The Bible is reliable

RELIABILITY"You seem to state that no one can interpret the ancient scriptures from any religion (or secular sources). The fact that people are able to translate it shows you are incorrect.">> Pro says that since people were able to translate the Bible, it must be translated correctly which is quite obviously fallacious. Pro has no proof whatsoever that the Bible was translated "correctly" as per my previous round's contentions that it could not be. His only response was that the "church fathers" allegedly had the skill to interpret the original texts; however, there is no proof of this and thus we have no reason to accept it -- it is simply a bare assertion with no evidence. Just because they said they could interpret it 100% correctly doesn't mean that they could and actually did. Pro believes this based on faith, not proof. Nonetheless, this doesn't address my argument from last round. I'll simply copy and paste my contention since my actual point was ignored: By not having an objective meaning or direct instruction, application, message or version of history, the "intended message" can easily be lost, mistranslated or manipulated. Indeed a reader can subjectively interpret or apply the message however they see fit, regardless of whether or not it is valid. This can totally skew their alleged understanding of the text. That is not reliable; that leaves a lot of room for error. Extend this point since Pro dropped it. It goes beyond mistranslations.TRANSLATIONSRegarding translations, Pro says that the Kabala gave secret meanings to Hebrew words, the Gnostics gave secret and mystical meanings to different words, etc. This goes on to prove MY point that the Bible is not reliable because of how much it has been completely manipulated by various people through the ages. My opponent suggests that some people *might* have been able to interpret the original text (...even though this doesn't even begin to prove that the original content included in the text is perfect, reliable or correct in the first place...) and yet that doesn't help us regarding all of the Biblical mistranslations, misinterpretations, misapplications and other corruption that has watered so much of Biblical content down to us today. Even Biblical scholars cannot be trusted or assumed to have all of the "correct" information given the extremely shaky history of these documents.Pro accepts the alleged Hebrew interpretations above all else: above all scientific and historical research that suggests both the Hebrew's interpretations and claims might be problematic. For example, consider "the Hebrews conceived the world as a three-storied structure that included a flat-earth belief. That they believed in such an unscientific concept should not surprise us, because they were surrounded by pagan cultures much older than theirs whose cosmologic views were very similar. The Hebrews had simply borrowed this concept from their pagan neighbors" [1]. In other words, the Hebrew perpetuated a wrong flat-earth concept proving that EVEN IF their translations were 100% reliable (contrary to scholars' claims), even their perfectly translated content might be straight up wrong or inaccurate, and therefore not reliable. However perhaps it should not surprise us that my opponent would accept such *flawed* scientific propositions as fact; after all he seemingly rejects the concept of EVOLUTION itself as he critiques the fossil method in the last round. I don't think I'll spend my character space defending the concept of evolution in this debate -- but it should be noted that the Bible is quite obviously factually inerrant, since there is insurmountable proof of evolution (to some degree) based on various methods of scientific research and verifiability, whereas there is NO evidenced backed data to support Creationism and the other ridiculous concepts mentioned in the Bible if read at face value. Another tidbit on reliability: "The authors of the gospels claim to have been eyewitnesses of Jesus' ministry. Yet liberal theologians believe that the gospels were written during the period 70 to 100 CE by anonymous writers who had only second-hand or third-hand knowledge about Jesus, and who incorporated oral material that had materialized after Jesus' death" [2].Furthermore, "Liberal theologians have reached a consensus that many books in the New Testament were not written by the authors that they claim to be written by. This puts their legitimacy in question. We also know that unknown persons later inserted their own writings into some books.Some of the books that liberal theologians believe were written by different authors from the ones indicated by the Bible are: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy (a.k.a. The Pentateuch, the 5 Books of Moses, the Books of the Law, the Law, the Torah). These state in numerous places that they were written by Moses. But mainline and liberal theologians have long accepted the 'Documentary Hypothesis,' which asserts that the Pentateuch was written by a group of four authors, from various locations in Palestine, over a period of centuries. Each wrote with the goal of promoting his/her own religious views. A fifth individual cut and pasted the original documents in to the present Pentateuch" [2].SUPERNATURAL CLAIMS My opponent basically drops my point on metaphors. Extend.In fact my opponent drops most of my arguments all-together. He merely copy and pastes them, and then responds with an insufficient one-liner. For example, when I pointed out how both Adam & Eve and living to be 900 years is likely not true, Pro responds that just because science does not support those claims, doesn't mean we should accept them as inaccurate. However Pro does not provide any evidence or legitimate reasoning TO support those claims. He also says (for example) that I allegedly misquoted the part of Genesis about edible plants, yet does not offer a corrected verse, and does not explain how the verse is wrong. So I maintain my point that the Bible contains misinformation or things that are not entirely accurate and true, and is therefore unreliable. My opponent mentions that the Protestants (allegedly) accept one version of the Bible; however, that is entirely irrelevant. There are over 33,000 denominations of Christianity alone [3] that all follow the Bible. That's a lot of teachings of one man. And the fact that only the Protestants allegedly accept one version of the Bible, prove that the other 32,999+ denominations of Christians do NOT accept or agree on the proper version of the Bible. Thus the Bible is not reliable which is why there are so many versions and so many variations of beliefs and teachings. [1] http://www.theskepticalreview.com...[2] http://www.religioustolerance.org...[3] http://www.philvaz.com...