> > Sure, the Bible instructs me to read it
>>another way. But then we're back at
>>recursion. In order to believe in the Bible, I
>>must first believe it when it says I have to
>>read it this certain way in order to believe
>>it.
>
> This doesn't make sense at all, whether by
>faith *or* reason. If you are presented with a
>map of the world and asked to determine if it is
>an accurate map of the world, do you read the
>red lines as contours and blue lines as roads
>instead of vice versa, determine it is faulty,
>and discount it, all without having read the
>map's legend, on the grounds that the map's
>legend is part of the map?

Ah. But what if I hand you a map, and it shows two roads crossing. And you go to where those two roads cross and find that they don't cross? Then you look at the map, and it says "Never mind about those roads not crossing--believe that they cross, and keep going." And everytime you get to a point where two roads are supposed to cross and they don't, you read the little blurb and keep going. Then towards the end of your survey, you're doing things like "Well, see, it says these two roads here cross, and I can't actually see here where they do, but if the Earth was folded at this particular place twenty years ago, they WOULD have crossed, so huh, the map must be right!" to justify every little inconsistency, you're not exactly being logical or rational.

And anyway, a *good* map wouldn't have roads crossing where they don't and vice-versa anyway.

-- Dave