There have been 16 incorrect characters (as in letters, periods, commas, et cetera) found, and to me that means that the Bible is 99.99% perfect, which is good enough for me to call it perfect. What I'm trying to say is "close enough".
I agree that only God can be entirely perfect, but I have no problem believing that a man under the influence of God can be a perfect scribe. In no way is that man a perfect being, but he could write exactly what God wanted him to write. I can't imagine why God would allow mistakes, because he would know that people would use any mistake they could get their hands on to discredit the entire Bible, and people do; they use whatever footing they can to say the entire Bible is wrong, because if one thing is wrong, why is the rest of it still credible?
As far as the 900 year old people go, I say again: why make it up? There is no reason for God to have made it up, and there is no reason for the author to have disobeyed God when writing it (assuming he could). I only say it is important because I trust in every word of the Bible, because it is God's word.
This is off the topic now. I understand that you got mad at me because I did not make myself clear, and you actually did a very good job of toning it down, but I'd appreciate you keeping your anger out of the debate. Thanks.