Religion Thread

[TheMightyEthan]

Obviously what he wrote was just a summary of researcher's conclusions, and not an exhaustive dissertation on the subject.

[Yantelope V2]

Clearly. I am however skeptical that this researcher was able to provide any harder evidence.

[Yantelope V2]

@6264: I'm going to put this whole thing in a spoiler because I think it's gonna be long.

 

 

 

The Discrimination Section

 

2 Samuel 5:8

 

And David said on that day, Whosoever ... smiteth ... the blind that are hated of David's soul, he shall be chief and captain. Wherefore they said, The blind and the lame shall not come into the house.

 

 

Ok, so I did some checking on this according to Dr. Constable "The interchange concerning the blind and the lame (vv. 6, 8) seems to be “pre-battle verbal taunting” (cf. 2 Kings 18:19-27).[59] The Jebusites claimed that their town was so secure that even disabled inhabitants could withstand an invasion. Another view is that the Jebusites meant that they would fight to the last man. A third option is that the expression refers to the custom of parading a blind and lame woman before the opposing army as a warning of what would befall treaty-breakers. This view assumes David had previously made a treaty with the Jebusites.[60] David countered by taking them at their word and applying “the blind and the lame” to all the Jebusite inhabitants of Jerusalem. His hatred was for the Jebusites, using the figure that they themselves had chosen to describe themselves, not for literally blind and lame people. “The blind and the lame” evidently became a nickname for the Jebusites as a result of this event."

 

Leviticus 20:13

 

If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.

 

 

So that's kind of digging into the issue of homosexuality and that was leading into the ideals of old testament and new testament so I dug up a paper that eplains these things far better than I could and I'll post the link here.

 

http://www.thevillagechurch.net/mediafiles/jesusandhomosexuality.pdf

 

2 John 7

 

For many deceivers are entered into the world, who confess not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist.

 

 

Leviticus 21:17-23

 

Whosoever ... hath any blemish, let him not approach to offer the bread of his God. For whatsoever man he be that hath a blemish, he shall not approach: a blind man, or a lame, or he that hath a flat nose, or any thing superfluous, Or a man that is brokenfooted, or brokenhanded, Or crookbackt, or a dwarf, or that hath a blemish in his eye, or be scurvy, or scabbed, or hath his stones broken; No man that hath a blemish of the seed of Aaron the priest shall come nigh to offer the offerings of the LORD made by fire: he hath a blemish; he shall not come nigh to offer the bread of his God. ... Only he shall not go in unto the vail, nor come nigh unto the altar, because he hath a blemish; that he profane not my sanctuaries.

 

 

Deuteronomy 22:23-24

 

If a damsel that is a virgin be betrothed unto an husband, and a man find her in the city, and lie with her; Then ye shall bring them both out unto the gate of that city, and ye shall stone them with stones that they die; the damsel, because she cried not, being in the city.

 

 

The Stoning Section

 

Deuteronomy 22:13-21

 

If any man take a wife, and go in unto her, and hate her ... and say, I took this woman, and when I came to her, I found her not a maid: Then shall the father of the damsel, and her mother, take and bring forth the tokens of the damsel's virginity unto the elders of the city in the gate: And the damsel's father shall say ... these are the tokens of my daughter's virginity. And they shall spread the cloth before the elders of the city. ... But if this thing be true, and the tokens of virginity be not found for the damsel: Then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her with stones that she die.

 

 

Deuteronomy 21:18-21

 

If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey the voice of his father, or the voice of his mother ... Then shall his father and his mother lay hold on him, and bring him out unto the elders of his city ... And they shall say unto the elders of his city, This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton, and a drunkard. And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die.

 

 

Deuteronomy 13:6-10 (Good old Deuteronomy, so many stonings)

 

If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, which thou hast not known, thou, nor thy fathers; Namely, of the gods of the people which are round about you ... Thou shalt not consent unto him, nor hearken unto him; neither shall thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal him: But thou shalt surely kill him; thine hand shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. And thou shalt stone him with stones, that he die.

 

 

Numbers 15:32-56

 

They found a man that gathered sticks upon the sabbath day. ... And the LORD said unto Moses, The man shall be surely put to death: all the congregation shall stone him with stones.... And all the congregation brought him without the camp, and stoned him with stones, and he died; as the LORD commanded Moses

 

 

General Dickery

 

2 Chronicles 15:13

 

Whosoever would not seek the LORD God of Israel should be put to death, whether small or great, whether man or woman.

 

 

So I'm kind of grouping a bunch of the previous statements together here becuase they seem to be in regards to the mosaic law. So there's a bit of confusion as to the purpose of the mosaic law and which parts do and don't relate to us today and some of that is already touched on in the paper I linked to above. Basically, as our relationship with God has changed and as God has continued to reveal more of his will to us the ways in which he has called us to respond to those around us have changed. Mosaic laws were laws with which to actually establish a government, church and society. They governed pretty much all aspects of life and the symbolic nature of those rituals were to point the way toward the saving work of Christ which had not yet happened. After the death of Christ on the cross the work of salvation had been done and the barriers between man and God had been broken by the work of Christ. As such we no longer have need of a temple or preists through which we must speak to God as he can now commune with us directly. Also as a result the covenant of God was extended beyond just the jewish community to the rest of the world.

 

This pivotal change in the way God relates to us removed the establishment of the Jewish Theocratic state (although the Jewish community had never really followed it properly to begin with). As a result we're no longer bound by the rituals and laws that the Jews were to keep but instead we're covered by grace. Now Jesus did institute a new, even higher calling to a moral standard. He called us as christians to no longer seek revenge or justice from others by taking them to court or by resisting evil doers but instead to give of ourselves freely.

 

So while I'm not saying the old rules ever changed or were ever wrong or still aren't good or proper, Jesus set forth a new standard of love and grace to follow rather than a civic theocracy to isolate ourselves inside. It's not subjective morality it's just progressive sanctification.

 

Galations: 5:1

For freedom¹ Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not be subject again to the yoke² of slavery. 5:2 Listen! I, Paul, tell you that if you let yourselves be circumcised, Christ will be of no benefit to you at all! 5:3 And I testify again to every man who lets himself be circumcised that he is obligated to obey³ the whole law. 5:4 You who are trying to be declared righteous⁴ by the law have been alienated⁵ from Christ; you have fallen away from grace! 5:5 For through the Spirit, by faith, we wait expectantly for the hope of righteousness. 5:6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision carries any weight – the only thing that matters is faith working through love.⁶

 

 

Genesis 38:9-10

 

And Onan knew that the seed should not be his; and it came to pass, when he went in unto his brother's wife, that he spilled it on the ground, lest that he should give seed to his brother. And the thing which he did displeased the LORD: wherefore he slew him also.

 

 

Here's a more literal translation from bible.org

38:8 Then Judah said to Onan, “Have sexual relations with¹³ your brother’s wife and fulfill the duty of a brother-in-law to her so that you may raise¹⁴ up a descendant for your brother.”¹⁵ 38:9 But Onan knew that the child¹⁶ would not be considered his.¹⁷ So whenever¹⁸ he had sexual relations with¹⁹ his brother’s wife, he withdrew prematurely²⁰ so as not to give his brother a descendant. 38:10 What he did was evil in the Lord’s sight, so the Lord²¹ killed him too.

 

So Onan was trying to end his brothers line and it was out of spite and the lord killed him for it. God also killed people in the new testament just for lying about how much they gave to the church.

 

Acts 5:1

5:1 Now a man named Ananias, together with Sapphira his wife, sold a piece of property. 5:2 He¹ kept back for himself part of the proceeds with his wife’s knowledge; he brought² only part of it and placed it at the apostles’ feet. 5:3 But Peter said, “Ananias, why has Satan filled³ your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and keep back for yourself part of the proceeds from the sale of⁴ the land? 5:4 Before it was sold,⁵ did it not⁶ belong to you? And when it was sold, was the money⁷ not at your disposal? How have you thought up this deed in your heart?⁸ You have not lied to people⁹ but to God!”

5:5 When Ananias heard these words he collapsed and died, and great fear gripped¹⁰ all who heard about it. 5:6 So the young men came,¹¹ wrapped him up,¹² carried him out, and buried¹³ him. 5:7 After an interval of about three hours,¹⁴ his wife came in, but she did not know¹⁵ what had happened. 5:8 Peter said to her, “Tell me, were the two of you¹⁶ paid this amount¹⁷ for the land?” Sapphira¹⁸ said, “Yes, that much.” 5:9 Peter then told her, “Why have you agreed together to test the Spirit of the Lord? Look! The feet of those who have buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out!” 5:10 At once¹⁹ she collapsed at his feet and died. So when the young men came in, they found her dead, and they carried her out and buried her beside her husband. 5:11 Great²⁰ fear gripped²¹ the whole church²² and all who heard about these things.

 

So, not really sure what you take issue with here unless you're going to argue that death is not a suitable punishment for lying but it's pretty clear throughout the Bible that any sin is punishible not just by death but by eteranl separation from God in a pit of fire. If you take issue with that well that's another ball of wax that we can get into.

 

Matthew 10:34

 

Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword.

 

 

Your whole passage is here:

 

10:34 “Do not think that I have come to bring⁶⁰ peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace but a sword. 10:35 For I have come to set a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law, 10:36 and a man’s enemies will be the members of his household.⁶¹

10:37 “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. 10:38 And whoever does not take up his cross⁶² and follow me is not worthy of me. 10:39 Whoever finds his life⁶³ will lose it,⁶⁴ and whoever loses his life because of me⁶⁵ will find it.

 

It's basically saying that following Christ will lead to strife.

 

 

 

Okay, so that's it. There's some complicated stuff in there and I'm not an expert by any stretch so if I explained it improperly I'm sorry. If you have questions about the translation or how it was translated then you can check the references on the net bible's site and they actually have a ton of notes on what was translated as what and why if that's helpful. Let me know if I made anything sound confusing or if I need to explain something further.

[Yantelope V2]

Edit: for some reason this section is getting chopped out so I'm putting it here.

 

 

 

Leviticus 20:13

 

If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.

 

 

So that's kind of digging into the issue of homosexuality and that was leading into the ideals of old testament and new testament so I dug up a paper that eplains these things far better than I could and I'll post the link here.

 

http://www.thevillag...mosexuality.pdf

 

2 John 7

 

For many deceivers are entered into the world, who confess not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist.

 

 

Leviticus 21:17-23

 

Whosoever ... hath any blemish, let him not approach to offer the bread of his God. For whatsoever man he be that hath a blemish, he shall not approach: a blind man, or a lame, or he that hath a flat nose, or any thing superfluous, Or a man that is brokenfooted, or brokenhanded, Or crookbackt, or a dwarf, or that hath a blemish in his eye, or be scurvy, or scabbed, or hath his stones broken; No man that hath a blemish of the seed of Aaron the priest shall come nigh to offer the offerings of the LORD made by fire: he hath a blemish; he shall not come nigh to offer the bread of his God. ... Only he shall not go in unto the vail, nor come nigh unto the altar, because he hath a blemish; that he profane not my sanctuaries.

 

 

Deuteronomy 22:23-24

 

If a damsel that is a virgin be betrothed unto an husband, and a man find her in the city, and lie with her; Then ye shall bring them both out unto the gate of that city, and ye shall stone them with stones that they die; the damsel, because she cried not, being in the city.

 

 

The Stoning Section

 

Deuteronomy 22:13-21

 

If any man take a wife, and go in unto her, and hate her ... and say, I took this woman, and when I came to her, I found her not a maid: Then shall the father of the damsel, and her mother, take and bring forth the tokens of the damsel's virginity unto the elders of the city in the gate: And the damsel's father shall say ... these are the tokens of my daughter's virginity. And they shall spread the cloth before the elders of the city. ... But if this thing be true, and the tokens of virginity be not found for the damsel: Then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her with stones that she die.

 

 

Deuteronomy 21:18-21

 

If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey the voice of his father, or the voice of his mother ... Then shall his father and his mother lay hold on him, and bring him out unto the elders of his city ... And they shall say unto the elders of his city, This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton, and a drunkard. And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die.

 

 

Deuteronomy 13:6-10 (Good old Deuteronomy, so many stonings)

 

If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, which thou hast not known, thou, nor thy fathers; Namely, of the gods of the people which are round about you ... Thou shalt not consent unto him, nor hearken unto him; neither shall thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal him: But thou shalt surely kill him; thine hand shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. And thou shalt stone him with stones, that he die.

 

 

Numbers 15:32-56

 

They found a man that gathered sticks upon the sabbath day. ... And the LORD said unto Moses, The man shall be surely put to death: all the congregation shall stone him with stones.... And all the congregation brought him without the camp, and stoned him with stones, and he died; as the LORD commanded Moses

 

 

General Dickery

 

2 Chronicles 15:13

 

Whosoever would not seek the LORD God of Israel should be put to death, whether small or great, whether man or woman.

 

 

So I'm kind of grouping a bunch of the previous statements together here becuase they seem to be in regards to the mosaic law. So there's a bit of confusion as to the purpose of the mosaic law and which parts do and don't relate to us today and some of that is already touched on in the paper I linked to above. Basically, as our relationship with God has changed and as God has continued to reveal more of his will to us the ways in which he has called us to respond to those around us have changed. Mosaic laws were laws with which to actually establish a government, church and society. They governed pretty much all aspects of life and the symbolic nature of those rituals were to point the way toward the saving work of Christ which had not yet happened. After the death of Christ on the cross the work of salvation had been done and the barriers between man and God had been broken by the work of Christ. As such we no longer have need of a temple or preists through which we must speak to God as he can now commune with us directly. Also as a result the covenant of God was extended beyond just the jewish community to the rest of the world.

 

This pivotal change in the way God relates to us removed the establishment of the Jewish Theocratic state (although the Jewish community had never really followed it properly to begin with). As a result we're no longer bound by the rituals and laws that the Jews were to keep but instead we're covered by grace. Now Jesus did institute a new, even higher calling to a moral standard. He called us as christians to no longer seek revenge or justice from others by taking them to court or by resisting evil doers but instead to give of ourselves freely.

 

So while I'm not saying the old rules ever changed or were ever wrong or still aren't good or proper, Jesus set forth a new standard of love and grace to follow rather than a civic theocracy to isolate ourselves inside. It's not subjective morality it's just progressive sanctification.

 

Galations: 5:1

For freedom¹ Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not be subject again to the yoke² of slavery. 5:2 Listen! I, Paul, tell you that if you let yourselves be circumcised, Christ will be of no benefit to you at all! 5:3 And I testify again to every man who lets himself be circumcised that he is obligated to obey³ the whole law. 5:4 You who are trying to be declared righteous⁴ by the law have been alienated⁵ from Christ; you have fallen away from grace! 5:5 For through the Spirit, by faith, we wait expectantly for the hope of righteousness. 5:6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision carries any weight – the only thing that matters is faith working through love.⁶

 

 

[Faiblesse Des Sens]

Clearly. I am however skeptical that this researcher was able to provide any harder evidence.

 

But of course, you won't bother to read into the subject, and if you do you'll just disregard it.

[Yantelope V2]

Again, you're confusing my skepticism with dismissal. I'm not dismissive of the evidence of evolution I'm just not convinced by it.

 

If we're talking dismissive nobody has bothered to actually say why I'm wrong or defend WTF's statement beyond asserting that there might be other evidence. They're just attacking me for being critical of it. How is that not dismissive?

[Thorgi Duke of Frisbee]

"So, not really sure what you take issue with here unless you're going to argue that death is not a suitable punishment for lying but it's pretty clear throughout the Bible that any sin is punishible not just by death but by eteranl separation from God in a pit of fire. If you take issue with that well that's another ball of wax that we can get into."

 

I'd take eternal damnation any day of the week if it meant I could live my life to the fullest. I'm not afraid of God or whatever the afterlife has in store.

[VicariousShaner]

 

 

So, not really sure what you take issue with here unless you're going to argue that death is not a suitable punishment for lying but it's pretty clear throughout the Bible that any sin is punishible not just by death but by eteranl separation from God in a pit of fire. If you take issue with that well that's another ball of wax that we can get into.

 

How would one not take issue with that? That's a pretty harsh punishment for doing virtually anything God decides isn't cool, for whatever reason.

[deanb]

Did you just respond to 6264 with a copy-paste from Wikipedia? You'd suck at modern schooling if you forget to take out all the citations from your homework.

 

 

Anyway: Which part aren't you convinced by? Gotta have a pretty rigid stance to not be swayed by a single shred of the millions of years of evidence gathered and analysed over several centuries. I can understand being sceptical of FTL neutrinos because they go against known science and even the scientists themselves are not saying "confirm this" but "point out where we fucked up". But with evolution it's all playing out as predicted. The model is pretty damn sound. Which I guess comes to question two: Which model do you follow? i.e the explantion of how this

 

became this

 

Also what were you taught at school? Did they skip over evolution in science lessons or was it just something that didn't weight too much into marks?

 

(These are things I'm genuinely curious on. I've never met anyone who believes evolution doesn't exist before)

[Yantelope V2]

Did you just respond to 6264 with a copy-paste from Wikipedia? You'd suck at modern schooling if you forget to take out all the citations from your homework.

 

Those are references to the translation from the net bible. http://net.bible.org/#!bible/Matthew+1

[MasterDex]

So using your reading of the bible and christianity then, christianity was blessed by god and all that Moses did was to prepare the world for Christ. So what of the other world religions? The Christian/Jewish/Abrahamic god would have us believe in only him or be condemned to hell. So you believe that most of the world is doomed to an afterlife of pain and sorrow?

 

If you don't believe in evolution, do you believe in chromosomes and DNA? Do you not believe that parents pass on their genes to their children? If you do believe that then why is it such a stretch to believe that the passing on of genes and mutations from parent to child over millennia would not result in changes in the make-up of an animal? Are lots of African people punished by god or were they just unlucky enough to receive a mutation from their parents that left them with sickle cell disease?

[SixTwoSixFour]

-Truncated-

 

2 Samuel, telling your guys to kill handicapped people is not okay. Even if it's to get them riled up for a battle, I'm not okay with that. Sadly, you didn't respond to a couple of the ones I would have been really interested to see an answer to, so that's theonly answer that I object to (other than the homosexuality, but we've been down that road afore).

 

Other than that, I found your explanation of mosaic law helpful, and I appreciate it. I don't buy it personally, though. I think for those laws to have ever existed- the mixed cloths one, the don't touch a pigskin one, etc.- is crazy, and I don't believe that God would write rules like that. Those have the ring of Man to me, in their illogic and foolishness. Honestly, if you believe in the Bible it seems like the only possible conclusion is that God is an asshole.

 

I'm not one of the atheists of our little group, I do believe in God, just not the god of Abraham. I'm not trying to say there's no god. I just don't believe that the Bible is His word.

 

Let me pose a question to you. What kind of god would condemn you to eternal suffering for guessing wrong on what is basically a multiple choice question with infinite answers? New religions are invented all the time, you could create one right now if you wanted. Only one is right. There is no evidence, it's all based on faith. So your odds of choosing the right answer are 1/ ∞ and if you're wrong, eternal hellfire. Personally, I don't believe that any god that's up there would be that much of a cock.

Edited February 18, 2012 by SixTwoSixFour

[Mister Jack]

This isn't an entirely serious response but 6264's post kinda reminded me of this. Even if it's a comedy bit, it does have a point about the old testament god and the new testament god.

 

http://youtu.be/xFnUJ3QosVU

Edited February 18, 2012 by Mister Jack

[TheMightyEthan]

Personally, I don't believe that any god that's up there would be that much of a cock.

 

I can't claim to know what kind of "person" God might be, if one exists, and I don't see that there's any reason He wouldn't be a dick. What I do know, though, is that such a god is not one worth worshiping.

[Yantelope V2]

@dean: well, I'm prepping for an "AH! SO THAT EXPLAINS IT!" I went to public school through 4th grade at which point my parents got pretty tired of the school not being up to their standards so they homeschooled me. My parents both went to public schools and have 4 year degrees from a Texas public university. My Brother went to school through 10th grade and got tired of it and homeschooled the last two years of high school. I got a pretty decend score on my SAT (1330 if it matters) and got my BS degree in engineering from a public Texas university with a 3.0 GPA (I know that's not super). So I don't consider myself uneducated. Anywho, you can say I was indoctrinated at this point and it's impossible to prove that I'm not brainwashed but I consider myself to be a highly critical person and I make every attempt to challenge my beliefs whenever such a challenge arrises. I will freely admit that I have not studied the intricacies of evolution and I am not equipped to fully refute it.

[Waldorf and Statler]

I just want to state, gravity is considered a theory by some too. But fuck gravity, not enough evidence. I'm floating as it is. Into space.

[Johnny]

Gravity is a theory. It's the scientific theory explaining why stuff falls to the ground when dropped.

Theory in science is way different from how the word theory is used in everyday language. The way you'd use theory in general is more close to what a scientist would probably call an "idea" or a "hunch."

[deanb]

@Yante: AH! SO THAT EXPLAINS IT! (and a bit more)

(p.s your SAT scores mean nothing to me. our SAT are in levels (i.e I got a lvl 8)

 

 

@the rest: The general use of theory is is closer to a hypothesis. A hypothesis is "we think this will work this way" then you test it and find out. A theory is "this is how it works and how it will work". It's not always 100% right, and will as scientific understanding and our tools to observe the universe improve (i.e microscopes, LHCs, satellites, genome sequencing etc), the theory is refined and improved. Theory of relativity, theory of gravity, theory of evolution etc. Theories also make predictions of what would happen. For example Mendeleev and his periodic table, he managed to fill out several elements that weren't at the time known of.

 

Scientist observes how the universe works, then the theory explains what is happening. It doesn't guess what is happening, because what is happening is actually happening. No one is guessing gravity exists. We know it exists, it existed before Newton even "observed" it. What Newton did was to write it down. Same with evolution. It happened, Darwin then observed the changes of evolution in action. Then he wrote his theory. It had a few rough patches, for example his was "survival of the fittest" which isn't strictly true, which have been improved and refined upon as our techniques improved. For example genome sequencing. Genetics wasn't really a thing when he was around, so he couldn't really explain the adaptations and mutations through genetic mutations as we can now. Same as Newton cocked up a bit which Einstein since reworked, and scientists are still building on.

 

And slightly related: The banana

 

 

Wild banana -

 

Cavendish man-made banana -

 

Wooh for theory of evolution and it's advancements. You'll find corn is much the same too. In fact most modern fruits, vegetables etc are purpose bred.

 

[Yantelope V2]

2 Samuel, telling your guys to kill handicapped people is not okay. Even if it's to get them riled up for a battle, I'm not okay with that. Sadly, you didn't respond to a couple of the ones I would have been really interested to see an answer to, so those are the only answers that I object to (other than the homosexuality, but we've been down that round afore).

 

Other than that, I found your explanation of mosaic law helpful, and I appreciate it. I don't buy it personally, though. I think for those laws to have ever existed- the mixed cloths one, the don't touch a pigskin one, etc.- is crazy, and I don't believe that God would write rules like that. Those have the ring of Man to me, in their illogic and foolishness. Honestly, if you believe in the Bible it seems like the only possible conclusion is that God is an asshole.

 

I'm not one of the atheists of our little group, I do believe in God, just not the god of Abraham. I'm not trying to say there's no god. I just don't believe that the Bible is His word.

 

Let me pose a question to you. What kind of god would condemn you to eternal suffering for guessing wrong on what is basically a multiple choice question with infinite answers? New religions are invented all the time, you could create one right now if you wanted. Only one is right. There is no evidence, it's all based on faith. So your odds of choosing the right answer are 1/ ∞ and if you're wrong, eternal hellfire. Personally, I don't believe that any god that's up there would be that much of a cock.

 

I'm not sure you read the response to samuel as I did. I'm pretty sure they're referring to taunting people. I'm fairly certain they're not actually talking about killing handicapped people.

 

A lot of the Mosaic law was either symbolic in nature or simply health related. A lot of rules regarding what to eat and not to eat were to help keep the people healthy. Cows generally don't get worms becaus they chew their cudd and have 4 stomachs and so it was safer to eat cow than pig. There were other rules like this such as washing of hands and not touching blood and things like that. The israelites didn't know about germs but God told them to wash their hands to keep themselves clean. Doesn't sound like something a human would make up.

 

Also the ideas of not wearing mixed linens or planting two seeds in the same ditch or not getting tattoos were symbolic in nature. They were a symbol of remaining pure and holy. Tattoos were generally pagan symbols. There's a lot of symbolic meaning even in the passover supper such as removing all the yeast from the house represents the removal of sin from our lives. Whether or not it sounds crazy depends on if you understand the meaning or purpose behind it. Strangely the israelites did not fully understand the meaning as many of them rejected the Christ when he did come.

 

Sending people to Hell is actually the toughest issue that any christian deals with. If you wanted to talk about the truly "messed up" or just plain horrifying stuff in the bible that's where I'd start.

Edited February 18, 2012 by Yantelope V2

[deanb]

See symbolically is how the bible is looked at over here. It's full of morals, not factual recollections of historical events. However you said yourself you're a biblical literalist. You take what was said in the bible literally. Surely can't really have it both ways? Some is symbolic, some is real. (well obviously some... Israel. I'll let myself out).

 

As for Israelites not knowing of germs: We didn't know about gravity. We still knew from trial and error that you tended to live longer if you didn't jump off a cliff. Didn't know of vitamin C, knew that lemons and oranges were good on ship voyages.

[WTF]

 

While I'm not the one to post this kind of image, it does show that technically it's not easy to identify what that is. I can show you what it is. As for specific points from the book. I can't remember them at the moment but it's mostly to do with shape and form and like I mentioned before breasts with such curvature and small nipples aren't conducive to breast feeding which is the primary function of breasts, a mammalian feature, for mammals. When one function is overcome by another function then there's a reason for such an evolution. I mean take a look at the breasts of most mammals and you'll find that the nipples are quite elongated. Compare human ones to monkeys even.

 

As for theories and gravity, while dean is right. The issue is that there's often a mixup between hypothesis and theories. A scientific theory and what's used in common vernacular as a theory are different as the givens, procedure, proof and inference are different when speaking in scientific terms and layman's terms. For instance we're not going to go on about ATP synthesis during photosynthesis when we explain to a regular person, we'll just say plants create food/energy from sunlight taking in CO2. While that's correct in a broad sense, it's not quite accurate.

 

Gravity as a Force is almost considered fictitious because it is a very weak force, it's infinitesimally weaker than electrostatic force that holds the subatomic particles of an atom together. There are plenty of forces stronger than gravity. Yet when talk about large bodies it is sufficiently important. However gravity as we knew it or explain in layman's terms isn't as big a deal anymore.

 

I'd say a bigger issue in quantum physics is the higgs boson particle because of the tendency of certain scientists who require 'funding' to try and place all their bets to this particle being a singular particle that obeys a crap load of properties. A lot of scientists are rightfully sceptical about it because instead of isolating it, we just keep adding properties to it. Also I dislike the misnomer of calling it the God particle, it isn't the God particle but rather a particle that could be the fundamental element of matter. Speaking of matter, I don't even want to get started on how wrong theories from the mid-90s on anti-matter to even a lot of modern theories are. Anti-matter needs to be something that consistently emits energy and is stable in emitting energy which is why when matter and anti-matter collides it creates well the end of everything technically. It's not the whole BS of negative nucleus and so on and so forth, that's negative matter.

 

You want to discuss things that we know very little about then there's dark matter. I mean really what is dark matter - we have no clear idea. We know it's there. What exactly are its properties, what is it's potential. we know very little about all of these things. Instead people who are sceptical about science ask questions for which we do have answers for. I do not mean on this forum but in general.

 

Also Dean in his own way is explaining Scientific Inquiry and Scientific Method. The whole process from observation to inference. Scientific Method hasn't changed since the time of Plato and Aristotle but what we know has changed a lot. I mean back in the early days people literally believed that mice came from cheese (The world is flat theory did not originate in the earliest societies, they believed it was spherical or circular for the most part, it originated later).

 

Here's a bit of Trivia: Thomas Dolby, singer of 'she blinded me with science' and who pretty much created ringtones (and thus got paid for years whenever they were created (Even now I believe)) is also a member of the Flat Earth Society (yeah it's exactly what it sounds like). There are also mathematicians who like to prove that the earth is flat.

 

The thing about arguments and the way human logic works is that we can convince ourselves to believe in what we are likely to believe provided we're given enough direction in that side. It's valid for everyone regardless of belief.

[TheFlyingGerbil]

That PDF on homosexuality is just as misguided as I expected form a pamphlet that links to exodus international and goes to show that the science and research that Christians use can never really be called such as it is always undertaken with an agenda.

 

It also goes to show just how many problems there are with taking the Bible at face value, as there has been so much human meddling in it from the people that wrote it in the first place, the people who chose what went in there and the numerous translations and retranslations even if it started as the word of God it now has the distinct murk of the hand of man. Here's a translation for when you're not looking to be filled with hate.

[deanb]

Which PDF?

 

edit: Wait I found it. Now reading.

 

edit: now not reading it. Jesus Christ is it fucking hard to read this writing (not helped by random capitalizations, terrible formatting and a huge over-use of footnotes). It does touch upon the "judge not lest you be judged" kinda thing though in the Conclusion though...

[Battra92]

Sending people to Hell is actually the toughest issue that any christian deals with. If you wanted to talk about the truly "messed up" or just plain horrifying stuff in the bible that's where I'd start.

 

C.S. Lewis I think put it best in "The Problem of Pain."

"Finally, it is objected that the ultimate loss of a single soul means the defeat of omnipotence. And so it does. In creating beings with free will, omnipotence from the outset submits to the possibility of such defeat. What you call defeat, I call miracle: for to make things which are not Itself, and thus to become, in a sense, capable of being resisted by its own handiwork, is the most astonishing and unimaginable of all the feats we attribute to the Deity. I willingly believe that the damned are, in one sense, successful, rebels to the end; that the doors of hell are locked on the inside."

[TheMightyEthan]

So is that to say that you believe that even once in hell one can repent, and thus in that sense they hold the key to their own prison?