₦airaland Forum

4kings:
Haba!, primitive writings started 3000 years before Christ, even your bible says Jesus read the scriptures(old testaments).

I never disputed Josephus, I was saying that his writings about Jesus was most likely influenced by Eusebius. (Read again)


Funny, agnostics\deists here on nairaland & the world think the stories of the bible is comparable to a fairy tale, I just told u that Tacitus(ur evidence) wrote about an adventurer rising from the dead and u said I am being biased because of my point, smh.
Talking about myth Aristotle, Socrates, plato, Seneca were born centuries before Tacitus and they thought rationally and didn't believe in myth, so we can say they had followers that existed then, so how can u say we should believe the words written down by an emperor who was mythological.

Wow l think l have made my point, and there's no need to push this any further.
On the issue of Josephus, l still don't get you..
If you are saying that Josephus reference to Jesus was altered by Eusebius, then we are saying thesame thing,but the original paragraph that speaks about Jesus was from Josephus. There are even older Syrian and Arabic manuscripts of the text from Josephus which do not speak of Jesus being the Christ or his ressurection, which would look more like original text of Josephus, the reference to jesus as a wise man who attracted many Jews and of the cheif men among them giving him up to Pontius Pilate is generally agreed to as authentic. This quote sums it up....
Those scholars who accept the "partial authenticity" theory conclude that - at a minimum - something similar to the following reconstruction of the TF was likely original to Book 18:
At this time there appeared Jesus, a wise man. For he was a doer of startling deeds, a teacher of people who receive the truth with pleasure. And he gained a following among many Jews and among many of Gentile origin. And when Pilate, because of an accusation made by the leading men among us, condemned him to the cross, those who had loved him previously did not cease to do so. And up until this very day the tribe of Christians (named after him) had not died out.
(per Meier, op. cit., page 61).
Also the reference to James the brother of Jesus is authentic.
But if you are saying that Eusebius sold ideas about Jesus to Josephus, then this obviously cannot be the case, since Eusebius was not alive the during the time of Josephus.

On the position of historians on Josephus' reference to jesus, this is what wikepedia has to say......
A passage that states that Jesus the Messiah was a wise teacher who was crucified by Pilate, usually called the Testimonium Flavianum.[5][6][1] The general scholarly view is that while the Testimonium Flavianum is most likely not authentic in its entirety, it is broadly agreed upon that it originally consisted of an authentic nucleus, which was then subject to Christian expansion/alteration.[6][7][8][9][10][11] Although the exact nature and extent of the Christian redaction remains unclear,[12] there is broad consensus as to what the original text of the Testimonium by Josephus would have looked like.[10]

Modern scholarship has largely acknowledged the authenticity of the reference in Book 20, Chapter 9, 1 of the Antiquities to "the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James" [13] and considers it as having the highest level of authenticity among the references of Josephus to Christianity.[14][1][2][15][16][17]

4kings:
1) Your explanation for the synoptic gospels does not make sense, how can witnesses, who stayed with a man for years, bearing in mind that we were told that the works this man did is enough (in comparison) to fill a textbook, require a common source when writing about him. Besides, the q-source is just an hypothesis made not too long ago, in an attempt to explain why the gospels were very much alike.

2) what do u mean by 'all' scholars agree that Josephus reference was authentic?, if that was so this argument would be stupid. BTW u should be open minded when searching for facts so u don't get caught up with biased views.

3) Tacitus, seriously, the same guy who gave detailed account of an adventurer rising from the dead, smh. Also have u noticed that this emperors mostly consulted themselves(romans scholars) for info, (like tacitus and pliny, Constantine and eusebius) and not Jewish people(@ least they're not mentioned in their works).

The Roman empire advocated for christainity, for order, and not because Constantine saw a cross in a sky and got converted, except he was on some high w**d.

1) lt was not a culture where things were always written down, besides most of the apostles may not have been that literate to write things down, they also may have thought that the end was nigh and did not think of preserving these stories in books, but when the apostle began to die, the Christian communities had to put down these stories they had from oral culture. Even Talmudic Judaism in those days was oral, not so much writing until the second century.
2) Funny how you tell me to read and not be biased, if you are truly current on this issue you would know that no scholar disputes the reference to James the brother of Jesus by Josephus, and that while the other text may have been altered, it was still written by Josephus, unless you just read up only biased atheist websites, rather than the works of academians on this issue. You are the one who should do more reading on this issue my friend not me. As a matter of fact except for maybe Richard carrier and Robert price(Richard is not even that qualified) no other professor of history( Christian or non Christian) would agree with you here on the issue of Josephus', reference to Jesus.
3) Are you truly non biased as you claim to be? If Tacticus had not made a reference to Jesus, you would also be the first to raise your voice on a thousand hills, that even Tacticus didn't mention Jesus. He did and now you try to prove a point that he can't be trusted. Well as every Historian would tell you many of the sources we rely on for ancient history can't be totally trusted as well, they are biased and give credence to myth and magic. The work of the Historian has always been to separate the chaff from the wheat.
This issue has nothing to do with Constantine or your other Roman conspiracy theories.
Good evening.

Joshuabase:
Isn't it convenient that evidence for his existence was allegedly burnt?

I know Josephus and Tacitus mentioned a Jesus character in their works, but the account wasn't of first hand experience.

Who are the others that mentioned Jesus in history? And lived around the time he was allegedly Alive?

So much of what we know about first century messaianic Judaism comes from Josephus. Again you think this was a literate culture with channels and CNN or press news and media, or you think many jews delighted in writing things.But for Josephus, we have limited knowledge of rabbis of the era. It was more of an oral culture. Also even philo's interest was not to give us account of the various messaiah's in his time. Josephus was the man who focused on this, and we know ca lot about them now and the various zealot movements in first century Judaism, Thanks to Josephus. Most of your questions have been answered by scholars, just read up on their materials.

4kings:
Honourhim, nice to meet u again in another thread.
Let me just chip in on part of what u said:
1)The four synoptic gospels, are very very much 'IDENTICAL', though we were told that the works Jesus did was (in comparison) enough to cover the size of an encyclopedia textbook or even more.
2)The man Jesus as recorded in the Bible, attended to more than 5000 people like twice(or more if u include the 'unknown records'), am very sure most of them were young(remember the boy with fishes), but yet in history only Josephus notes which is even a third party reference and also contained fairly minute portion, mentioned Jesus and also this is even sceptical because of Eusebius likely influence . Haba!
3) Even philosophers like Aristotle and Socrates, who were born 3-400 years before Christ, their works, are fairly recorded, and nobody disputes their existence (and guess what; they didn't walk on water). Also, Seneca the Younger who taught stoic philosophy, was also present during Jesus time, yet he does not believe in the supernatural not to talk of mentioning Jesus in his lifetime, in case u say he was from Rome and not Israel, be reminded that Rome colonised Israel in those days, so he must have noticed an extraordinary event to change his pattern of thinking, if at all there existed.

The only strong evidence that Jesus existed is the phrase 'I feel him in my heart'.

1) The synoptic gospels are identical because while Mark was the first to be written, Matthew and Luke were drawn from an early oral Q source and mark.
2) All scholars agree that Josephus reference to James the brother of Jesus is authentic and has not been altered, also while the first reference was altered slightly to say that Jesus was a god, it was certainly written by Josephus because it follows thesame pattern and many of the phrases used are in line with Josephus writing style. In fact there are versions from Ethiopia that do not show any sign of being altered. BTW Tacticus also spoke about Jesus.
3) While it is true that the works of Aristotle are well documented, we do not have so much to rely on when it comes to Socrates, it is very much like that of Jesus, we have mark and Paul as well as the Q sources for Jesus, in thesame way we have Xenophone, Plato, and Aristophanes, accounts which scholars do not totally trust as well.
Also l noticed your argument from silence, stating the fact that no one mentioned Jesus in his time. What you fail to prove is why the historians of that time should care about a Jewish teacher and would be messaiah at the time, when there were also many like him. Philo for instance was more interested in politics and philosophy. What we do know about the messaianic movement of that era comes from just one man..Josephus. And he mentioned Jesus not once but twice. Also if we should discard the works of Tacticus simply because he was non contemporary, then historians would have very little to go by today, since a lot of what we know in history comes from non contemporary sources.

bolt000:
wow!! i didn't know your thinking faculty was this narrow, now I'll just ignore you, Ciao.

Okies, that means you have nothing to say. Ciao.

Joshuabase:
The largest source of knowledge on the entire Internet isn't the best source of information?
That concludes this discussion.

It is not the best source of knowledge for one who wants to carry out a thorough research on the matter but a standard one nonetheless.
Even your wikepedia doesn't totally agree with you. So what are we saying?

Joshuabase:
I read Wikipedia. Not atheist websites. I've never read an atheist website till today.

Argumentum Ad Verecundiam , Bart's convictions have nothing to do with whether Jesus existed or not.

You're still having trouble presenting links.

Lol, so wikepedia(a site that is constantly edited, and certainly not the best source for information) is what you read, and then suddenly your eyes were opened and you became an atheist, and you call that research? Like seriously?
If you really want to learn about this, search for the works of historians on this.
Even your wikepedia, this is what it has to say..
A plurality of New Testament scholars, applying the standard criteria of historical investigation, find that the historicity of Jesus is more probable than not,[1][2][3][4][nb 1][nb 2][nb 3][nb 4]

bolt000:
Sorry to break it to you but Philo did write about it, Visit http://www.jesusneverexisted.com/philo.html

All your other arguments are Invalid.

If you want to debunk the existence of Jesus, read the works of true historians in this field, professors and scholars( even atheist ones) and not just websites from random biased atheists on the internet whose arguements no scholar or professor of history would take seriously.

bolt000:
Who wrote the Gospels? We have NO idea! The belief that they were written by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John is based on hearsay and assumptions---catholic tradition. Protestants denounce most of the traditions of the Catholic Church but have retained two of the most blatant, evidence-lacking traditions, which have no basis in historical fact or in the Bible: the canon of the NT and the authorship of the Gospels.

The only shred of evidence that Christians use to support the traditional authorship of the Gospels is one brief statement by a guy named Papias in 130 AD that someone told him that John Mark had written a gospel. That's it! Papias did not even identify this "gospel". Yet in 180 AD, Irenaeus, a bishop in FRANCE, declares to the world that the apostles Matthew and John and the associates of Peter and Paul---Mark and Luke---wrote the Gospels. But Irenaeus gives ZERO evidence for his assignment of authorship to these four books. It is well known to historians that it was a common practice at that time for anonymously written books to be ascribed to famous people to give them more authority. For all we know, this is what Irenaeus did in the case of the Gospels.

But how does all of these really matter? I fail to see what your point is, what is important is not the author of each gospel but the fact that they were quite early ranging from 40 to 70 years after Christ( just a generation away from the events) and for a long time were widely accepted by several Christian communities. Also it is most likely that even Matthew was derived from an earlier Hebrew version! that we do not know for now, but l fail to get your point in all these, and how it affects anything.

Joshuabase:
In all of history, Josephus and Tacitus are the only reliable historians who mentioned Jesus Christ in their works.

How many historians of that era do you know? If you want to argue this with me, first do your research properly by reading the works of historians and scholars in this field even the atheist historians as well. Don't do your research by reading any website you find from village atheists or even from Christians. You can begin by reading up why the atheist historian Bart Erhman is convinced that Jesus existed, his position on the matter is thesame with virtually almost every other proffesor of history on this matter(atheists, christians, jews, agnostics, etc). I wonder the type of research you made on the historicity of Jesus that led you to atheism.

Joshuabase:
One of the major reasons I became an atheist, was lack of evidence.
But a lot of people here might ask - "Lack of evidence of what exactly?"

Let's go back on time, 14th September 2013. I was googling arguments to use against atheists much like what winner01 and kingebuka do on a daily.

I typed the words "Extra biblical evidence for Jesus' existence" into google's search bar. I felt very confident that when Google returned the results I would have the ultimate weapon to use against atheists.

To my dismay, I got nothing concrete. What the Bleep!? I thought to myself, Jesus spoke to 5,000 people twice! He brought someone back from the dead, he claimed to be the son of God and for some reason, even Pliny the younger was more popular than him.

I couldn't accept it, I tore the entire Internet apart. Looking desperately. And do then it dawned on me. If Jesus were an actual historical figure I shouldn't have to look this hard. I came across josephus' Antiquities of the Jews. Not good enough, Josephus didn't actually meet or knew Jesus personally. . His documentations were based on third hand accounts and were subject to Christian interpolation.

Roman historian, Tacitus in his book ANNALS mentions a man crucified called christus by pontius pilate. Once again, based on more third hand accounts.

What about the people Jesus interacted with? The pharisees, surely they must've documented h the existence of a man claiming to be God?. They didn't. . There is no historical 'First hand account of JesIt' that exists in history apart from the synoptic gospels. I had many questions, but above all I was afraid of going to hell by questioning the Bible and the existence of Jesus. So I stopped researching and purged my mind of blasphemous thoughts.

That day, I might not have realized it but atheism had successfully taken root in me.

No scholar worth his name, whether Christian or not doubt the historicity of Jesus, what they say is that the gospel accounts are not 100percent accurate or some are exaggerated. It is expected that there was no contemporary account of Jesus life because he was not quite popular in his day, he was just one of many Jewish zealots and messaianic figures in those days, some were also healers who awaited the kingdom of God. So why should philo for instance single out yeshua to write about him? The Jews hated Jesus the most and when they compiled their chronicles of the Talmud in the second century, they spoke about how a certain yeshua led the people astray with his magic, hence the elders were of the opinion that he must be killed. These people could easily have said that Jesus did not exist, but there was no argument about this, not even from his enemies until recently in the 19th century, because atheists so hate Christianity and would bring up all sorts of argument no matter how unreasonable it is.
Also historians do not do their job simply by throwing away all non contemporary accounts, if this were so, we would have very little to go by in history today. Therefore Tacticus and Josephus are reliable. Tacticus was an historian, who did his research and was writing about things that happened before he was born, we take those things he wrote about Rome seriously and do not discard simply because they are non contemporary sources, he also had no reason to listen to Christians or believe that Jesus existed.

bolt000:
Yea, good perspective.. I also think of the bible as a book that was over exxagerated.
which brings about questions like; "Why didn't Philo of Alexandria write about Jesus or Christianity?", "Why didn't Paul write a gospel?"

"Why didn't Jesus write anything at all? " all these questions are meant to shake the christians opinions about chritianity, yet it doesnt.
Its amazing.

You are asking why Paul didn't write a gospel? I simply don't understand that question. Also why is it compulsory that Jesus should write anything? Then again at your op, why do you associate atheism with intelligence? Many intelligent people are atheists but there's no proof that most are atheists because they are intelligent, and l'm sure you also know many intelligent Christians even more intelligent than your atheists, but not all are Christians simply because they are intelligent. Most of your questions however have been answered by Christians in the past. If you are not satisfied with those answers, then deal with them step by step, rather than ask such questions over and over again.

urahara:
I have never in my life seen a xtian dat doesnt bliv in witches neva

Maybe because you live in Nigeria.#just maybe#

Wow but several times, Jesus makes it clear that if you have wronged your neighbor you must settle the matter with him even before you pray. Or am l missing something here?
Besides the bible makes it clear that when you wrong your fellow human, you also wrong God. Joseph believed sleeping with potiphar's wife was both sin against his master and God, and l believe if he was to seek forgiveness, it would have involved both parties. You can't ask God for forgiveness without also making amends with the person. It's just like saying when you steal you have not only sinned against the person you stole from but against the state, or humanity, or nature(whichever you believe in).

PastorAIO:
Actually the whole hell fire thing was started by Zoroaster. Or at least by the the priests that added to the religion after he died.

In fact most of these elements that we find in judaism christianity islam, had their origins in the Zoroastrian faith.

Yes you are right, but Zoroaster only believed in hell as a part of his worldview, he did not invite others of other religion to either come to his religion or go to hell. In the bible, hell fire as a form of life after death is indicated in few places and in all of them, the bible does not state that you must either accept a religion or go to hell on the last day, in fact most of the references to hell fire are from revelation where even death goes to the lake of fire. In the sayings of Jesus hell is a form of regret and gnashing of teeth but religion was not attached to it the way it is in Quran.

Chimighty007:
...sometimes it baffles me how the world enlist Christianity among the various world religions and how Christians react or try to defend or differentiate Christianity from other religions.

So, lemme ask; Is Christianity a Religioon?

Christianity began as a messaianic movement, the Jewish messaiah in first century judiasm was expected to be a man not God, he was to subdue the gentiles, bring world peace, and usher in a new age of the kingdom of God in Isreal, a new heaven and earth that would see the ressurection from the dead of all the matyrs and heroes of faith in Isreal. Finally he was to build the temple of Yahweh.
With Jesus, these things didn't happen as planned, rather he was killed by the gentiles. This should mean he is a false messaiah but for the fact that they were so sure he rose again, which was proof that God has really ushered in the expected new age. So they lived their lives as though all of these were true, believing those things that are not as though they were.
Thus to answer your question, Christianity is or is not a religion depending on how you define religion. If you define religion as a way of life it is a religion. If you define religion as a set of beliefs or dogma, or a form of dogmatic adherence to rituals, then it is not a religion.

SirWere:
Chaii.... Do you not know what being a pastor means??

It means, being the mouthpiece of God, the representative of the mosthigh.


Explain to me how such a man should still commit very idiotic and perveted sins......



.,.....And yet they do.......

A pastor is just a human being like you, the bible never refers to pastors as the mouthpiece of God. I believe you are also a former Christian, if so, then it is surprising that you post this.

TomHagen:
Really? Have you read the Koran? Who are the infidels?

Well you are right though, Islam seems to be the only religion with a book that outrightly threatens people of other faiths with hell fire and vividly describes hell fire, that is why l never spoke about Muhammed in the post you responded to. It however doesn't concern me what they believe, since l believe it is not true, hence l worry less about that.

AnonyNymous:
If we can't use logic I.e what we can understand, then how are we supposed to know which one is right? After all, all religions defy logic and depend on faith. So how sure are we that the particular one we choose is right? Ate we supposed to gamble? Or is it some 'fuzzy feeling in our heart' that will tell us Jesus and not Zoroaster or Lao Tse or Mohammed, is right?

Zoroaster and laoTse to the best of my knowledge do not demand that you must believe in them and neither of them claim their religion is the only right one. In Christianity, Jesus only states that you must believe in him as the one who brings the kingdom of God to you, this message is primarily in a Jewish context but can be applied equally to all who want to make a new start and who long for the reign of God on earth. This has nothing to do with religion, but religion has encompassed this message and played a great role in its spread. Jesus hardly said his religion was better than another religion, you can accept Christ without necessarily clinging to dogma,though without dogma the message may not have been protected for long. So you are not under any pressure, take your time to follow the path you find as the best, and which you think would work for you( this however is from an assumption that you believe in God, and you just want the right religon to choose).

TomHagen:
Surely you jest. Are you saying there are no humanists in non-Christian societies?

Their humanism is not anti God, they don't understand the term thesame way you do. Your notion of humanism is shaped by the west, with the need to rebel against Christianity.

TomHagen:
Surely you jest. Are you saying there are no humanists in non-Christian societies?

I was reffering to humanism in the modern Western world which primarily shapes the notion of humanism today, it is now anti God, it was never so.

cloudgoddess:
The precise opposite is true. No aspect of human experience is unique to religion, the good nor the bad.

If anything, the Abrahamic religions exacerbate many of the unpleasant/destructive aspects of being human (tribalism/"us vs. them" mentality, childhood trauma & indoctrination, emotional reasoning, taking life for granted, etc etc). And it teaches us to hate our very nature, causing an obsession with unrealistic ideals.

Humanism is the way to go.

Humanism was born as a bastard child to Christianity. It is a good philosophy though (if you can control it) and most of the tenets of the early humanists in the rennaisance were derived from their Christian upbringing. Your humanism though would not make sense to an immoral die hard atheist in a world without God

Teempakguy:
yeah, right. You that you are hot Christan, have you sold your properties and given them to the poor Are you not going to lay yourself treasures in heaven?

And while you're at that, I hope you've never stumbled upon toolz and/or Tonto dike's bumbum on fp. Otherwise gouge out your eyes asap.

Wow, is that how you interpret the bible? Interesting! Were you also a former Christian?

macof:
^^^
you cannot separate the bible from Christianity... to talk about the contributions of Christianity to science we must look at the ways the bible served as source of scientific discovery


let's use another analogy. .If I ask "what is the contribution of football to the economy of Nigeria", you shouldn't be giving me the businesses owned by footballers but the way Nigeria gains economically from the game of football
what you all have done on this thread is like stating the businesses of footballers instead of details of how Nigeria gains from the sport

If that is how you look at it, then there is hardly anything that has contributed to science not even philosophy, because the scientific method is based majorly on verifiable experiments, in that case science is in a world of its own, if that is how you want to see it. But l disagree, because science began as philosophy and was actually born from the realm of philosophy. Philosophy itself is not independent as well, it is usually influenced by religion. Philosophy deals with reason, religion deals with both revelation and reason, but science deals with verifiable facts which are objective and have been tested. So we can probably say no religious book has contributed to science directly but some have inspired science through philosophy.

donnffd:
Alright, but if he wasnt responsible for anything that happened in the universe, if everything was just a cosmic accident and nothing was planned except the starting of the universe, what is the assurance he would care about what happens to us when we die?, he obviously doesnt interfere with the workings of the universe as it is!!!

But since he was able to start the universe, knowing him and his nature would help our science a lot, and would at least hurt no one, or don't you think so?

Again the question is not....What is the contribution of the bible to modern science? But....What is the contribution of Christianity to modern science?
The bible is not a science textbook but it has inspired scientific men no doubt, and continues to do so.

macof:
you still don't get it!


when the christians went on a rampage killing the pagans of Europe, they did that screaming Jesus and to the honour of their religion as they pick up from the example of evil characters painted holy like Moses. the only reason these killings existed in the first place was to spread Christianity - there you have the evils of Christianity
I can mention more evils of Christianity if you so wish

but no scientific movement or theory has been founded on the Bible, unlike the Crusades, Inquisition etc

I don't have to know anything about Newton other than what he is famous for - Physics, so he being an evangelist will only help your argument if his contributions to physics were gotten from the bible, like his contributions to evangelism would have been gotten from the bible

it's very simple really, I don't see why this topic is top difficult for your kind to understand

The same way you explain that the crusaders attributed their crusades to the bible is thesame way Kepler and the likes quoted from scripture especially Romans saying that God had made an orderly universe and they were thinking God's thoughts after him. Just google their Christian quotes and how they relate it to science. Francis Bacon who gave us the scientific method was a lover of the book of proverbs and quoted from that book severally as an inspiration for his scientific work. Of course the bible is not a scientific textbook, but we are talking about where this men got their inspiration from. You may say they are wrong or they took the bible out of context, but that is your opinion, thesame way l would tell you the crusaders were wrong and took the bible out of context.

donnffd:
If so, then the belief in this kind of being is not based on fact, rationality or reality rather its based on sentiment and emotions.
If we believe things just because they feel good or sound right, then we would believe the world is a paradise.
Is that rational?

Way to twist my words, you said if the deist God exist there is no need to search for him. I gave you reasons why there may still be a need to search for him.

macof:
The very fact that the question the op is asking isn't understood by all you Christians is enough to realize something is fundamentally wrong with you all.

the question is contributions of Christianity to science and technology not contributions of people from christian families

I expected you lot to go to the bible and show science that was picked from there not unchristian works of Christians

So when a christian does something wrong, cause war, or persecute scientists, you'll say that it is Christianity that influenced him. But when the Christian does science, explaining that he is out to discover the orderly laws of the universe and hence think God's thoughts after him(according to Romans 1v20), or when he is inspired to build cathedrals for ages or kick start universities, you then turn around to say that it is unchristian of him?
The likes of Boyle and Faraday were not just from Christian families, they were evangelists themselves, Newton was a theologian, Kepler believed he was influenced by his faith. What about the monk Mendel, if Christianity was antiscience why should a monk become such a great scientists or the priest George Lemaitre. Even the Jesuits are still commended for their zeal towards education, and how they educated the masses of their time, and the puritans are responsible for many of the great universities and hospitals in the west. Newton specifically said his work was an answer to prayer. So why do you say they are not influenced by Christianity?

Pdizzle:
Galileo was a Christian, what/who is to blame for the problems he had with the church?
You didn't answer my last question, let me ask another;
Do you believe the earth have pillars?

Modified above.

Pdizzle:
What's there to prove?
Galileo had problems with the church for saying the earth is rotating and sun is not.
If you really believe the tower of babel story, would you nurse the idea of being an astronaut, talkless venture into the sky?

Galileo and who again? Also note that the church had problems with many other Christians, and Gallileo himself was a Christian, nor did he blame Christianity for the problem he had with the church. Funny how you could only name Galileo as the scientist the church had problem with. Note also that some in the church supported Gallileo, and even then Gallileo was not totally right about the movement of the sun. The likes of Copernicus and others in that era were sponsored by the catholic church. There's no obstacle to science for the Christian mind.
The issue of the sun standing still or towel of babbel comes with very literal interpretation which Augustine had warned against earlier on. These stories are wonderful stories from the history of God's people in ancient times, they are not to be used to oppose science in a very carnal literal manner. Augustine had made that clear long ago.