Revelation

Question 1

Explain the difficulties of proving the reality of any revelation

Answer 1

• Special revelations occur to specific people and therefore are subjective. It’s not possible to prove them through observation and scientific testing.
• General revelations are available to everyone but there are conflicting interpretations of them between different religions and within religions. It’s not possible to determine which one of the different claims about them is true.

Question 2

What kind of evidence is needed to support the reality of any revelation?

Answer 2

• Does the revelation correspond to things in the real world?
• Does the revelation fit with earlier revelations accepted by the religion?
• Does the revelation change an atheist or agnostic to a belief in God.
• Does the revelation convert someone from one religion to another.

Question 3

Arguments that atheists put forward for revelations being illusions:

Answer 3

• Wishful thinking of believer
• Person may be suffering from physical or mental illness that makes them hear voices or see things and so they are mistaken.
• Mind can play tricks and there is another explanation.
• Conflicting revelations between different religions means they aren’t true.
• False experience brought on by alcohol and drugs.

Question 4

Why do religious believers accept revelations?

Answer 4

• They look at the effect that the revelation has on people as evidence. The fact that millions follow the major religions and ware willing to die because of their faith makes it likely that the revelations must have truth within them.
• If someone does not lie, why would they falsely claim they had a revelation.
• Common core of beliefs found in any revelation that support the revelation as true as they match scientific observations.

Question 5

Alternative explanations for claims of revelation:

Answer 5

• could be the result of a type of epilepsy (in which one believes that they have had a vision. Ellen G. White is supposed to have had this type of epilepsy however some would argue that there is no evidence that she made up the revelations or that she ever had seizures or a mental illness as no one reported that she had fits although she received revelations in the presence of others.)
• wishful thinking
• ordinary events interpreted as revelations
• fraudulent revelations
• conscience is a result of the way you were raised

Question 6

Why do believers find it difficult to accept the reality of some examples of revelation?

Answer 6

• conflicting claims to truth from different religions
• conflicting claims to truth within the same religion
• different perspectives on, or interpretations of, the revelation.