What does the Bible say about UFO's and extraterrestrials?

(Excerpt from Great Joy in Great Tribulation, a fairly run-of-the-mill offering from the far end of the fundamentalist Apocalypse industry.)

Scientific? What science is that? Oh well, if ID can be "science," I guess extra-solar demonology can be as well.

Why Toronto and "Pensecola," I wonder, and not, say, Boulder CO or Pahrump NV?

Nutty as it might seem, this is a fairly widespread view out at the fringe of "Last Days" Christian thinking. It has also been explored in various works of SF over the years, of course.
I am not too concerned about the reaction these people might have to the physical arrival of ETs, but the far more likely possibility of a "hit" at SETI could bring these views to prominence.
I have no idea whether this kind of religious thinking has been a factor in opposition to SETI funding, but it is easy to see how it might be.
Serious religious philosophers have debated the significance of ETs for at least a hundred years, but fundamentalists could very well be unaware of this. I think they would see ETs as a capital "T" Threat to their worldview and respond accordingly.

__________________
Abducting UFOs and conspiring against conspiracy theorists since 1980.

That one is answerable. Toronto (the "Toronto Blessing") and Pensacola (actually nearby Brownsville) have been the locations of well-publicized and long-running charismatic revivals in which the people have reported remarkable physical manifestations. So if you're looking for places they might expect spiritual warfare to become physical, they'd be front-line sites.

One of Hugh Ross' more out-there ideas was just this, that UFOs are best explained as demonic. He co-wrote a book to that effect, in fact. That wasn't one I wrote any prefatory comments to...

But if you believe ETs are the predicted anti-Christ in Revelation, then their discovery is neccessary in order to fulfill Biblical prophecy, and you should see the discoverey of ETs as a hopeful sign that the second coming is nearly upon us. So they should be pro-SETI.

__________________
"You miss 100% of the shots you don't take" - Wayne Gretzky

So those are the people who started the "G-d" trend.

I think it creates a lot more confusion than the one it clears.

__________________
"All your bias are belong to us." Ara Pacis
"A witty saying proves nothing." Voltaire

No doubt, especially when they're starting with an edited version of things.

__________________
"Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two has the greater view?" - Hugo

"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened." - Churchill

Hmm

I don't know whether to dare post to this thread or not, for the simple reason the whole premise of this thread seems to be treading into dangerous areas for this forum.

A while ago in another thread I tried to make the point about how we should be very wary of taking some other persons translation/interpretation of passages from ancient scriptures. All to often people seem to take as unchallenged truth when one self proclamed prophet or another claims that some ancient writing says (A) or (B). The number of times I have heard people claim that the Book of Revelation says x or y I just felt I had to read it for myself. Needless to say my interpretation of what I read was totally different to their's (but that is for another forum not here). Of course I was not looking to prove an earlier preconception of what it was all about but rather trying to see how such a story could have been dreamt by someone living in that time and culture given what was know of the world at that time. Of course even then I was limited because I could only read it in English and not in the form it was originally written therefore I fully accept that my source was already flawed by having been translated by someone else.

Therefore where in any ancient book is there clear reference to beings that travel to this world of our aboard vessels which are purely mechanical devices, devoid of spiritual or magical power need to make them fly.

Any references to Gods Demons Angels - flying charriots giant birds or whatever could be just that and nothing more. People back then believed in believed in flying charriots as well as dragons and people who were half man half animal. This is myth not science and to try and say that a flying charriot must have been a spacecraft or a giant bird was an aeroplane is going to far - that is not deductive reasoning it is fantasy, just like many of those stories of the past were if not fantasy then dreams and delusions.

So I say again show me where in any ancient book in the ORIGINAL TEXT is describes any advanced vehicle in sufficient detail that it is quite clear that it could not be the description of some mythical animal. That requires an accurate description of it shape, means of propulsion, how its occupants controlled it and navigated it even down to how many decks doors hatches and windows it had. Then and only then I might believe we are talking about a spacecraft and not a dragon.

__________________
Note 1. All requests for planetary demolition must now be submitted in quadruplicate on form UX-565/B4 and be counter-signed by the assistant administrative officer for interstellar traffic calming - department QG-7. Subject to approval by the chief planning officer and the infrastructure development coordination sub-committee.

The most convinging theory I've heard was that Revelations was about then-contemporary events, people, and groups, displayed allegorically so the writer wouldn't be beheaded for political dissent or stoned for heresy (there was no "freedom of the press" back then). This trick was also used by Nostradamus and other ancient/medieval writers in times when saying what you meant about those in power was career- or life-threatening.

__________________
"If this were play'd upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction."
Shakespeare, Twelfth Night
Illuminati's Razor-The most complicatedly evil answer is usually the most correct answer. - Fazor
"Every book is a children's book if the kid can read." - Mitch Hedberg
"Distance doesn’t matter much in space, where if you just start a thing off with the right kind of shove, sooner or later it will get where you want it to go." -Frederik Pohl, Mining the Oort

I think this is hardly mainstream theology.
I am curious why a demon spirit that can presumably walk through walls and possess a human being, need to fly around in a chunk of hardware?

Or did I miss something?

-V

Forget all the rubbish about spirits and gods and jesus.
Google "ezekiel flying wheels" or read it from a bible.
Nothing magic.It's alien flying saucers and the occupants are described as well as they could be 2000 years ago.

Please, never again, refer to Jesus as "Rubbish."

I refer you back to my earlier post.

Have you read ezekiel in its original form in the language it was originally written? If you are relying on someone else's interpretation you could be misled and even if you read it from the bible you almost certainly read it in English which means it has been through probably 4 levels of translation before you got to read it. In which case you have not been able to get back to the real source data and again any interpretation you make could be flawed.

We had this discussion once before in another thread on the question of whether the Indians had an ancient air force some 4000 years ago.

This is what I wrote back then

The predecessors of the flying vimanas of the Sanskrit epics are the flying chariots employed by various gods in the Vedas: the Sun (see Sun chariot) and Indra and several other Vedic deities are transported by flying wheeled chariots pulled by animals, usually horses (but the Vedic god Pūsan's chariot is pulled by goats, as is that of Norse Thor).

The Rigveda does not mention Vimanas, but verses RV 1.164.47-48 have been taken as evidence for the idea of "mechanical birds":

47. kṛṣṇáṃ niyânaṃ hárayaḥ suparṇâ / apó vásānā dívam út patanti
tá âvavṛtran sádanād ṛtásyâd / íd ghṛténa pṛthivî vy ùdyate
48. dvâdaśa pradháyaś cakrám ékaṃ / trîṇi nábhyāni ká u tác ciketa
tásmin sākáṃ triśatâ ná śaṅkávo / 'rpitâḥ ṣaṣṭír ná calācalâsaḥ

"Dark the descent: the birds are golden-coloured; up to the heaven they fly robed in the waters.
Again descend they from the seat of Order, and all the earth is moistened with their fatness."
"Twelve are the fellies, and the wheel is single; three are the naves. What man hath understood it?
Therein are set together spokes three hundred and sixty, which in nowise can be loosened." (trans. Griffith)

In Dayananda Saraswati's "translation", these verses become:

"jumping into space speedily with a craft using fire and water ... containing twelve stamghas (pillars), one wheel, three machines, 300 pivots, and 60 instruments."

But likelier in the original Indian symbolism when that hymn was composed, the wheel is a year, the 12 "fellies" are months (lunations), and the 360 spokes are days.
----------------------------------------------------------------
As I suspected and is often the case with ancient writings it is all in the translation. Most of us cannot read ancient texts in their original form and must rely upon the work of others to provide us with the supposed evidence. It is often here that the first "corruption" of the original story appears as the translator repackages the words to either suit a modern audience or to present the information in a way that supports his point of view.

__________________
Note 1. All requests for planetary demolition must now be submitted in quadruplicate on form UX-565/B4 and be counter-signed by the assistant administrative officer for interstellar traffic calming - department QG-7. Subject to approval by the chief planning officer and the infrastructure development coordination sub-committee.

Somewhere around here I have a paperback called "The Spaceships of Ezekiel" that I read many years ago. Back then, when I took "ancient astronaut" stuff more seriously, and I thought the ship he came up with was pretty neat. I remember it had a aerospike engine, a nuclear reactor, a "wheel within wheel" system to roll around the landscape, and other goodies. Even then, though, I couldn't for the life of me figure out how he got from the story to that spaceship, even when he tried to explain it. The leaps of logic were breathtaking to behold.

__________________
I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?

Disclaimer: Avatar is not an official NASA image and does not imply any specific interplanetary or interstellar capability.

The Leif Ericson Cruiser

Rubbish is a matter of opinion. I find the talk about aliens building pyramids, riding around in flying carriages, and writing Bibles much more ridiculous and nonsensical than most conventional religion.

Especially funny to me is how the people who believe these things think they're being bold by interpreting the scripture in a materialistic way, but still assume that the greatest truths about human history are somehow hidden in the Bible. If they've really transcended traditional religion, how come they still place so much value on the Bible?

__________________
"All your bias are belong to us." Ara Pacis
"A witty saying proves nothing." Voltaire

__________________
Forming opinions as we speak

__________________
Forming opinions as we speak