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You only need to look as far as your proof that the book of Isaiah was fully written by Isaiah

I find it interesting to note how many times the charge "circular reasoning" is made on this thread without demonstrating how the reasoning is circular. Skeptics use the "circular reasoning" charge like a widely waving wand similar to the liberals who use the "race card" when logical reasoning and facts do not sustain their position. Just throw it out there and the stigma is supposed to end the argument - even if it is a non-sequitur that is also an ad hominem.

Not-quite-so-fast...

Many of our Founders were Deists in varying degrees.
Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson lead that list.
Jefferson cut the “miracles” out of his “Jefferson Bible” and had little use for your Bible.

“The whole history of these books [the Gospels] is so defective and doubtful that it seems vain to attempt minute enquiry into it: and such tricks have been played with their text, and with the texts of other books relating to them, that we have a right, from that cause, to entertain much doubt what parts of them are genuine. In the New Testament there is internal evidence that parts of it have proceeded from an extraordinary man; and that other parts are of the fabric of very inferior minds. It is as easy to separate those parts, as to pick out diamonds from dunghills.” -Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Adams, January 24, 1814

Points can be established by both internal and external witnesses without being circular provided they use sound logic. You do not attempt to address the logic you just wave the "circular reasoning wand" even when it makes no sense. Josephus says this:
For he stirred up the mind of Cyrus, and made him write thus throughout all Asia: “Thus says Cyrus the king: Since God Almighty has appointed me to be king of the habitable earth, I believe that he is the God which the nation of the Israelites worship; for indeed he foretold my name by the prophets, and that I should build him a house at Jerusalem, in the country of Judah” (Antiquities 11.1.1).

Are you going to suggest that Josephus made up this decree of Cyrus?

Agreed that some were Deists but they all believed in creation which was my point.

That you cannot see the logical fallacy in your arguments supporting your claims is telling.

My point remains that your Biblical “proofs” fall short for many of us. Jefferson had a very different idea about the “Creator”

[quote=BOWSINGER]My point remains that your Biblical “proofs” fall short for many of us.

Concur.

Let's notice what Jefferson wrote about God and morals:

The god who gave us life, gave us liberty at the same time;

In 1823, he wrote to John Adams referring to “the God whom you and I acknowledge and adore” while denouncing atheism.

“[T]he Christian religion when divested of the rags in which they [the clergy] have enveloped it, and brought to the original purity & simplicity of its benevolent institutor, is a religion of all others most friendly to liberty, science, & the freest expression of the human mind,” he explained.12 It was a “benign religion … inculcating honesty, truth, temperance, gratitude and love of man, acknowledging and adoring an overruling providence.”13 Based on these understandings, Jefferson demonstrated a deep, even devout, admiration of Jesus, “the purity & sublimity of his moral precepts, the eloquence of his inculcations, the beauty of the apologues in which he conveys them...”14 At times, Jefferson described these moral and ethical teachings of Jesus as “primitive christianity” before its perversion by church leaders seeking temporal power.15

On Jesus ...Notwithstanding these disadvantages, a system of morals is presented to us, which, if filled up in the true style and spirit of the rich fragments he left us, would be the most perfect and sublime that has ever been taught by man.

Imagine how different our country would be if our most liberal politician would espouse these sentiments and if the rest of them were even more conservative in their thinking ...

That was an historical reference--not a Biblical proof. Nothing will convince a man against his will--God gives you that freedom and then will hold you accountable for how you used it.

The other founding "liberal" Benjamin Franklin:
"Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters. I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth, that God governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without his aid? Benjamin Franklin: Signer of the Constitution and Declaration of IndependenceWe have been assured, Sir, in the Sacred Writings, that “except the Lord build the House, they labor in vain that build it.” I firmly believe this; and I also believe that without His concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no better, than the Builders of Babel: We shall be divided by our partial local interests; our projects will be confounded, and we ourselves shall become a reproach and bye word down to future ages. And what is worse, mankind may hereafter from this unfortunate instance, despair of establishing governments by human wisdom and leave it to chance, war and conquest.

I therefore beg leave to move that henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of Heaven, and its blessings on our deliberations be held in this Assembly every morning before we proceed to business, and that one or more of the clergy of this city be requested to officiate in that service."

George Washington:
I am sure there never was a people, who had more reason to acknowledge a divine interposition in their affairs, than those of the United States; and I should be pained to believe, that they have forgotten that agency, which was so often manifested during our revolution, or that they failed to consider the omnipotence of that God, who is alone able to protect them.
Letter to John Armstrong, 11 March 1782, in Ford's Writings of George Washington (1891), vol. XII, p. 111.

If anyone is interested in such, I came upon a podcast called History in the Bible, by a fellow named Gary Stevens. I have been listening to the second part, concerning the New Testament. Quite interesting to me, I've learned alot, and plan to go back and listen to part 1 about the Old Testament. It's a layman's guide into the research and archaeology behind the biblical texts, more or less.

Skepticism which is based on the rejection of God, creation, and moral absolutes is a detriment to our nation and society-even though it is right that we allow that liberty of conscience.But in the end our nation will only survive if we understand what our founders understood:
“Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” (John Adams, October 11, 1798.)

Quick search found it. Looks interesting.
https://www.historyinthebible.com/index.html

It seems believers are incapable of understanding why quoting the bible to prove the bible makes no sense. Its the same as quoting the koran to prove the koran makes no sense. Without being able to quote the myths in the bible they are helpless. To believe in the bible or koran is fine but that is all it is a belief not a fact. Of course I expect you to quote the bible to answer this.

It appears to me that the agenda is "Let's scrap everything we know from historical accounts and dig in the dirt and rewrite history based on what we deduce from archaeology."

Should we do this with American History also?

No only biblical

I should have aided that American history is already being re-written, for the worse unfortunately.

Islam is a cult, a way of life, it requires you convert to islam or die. No other options exist for the true muslim practicing islam. It is not a religion.