Quote:Okay, i declare it untrue. Gosh, that was easy. Some challenge. Now, i suppose you're going to indicate that by 'declare' you didn't mean what the word really means, and you want 'proof.'
Can any critic can come forward and declare this 2,700+- yr old prophecy as untrue? Give it your best shot....
Quote:Thanks for the wish, but i'm a skeptic. I don't believe in luck, or the ability of the superstitious to convey it to others.
I gladly await any who person who "thinks" they have ther power or knowledge or wisdom to show this verse as untrue - to this very day - this very minute....
Hosea 3:4
For the children of Israel shall abide many days without a king, and without a prince, and without a sacrifice, and without an image, and without an ephod, and without teraphim
Thanks...
(and.. best of luck)...
Anyway:
Here we see the propensity of the Christain to pick cherries where The Books is concerned. The FULL prophecy is a little more complicated.
Quote:"David Their King" was king about, what, three hundred years before Hosea wrote this prophecy? It is literally 'after the fact.' If it were PROPHECY, it would have the name of the future king, not the name of the OLD one.
3:4 For the children of Israel shall abide many days without a king, and without a prince, and without a sacrifice, and without an image, and without an ephod, and without teraphim:
3:5 Afterward shall the children of Israel return, and seek the LORD their God, and David their king; and shall fear the LORD and his goodness in the latter days.
Many hold the reference to 'David' to be symbolic. A reference to Jesus, supposedly a descendent of David. Aside from the problem that Jesus is listed as having descended from someone cursed so that none of his descendents could ever BE king, Israel has not returned, not to this day. Some have accepted Christ, but haven't returned, some have returned without accepting Christ.
And Israel has no King, which fulfills the FIRST part, but not the second part, where a king is kinda required.
The Books warns us not to accept false prophets. We would also be wise to reject false prophecies, as in those that are only partially true.
The point of prophecy is to show the divine source of the soothsaying, in that when it comes true, we know that the foreknowledge required can only have come from divinity.
PARTIALLY true prophecy just means that someone guessed PARTIALLY right.
Any apology that depends on 'it hasn't come true yet' just acknowledges that the prophecy hasn't come true. And if it hasn't come true, it's not useful as a defense of the power of prophecy in The Books.
