How to debate an athiest claiming Noah's ark never happened?

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TechieGuy said:
then you’ve pretty much got your answer straight from the source…
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…except that the ‘source’ of Scripture is God.

So, if we believe in the truth of Christianity, then we look to Christianity for the full explanation of how to understand the truth of Scripture.
 
Seems to me that since the Jews wrote it down, they should know if it were myth or history.
 
Do you know why it suddenly turns historical. Let’s use the word historic, rather then fundamentalist literal.
Because it is the history of the Israelites.

The genres in the books and the Bible are many and varied.

Kevin are you Catholic or another denomination, it will help in posting a better answer to this.
 
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We must take into account all the different genres too, and the socio economic conditions at the time of the book authors.
 
Let’s be very careful with the term literal, As readings are not all word for word this is how it happened, but are conveying history and God’s plan for our Salvation.
 
You would do well to encourage your friend in his disbelief about a literal flood. It is hard enough trying to believe that a loving God would cause the terror of mass drawing of men, women, children and animals without believing that two of every living thing were packed onto a boat. Actually, it is hard to think of a loving God doing that even metaphorically.
 
What? There is NO geological evidence of a global flood ever occuring, nor is one even physically possible. I’d like to point you to Aron Ra’s relatively approachable video series on disproving Noah’s Flood, I know he’s an atheist but his citations are absolutely on point.
 
Jesus mentioned Noah and the flood. So to me there is no doubt that it happened. But yes, the details can be debated ad infinitum.
 
Only the people that originally wrote it would have the insight.
 
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So it seems there are three factors involved: 1. Literal or figurative? 2. Global or local? 3. Was it caused by God or was it naturally occurring?

That leaves us with 8 possibilities:
  1. A figurative global flood caused by God
  2. A figurative local flood caused by God
  3. A figurative global flood not caused by God
  4. A figurative local flood not caused by God
  5. A literal global flood caused by God
  6. A literal local flood caused by God
  7. A literal global flood not caused by God
  8. A literal local flood not caused by God
If the truth is between 1 and 4, then the atheists the OP refers to would be correct.

If the truth is 7 then we have two problems. First, the science disproves a global flood. Second, the impetus in the Bible forwhy there is a flood is because God created it meaning that the Bible would be wrong.

If the truth is 8, then what’s the big deal at least as far as atheists that the OP brings up? There are natural local floods all the time throughout history.

This leaves us with 5 and 6. As I noted, science shows there could not have been a global flood when men were alive. Here is a page from Talk Origins listing some of the problems with a global flood, so 5 is out.

Finally, option 6 doesn’t make sense from a narrative standpoint, since the story says the reason God flooded the world because he regretted making man. A local flood would not take out all of mankind.
 
Mike_from_NJ said:
So it seems there are three factors involved: 1. Literal or figurative? 2. Global or local? 3. Was it caused by God or was it naturally occurring?
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I think I would ask that you consider changing #2 to “Global or super-regional (and therefore, appearing to be global to the storyteller)”. That makes a big difference, I think, to the perspective of the story.
Mike_from_NJ said:
If the truth is between 1 and 4, then the atheists the OP refers to would be correct.
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Sure, but to what effect? If it’s figurative, then it’s meant to teach a lesson. If we posit a figurative tale, all the atheist interlocutor can say is “umm. ok. so… I guess I have no objection, then.”

What about 5-8, then? If we entertain 7 or 8, I don’t know what the atheist’s objection – or substantiation! – might be! I mean, how could he support the claim that something happened, but that God didn’t cause it? So… I’m thinking we throw those two out.

The best that our atheist friend could say is “5 is impossible, for a variety of physical reasons.” That would leave the believer the freedom to say, “yep; I get it… but, that means that #6 is not only possible, but if our last possibility, leads us to belief in God!”
 
We don’t do justice to the Gospel by leaving out God’s Judgment. As the world was destroyed once by water on account of men’s sins, so will it be destroyed by fire. As assuredly as the saints shall live in the New Jerusalem for eternity, there shall be no end to the torment of the wicked in fiery Gehenna. The Flood was a mercy: it put an end to the wickedness that had become so widespread that there were only eight righteous people left, despite ample warning, and even then, the death of the wicked was not instantaneous, but gave them time to contemplate their impending death, knowing exactly why they were being condemned and granting them the opportunity to repent even to their last breath.
 
Of course a global flood is physically possible; all it takes is all the water stored in the Earth’s mantle erupting to the surface.
 
Psalm 1:1 says not to “sit” with scoffers – those are atheists. No one can come to Christ unless the Father calls him/her. Some atheists do convert. I watch the journey home on EWTN and there will be an atheists convert once in a while.

In Ben Wiker’s book on the Reformation, subtitled 12 things Catholics should know, one of the chapters is on Luther, naturally. He didn’t invent the philosophy of “the Bible alone” for the Reformation. It was an atheist (Marsilius) two hundred years earlier who proposed that “Bible alone” idea to…what else…oppose the Catholic Church and its magisterium. Luther allied himself with the atheist idea that became the mantra of the Reformation.

Not a good idea to hang around with an atheist.
 
mythbuster1 said:
We don’t do justice to the Gospel by leaving out God’s Judgment. As the world was destroyed once by water on account of men’s sins, so will it be destroyed by fire. As assuredly as the saints shall live in the New Jerusalem for eternity, there shall be no end to the torment of the wicked in fiery Gehenna. The Flood was a mercy: it put an end to the wickedness that had become so widespread that there were only eight righteous people left, despite ample warning, and even then, the death of the wicked was not instantaneous, but gave them time to contemplate their impending death, knowing exactly why they were being condemned and granting them the opportunity to repent even to their last breath.
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Including how many little children and intellectually disabled people do you think? And how many innocent animals?
 
Animals are not as innocent as they seem and anyways we don’t know if there were intellectually disabled people at the time. There might not have been any children either.
 
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Gorgias said:
I think I would ask that you consider changing #2 to “Global or super-regional (and therefore, appearing to be global to the storyteller)”. That makes a big difference, I think, to the perspective of the story.
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If you want to. The points are that what we know about things like geology and endocrinology there was not a global flood during the time humans have been on the Earth, and if a flood affected only a portion of the Earth it couldn’t be literally true that God sought to wipeout humanity (minus 8 people) with a flood.
Mike_from_NJ said:
If the truth is between 1 and 4, then the atheists the OP refers to would be correct.
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Sure, but to what effect? If it’s figurative, then it’s meant to teach a lesson. If we posit a figurative tale, all the atheist interlocutor can say is “umm. ok. so… I guess I have no objection, then.”
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To what effect? The whole point of this thread is about those who would question a literal flood narrative. Some Christians agree with atheists that there was no literal global flood cooked up by God to wipe out humanity. Sure they may disagree as to the value of a figurative interpretation, but that in no way is the point of what the OP is asking.
What about 5-8, then? If we entertain 7 or 8, I don’t know what the atheist’s objection – or substantiation! – might be! I mean, how could he support the claim that something happened, but that God didn’t cause it? So… I’m thinking we throw those two out.
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I’m simply listing all possible outcomes of having three factors each having two possible outcomes.
The best that our atheist friend could say is “5 is impossible, for a variety of physical reasons.” That would leave the believer the freedom to say, “yep; I get it… but, that means that #6 is not only possible, but if our last possibility, leads us to belief in God!”
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If 6 were true then the Bible narrative has major faults:
  1. It gives the impetus for the flood as God wanting to utterly wipe out humanity (only later allowing 8 to live). A local flood would not do such a thing.
  2. It uses the idea that Noah had to gather up all the animals because of the complete destruction that the flood would cause. Without saving those animals on a floating zoo the species would have, according to the story, died out. This too would not be necessary in a local flood.
 
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