Let's be honest here. Everyone has an agenda. Just because FARMS doesn't
fabricate it's own research, doesn't make them any less objective than
somebody else. I can't say I've read much from FARMS, so I won't make
the judgement call. However historians in general will give no credence
to anything remotely spiritual or mythical. Scholars date most new
testament works after 70 CE* , the destruction of the Jewish temple,
because Christ prophesied about it in Mark. Many other NT works appear
to be textual derivatives thereof (Mathew, Luke, James, etc.), so they
must have been written later, and not by the original eyewitnesses whose
names they bear. They don't date them c. 70 CE because they have
evidence that puts authorship there, but because they cannot appear to
accept any of the spiritual evidence provided by the text. It's all a
matter of where your bias lies.
* CE, common era, is not a term I generally use, but I was describing
their viewpoint as accurately as I could. Personally I prefer anno
domini for the same reason Elder Nelson and other inspired people.
Daniel Crookston wrote:
All I remember is that someone asked about FARMS and he guffawed and said
that they don't do any "real" archaeology and then moved on. I haven't read
anything from them, but it seems like they're scientists with an agenda, and
any scientist with an agenda is going to produce shoddy (though possibly
objective-seeming) results.
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