Couldn't the authors of the bible have lied?

Of course...

@Kyle: People die for their 'beliefs' all the time, even today.... does that mean that their 'beliefs' were true?

IMHO

First, "immaculate conception" is not in the Bible. That was made up by the Catholic church long after the Bible was written.

You might be referring to the virgin birth of Christ, which is in the Bible and is central to Christianity.

With respect to what we know about God, the prophets authenticated themselves through miracles and by being right about future events. So God would talk to a prophet, tell them some facts about himself or what he wanted people to do, then would seal the deal with a prediction of the future or by giving the prophet some super power. The prophet would preach to the people about who God was or what he wanted from them, then either tell them what was going to happen tomorrow or do some miracle.

If the prediction of the future didn't come to pass, or if the prophet didn't have some kind of super power, people wouldn't believe the other things he said. But if he was right about the future or was able to do miraculous things (proving that God was working through him) then the people should believe the other things.

The Bible, then, is a collection of writings of the "successful" prophets who did miracles and/or had super powers. While we personally can't meet them and observe their powers of prediction or miracles, we have a written record and have to trust that the record wouldn't have survived if the prophet wasn't any good.

The Bible itself instructs people to kill the so-called prophets who don't pass the prediction test. So they wouldn't have gotten a chance to write anything down. :-)

Yes, they could have. So what the people of who put the books of the Bible together did was compare all things written about God and Jesus to find consistency. They came up with 66 books of the Bible to that were consistent with each other. They were put together and thats the Bible. Sort of like witnesses accounts to a car accident. If there were like four people who witnessed an accident and all their stories were the same but they witnessed it from different angles they must have seen the same accident. Their witness must be true.

There is always a possibility but I dont believe they did. Besides, how could the story of the great flood(in Christianity its Noahs Ark)be told in many religions when there is no reliable communication and they where written around the same time if the people who wrote the Bible lied?

That would be quite a feat, indeed if you think about it because of all the extra-biblicular writings that corroborate scripture not to mention the fact that though scripture spans such a vast expanse of time it is all very co-hesive in unity from one writer to the next without them ever having met or collaborated so that they all supported one anothers fabrications.

After at least 2000 years (in most cases more, and in some cases more than 5000 years), don't you think those liars would have been NOTICED?

But the bible has remained for THOUSANDS OF YEARS, despite claims of lies, error, and contradictions. EVERY so-called lie, error, and contradictions can be shown to be a misunderstanding on the part of uneducated readers, and NOT on the part of the authors of the bible. There are parts of the bible that have not yet been proven to be true, but there is NO part of the bible that has been proven to be false.

They COULD have lied -- but they didn't.

Couldn't the mechanic who worked on your car have been drunk?

Couldn't the person you ordered a book from just send you shredded paper?

Couldn't the drug dealer just sell you some sugar rather than cocaine?

etc, etc

Of course they could have lied. Of course, there is one other question:

Couldn't you be wrong in your reasoning and conclusions?

Of course. So could NASA about the moon landing. So could the US government about the Kennedy assassination.

You weigh these possibilities and make decisions. That something is possible is no indication that it is what actually happened or even that it is "equally likely".

There is so much evidence and historical proof that the holy bibble is a very large fictional parody of the humans through a period of about 1000 yrs.

The Bible is God's written Word to us.

It was written by human authors, under the supernatural guidance of the Holy Spirit.

“Above all you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet's own interpretation. For prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.” 2 Peter 1:20-21. (New International Version)

Breakdown of the Bible

36 human authors inspired entirely by God over 1600 years.

66 separate books

39 Old Testament

Genesis- The creation of the world, sin, flood and birth of Israel

Exodus to Esther- History of the nation of Israel

Job to Proverbs- the books of poetry and wisdom

Isaiah to Malachi- Prophecy or foretelling of the future events to come.

27 New Testament

Matthew to John - Four Gospels representing the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ now with all authority in Heaven and earth.

Acts- Birth of the Church (The Bride of Christ)

Romans to Jude - Letters to the Churches

Revelations - The ultimate future plans for: The Church, Heaven, Hell, a New Heaven and a New Earth.

Here are some Bible Study Resources for anything you may want to look up:

http://www.biblegateway.com/

http://www.ntgateway.com/

http://www.bible.org/

http://www.bible-history.com/

http://www.answersingenesis.org/

its possible, but why would they die for a lie? It's recorded in many documents outside of th ebible that almost all of the disciples died for the message. I sure wouldn't be tortured to death for a hoax.

@interest- yes people do but i thought the question was "did they lie?" they obviously didnt feel that they were lieing if they were willing to die for it.