Like i said before, God had more influence on the people in the middle-east (Christianity, Jusaism, and Islam) because they are all descendants, or "the seed" of Abraham which GOd has made a promise about. Because of God's promise there, they have a closer relationship with him than any other area in the world. Now, you and I both don't know for sure if God made a promise to any other civilization in other regions of the world, but i know that there is a spiritual influence on all peoples. So to simply answer your question, God chose Abram specially and because Abram actually followed and believed him God made a promise to him, and Abraham became the father of a "great people" whose number is as large as the stars in the sky or the sands on the beach (which are the Christians, Muslims, and Jews).

EDIT:

To Erebus:

First of all, as for Jesus's tomb, you have to realize, all the Gospels are written by men but are inspired by God. None of the author's were at Jesus's tomb but in the end they all get the same spiritual meaning. They do not contradict each other in the sense of meaning, but if you want to get technical then go ahead and have a great time.

Secondly, about your Genesis discussion, what bible do you have? As i read it, the text states "Now the lord God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the earth of the field and all the birds of the air.", which means that Now, or at that point in time God Had already formed out of the ground all the beasts and so on. I guess i have a different version than yours (i have the NIV).

Thirdly, Days only refer to periods of time in which different things happen. A day back then wasn't the approximate 24 hours of earths rotation, it was a period of time when people would wake up, do stuff and then go back to sleep and wake up again in a new conscience.  That is a day for us. Day is an term not meaning sunrise to sunset, but meaning seperate periods of time. Don't take things too literally (and don't take things too iliterally either).

Okay, now the fourth thing. All of Jesus's words i would say are basically a shortened version of Revelations which means that both what Jesus and the Revelations is stating are both filled with metaphors, similies, and things that are meant as they are said. Now i'm not sure i understand what you mean your paragraph, but as for your ending sentence, "Jesus thought the coming of the Son of Man would be in their generation.  It was not." That isn't what Jesus meant. The old Jewish texts can be translated into two ways, the term generation or the term race. If it is taken by the term race, (meaing the Jewish race, or the Human race) than it makes perfect sense. Generation didn't/doesn't always mean one "age" of peoples.

Now on to your other things: 

Does God tempt people?

James 1:13 "Let no man say . . . I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man."

Genesis 22:1 "And it came to pass after these things, that God did tempt Abraham."

Are they both right?

 I'll have to read it and check it later. Oh and tell me what version of the Bible you own.

Hey how about: Who was Joseph's father?

Matthew 1:16 "And Jacob begat Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ."

Luke 3:23  "And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which was the son of Heli."

Was it Jacob or Heli? Someone is wrong here.....

Jacob is the Grandson of Abraham, and is also called the father of Israel. Now if that isn't right to you i myself have a question, Is Heli a boy or a girl?

How many animals went in the ark?

Genesis 7:2 "Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee by sevens, the male and his female: and of beasts that are not clean by two, the male and his female."

Genesis 7:8-9 "Of clean beasts, and of beasts that are not clean, and of fowls, and of every thing that creepeth upon the earth,  there went in two and two unto Noah into the ark, the male and the female, as God had commanded Noah."

 Was it a pair or "three by sevens" of clean animals?  Either way one of these statements is wrong.

All animals went in two and two for the sole purpose of reproduction, but the clean beasts in which Noah is given to eat get three by sevens (alot more than the "unclean" animals for obvious reasons).

 Did fowl come from the water as in Genesis 1:20-21 or from the land as in Genesis 2:19?

Because you didn't give me a qoute i cannot answer this one right now. I will answer it later unless someone beats me to it.

Where was Jesus' first sermon?

Matthew 5:1-2 "When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountain; and after he sat down, his disciples came to him.  then he began to speak, and taught them saying:"

Luke 6:17 " He came down with them and stood on a level place with a great crowd of his disciples and a great multitude of people from all Judeah, Jerusalem, and the coast of Tyre and Sidon."

 So did he go UP a mountain or DOWN to a plain?

Firstly you have to understand, Jesus has had many sermons throughout his life some of which were not recorded by word. Now, I dont have my bible with me now so i cannot be sure, but where does it say that this was his first sermon? And if it was written by different people than wouldn't thier "first sermon" change? You have to understand that Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John may not be written by the people in the title of the book.

Also i want you to understand something. We don't have to "save" the Bible. The Bible is just a book filled with history, poetic works, letters, philosophies, and revelations all written down to prevent huge mutilation by oral traditions. What i find interesting is that people have to waste time struggling to find things wrong with the bible, searching through the pages looking for contradictions when the book is filled with so much Hope, Love, Life, Justice, History, and Philosophy. The most peculiar thing to me is that if this Book to you guy sis no different from the other Books like this, why then do you guys "need" to attack it. If people read this book for intelligent reasons people would become so much more intelligent. It's just strange to me that one book can have such an awesome impact on everyone's lives, the Faithful or the Unfaithful. It's like religion, God, Christianity is infecting peoples lives and people can't help but be affected.

or, (dont know if it is already a religion), but i heard a story humans were supposed to work in mines on another planet, but we were to stupid so they (dunno who or what) gave us intelligence, but then we got to smart and become a thread and then placed us on the earth to get rid of us.

so thats why we are on earth :)

Quick reply, I'm making dinner.

I'm glad you're not making furious replies or anything. This IS a videogame forum, in case you have forgotten when you type up your furious responses.

 I'll be more articulate when I get the chance:

What color is this shirt? Red? (answer: its maroon) As I said, eye witness accounts! Depending how the light is cast and from whom you're getting your accounts, some might say "red," some may say purple. Can everybody be right when some say "red" or "purple?" 

All in the family:

As I understand pronouns, such as  "father" and "son," we have a system in which we identify generations, i.e. father,  grandfather, great^x grandfather were x = 2 + the number of generations back he goes. Back in the Jewish culture, there was no distinction. I'd dig up some examples, but again, time constraints.

6 Days:

Yes there is a point. Days are used as different demarcations of different time periods, much like how we refer to the Bronze Age or the Stone Age.

End of this world:

Yes Jesus had another fulfillment when he was referring to the end of the world, not only was he referring to the end of the Jewish world, but also the end of the world. He gives us signs. Wars, Earthquakes, Pestilences, etc. etc. Luke tells us that when these things occur a lot and all at once (Jesus gave the illustration of one tree bearing fruit might mean its  a freak tree, but all trees bearing fruit is a definite season change). 

They better make a space channel 5 for Wii. that would rock.

another quick reply:

n the Gospel according to Mark, the word used for "purple" is the Greek word "porphura," Strong's Ref. # 4209, (pronounced por-foo'-rah) it is of Latin origin; from the purple mussel, i.e. (by implication) the red-blue color itself, and finally, a garment dyed with it.

The corresponding Hebrew word is "tekelet," Strong's Ref. # 8504, (pronounced tek-ay'-leth) which is derived from the word for the cerulean mussel, i.e. the color (violet) obtained therefrom or stuff dyed therewith.

The word in the Gospel according to John is a similar Greek word to the one used in Mark. The two are so similar that it is more a matter of shade, as opposed to color differences. The Greek word used is "porphurous," Strong's Ref. # 4210, (pronounced por-foo-rooce') derived from from another word "purpureal," i.e. bluish red. Therefore, it is not an issue of a contradiction in the Bible.

The two Greek words side by side are really similar:

porphura
porphurous

And you can easily have two people look at a color, and one may say "Violet" and another "Scarlet."

crazy stuff Yahoo Answers has :-p

mmmm I had pasta for dinner.

Don't get the idea that I am going to answer every single question you throw at me. Some of these things I can explain off the top of my head, but many of these things take a little bit of time to come with a proper answer.

The way things are going, you're going to come up a list of Bible contradictions and I will respond with an equally long sized list of Bible explanations. You will continue to be skeptics, and I will continue to be a believer.

I do concede to you one point:

The Bible was written in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek a long time ago, and whether or not you believe in its diving inspiration, the originals have been lost due to disintegration of the paper of which it was written.

What do we have now? We have copies upon copies upon copies over the generations. How do we know its accuracy? By taking a look at the earliest copies we have and comparing it with the current copies. It turns out that it is mainly intact, with a spelling error here and there (of which they have been documented). And there are some things, like the conclusion or Mark or the beginning of John chapter 8 where its inconclusive as to whether or not those texts are "authentic."

On top of that, we have dozens of translations, whereby many well meaning men have input the "correct" interpretations of Bible passages into the book instead of letting the Bible speak for itself.

What does it all mean?

It means that not all translations are created equal. The King James Bible, for example, is a very old and popular Bible, and if something is around long enough and is popular enough, then it gains sort of an "authority" to it. However, we have so many more bible texts to refer to and we know so much more about bible greek than those scholars in England did 400 years ago.

So what it means is that it takes a very careful study of the Bible and of the context of what is written. Does this mean that we should all get degrees on Koinic Greek and Hebrew? No, but we can study the culture of the people at the time, or look in the dictionary for some of the original Greek definitions (as the Yahoo answers thing answered pretty well).

@rickthestick2 and That Guy

Nice to see someone else getting in on the fun.  To rickthestick2 first let me say that the wording at the end of my last post was poor. I should not have written "save the Bible" because I don't think anyone needs to.  As a matter of fact I think that by sticking to a literalist interpretation and trying to rectify every single contradiction actually takes away from the Bible.  Now to both rickthestick2 and That Guy I think perhaps what Schopenhauer and I are trying to do here is getting a little lost.  I do not "need" (as rickthestick2 said) to attack the Bible.  You have to look at the context of this argument.  There is only one point here: That the Bible contradicts itself sometimes.  Thats all.  This does not mean you should go home and burn your Bible or that you cannot find things that will impact your life inside it.  It just means it contradicts itself sometimes.  It may seem that this is some kind of furious attack on everything that is Christian but it is not.  Why do i persist in pointing out these examples (some of which may indeed be resolvable, but some of which i seriously doubt)?  Only to get it across that there are contradictions.  This is not a world-destroying point.  The Bible can still be used if you accept them.  What I dont understand is your need to fix all of these.  Why not let it go?  It seems to a certain point (without realizing it?) That Guy has.  Just look at the persistence of this Scarlet - Purple debate.  It's great that this debate has gone to the level of translations of Greek words and Hebrew words; its really starting to feel real. Your (That Guy) last post is really interesting and sheds some new light on the color of the robes.  Thank you.  But you still miss the point.  I am not saying that this event did not occur.  Nor am I denying the existence of colors that can look reddish and purple.  Your nice picture of the shirt was a good example.  More than likely there was some kind of reddish-purple robe used.  Thats not the point.  The point is that the two accounts are different and cannot both be read literally as true. Something cannot be both two colors at the same time. Nor can it be two shades of a color at the same time.  The accounts are (minutely) inaccurate.  Try to grasp this.  This is not a big point.  This is not even a small point.  Its a very very very small point.  This is a simple point of logic.  You can not have both A and not-A.  This even works for:

1. A is porphura (purple)

2. A is porphurous (bluish red)

It does not follow from this that it is some shade in between when most likely it was.  Wheather it was in reality or not is not the question here. This is a small but easy to understand example.  This example will not "bring down the Bible" nor do i wish it to. 

So do you get what it is we (Schopenhauer and I) are trying to do here?  Well I should actually say that rickthestick2 probably already kinda knew what was going on here (as he wrote in his post) I am glad that you (rickthestick2) want to read the Bible in context of meaning and not literal interpretaion. If both of you believe this then there is no reason to continue.  What do you say That Guy?

If you want to continue I am most certainly happy to keep this going and going.  I could respond to some of these points too.  Yes, Heli is a boys name.  So Josephs father is said to be 2 different men. (unless of course Josepth's mother had a husband called Heli (who was the brother of Jacob) who died... and then she maried Jacob .... hmmm....) And rickthestick2, even if I were simply to accept all of your responce to the coming of the Son of Man question it still does not resolve Matthew 16:28 as I quoted earlier.

But before we completely lose sight of the context of this argument let me ask again.  Do we need to continue?

We'll just have to agree to disagree on all this Bible stuff.

I never insisted on a literal interpretation of the Bible; and apologize if i didn't explicitly state that before. But looking at what I've mentioned, we have to look at the context of the writing and piece things together ("smash" things together, as you like to call it). If I subscribed to a literal interpretation, i would have insisted that the earth was created in 6 literal days (if not 6,000 years).

And had we brought up the books of revelation, ezekiel or daniel, its almost impossible to insist on a "literal interpretation"

You bring up a lot of contradictions, but my point is that there is a give and take -- there can still be a dialogue as to what really happened. Like my eye-witness analogy; we get all the evidence together and then we can rebuild the scene of the "crime."

We can continue on, but as I also mentioned, I'm not interested in you coming up with huge lists and me responding with huge responses. I'll accept a "cease fire" for the sake of brevity.

I need to get my Dreamcast hooked up again. Can't get enough of that Space Channel 5.

Now that the white flag has gone up, I will give my closing comments on this debate.  The point that I (and Erebus) were going after may seem like a small one (and it really is) but it can be hard for some people that I have encountered to accept. The Bible is a book thrown together from many accounts by people that were not eyewitnesses many years after these events occurred. Every event can not be taken at face value. Some need interpretation; others are not historically accurate, while others have historical truth to them. Some events were altered to make theological points.  (One example is the time of the death of Jesus. This point is nearly impossible to dispute) This throws even more clouds of doubt about what happened, which means that we must be that must more vigilant when reading. We can attempt to fix some of these discrepancies we find, but not all. The Bible needs explanation, commentary and study. God’s explanation of the world must be explained to us moderns. These points are for the most part universally accepted by Bible scholars.

I will leave it up to the readers to fully understand what all this could mean.  I have my own thoughts, but I will not bother to go into them here.

Thank you very much for the time you took in debating Erebus and I, That Guy. If at a later time you still want to plunge forward with this debate you are welcome to, and I (and probably Erebus) will attempt to meet the challenge.  

Here is to Space Channel 5 3 on the Wii or for that matter anything as long as the series continues. 

Yeah, what people fail to realize is that the Bible is written by men, but was given an undeniable meaning by the Grace of God. It holds the "Word of God" inside which makes it one of the most important/famous books of all time.

And to Erebus, it's not because I feel compelled to defend/save the Bible but because you asked questions so i'll give you an answer. The thing is, because the Bible is written by men at different times with different purposes under different circumstances and these men all have different lives that they went through, the bible seems to vary a little bit, but the marvelous thing is the Bible is never going to loose its meaning dispite all of that. So where does the Bible contradict itself in meaning? Nowhere, and i'm glad you realized that (or at least i think you did). Anyways, i'm sure the 4 gospels might have different accounts of each other, but as for Genesis i see no contradiction at all.

The thing i would like to understand however, is how this topic got off of the existence of God and into the different accounts in the Bible. As i said before, it is seemingly impossible to disprove the existence of God. That's what i believe anyways.

My final point is that people are quick to point out a "contradiction" but then stop looking right there. As much as I'd like to add my 2 cents about the disputed John 19:14 (which can be reconciled with the other accounts, by the way), I'll refrain as you will probably come back with something else. Some stuff you will just have to accept (like bluish red is the same as purple. It just is by definition. C'MON).

The issues you bring up cannot be discussed properly in 10 minutes of cut-pasting on the internet or by looking on Yahoo! Answers. Also, posting things in bold doesn't make it any more true. I assure you, there's much much more than meets the eye. I have and will continue to put all the evidence together and I will arrive at my own conclusions. That's what I've been urging everyone to do, no matter what they believe.