OldHat, my postulated Og didn't know a whole lot about orographic uplift, so he credited the appearance of clouds and rain to...well, something invisible up there. Which quickly morphed into somebody invisible up there. Somebody just like himself, but clearly all-powerful and all-knowing. In short, a god in his own image.
And that's wrong how? Can you create laws of physics?
All these discussions always come down to a couple points- religion is man made- which is debatable but probably as true a statement as we can understand- and second, there is no God...
I'm unwilling and unable to concede that there is no God for many reasons. The fact we have an imperfect understanding and faith in and of God doesn't mean he doesn't exist... quite the contrary. The fact that most religions have their own God figure can mean many things, but I prefer to think they are all referring to the same God but from their own points of religious views....
I have talked to many engineers, mathematicians, and scientists along my way and many of them concede that when you do the math of the universe and how things work in this ethosphere we reside in, the math is just simply too perfect to be random in any way. It had to be planned by an intelligent being with a plan of some sort...
And the one thing that I stubbornly hang on to when I have this discussion with my scientist Son in law and his wife, my daughter, is this- every one goes back to the "big bang" to describe the beginning of all things, the universe, the reason for life, etc.... but no matter what, before the big bang could happen there had to be some sort of matter for it to happen, regardless of the quantum science behind it... so, where did all that matter that now surrounds us, come from? If that was the beginning, where did everything we rely on for life, structure, etc... come from before that "beginning"?
I believe there are things we may never understand, but we continue to argue about them anyway- it's just our way as humans. Which is interesting since in most Christian texts it is implied that God gave us choice. How we use that choice is up to us, but it determines how we live our lives and treat others, how well our species survives, and how evil is practiced and described.... I once heard a Cardinal in a large area say- " there really is no heaven or hell as you have been taught that you go to after your death. You make your own heaven or hell on this earth while you are alive and live in them every day by your actions and your faith".... seems as good a description as any...
Bob
Never underestimate your ability to overestimate your ability.
Actually, there was no need for any discussion by the atheists. There was an enlightening litany of connected Bible verses and the interpretaion of words.
The athiests, like a dog attacking what it fears, are made very uncomfortable buy being reminded of GODS words and attack to try to drive those words away, just as lieberals and dimocommies and socialists do when faced with truth.
Ecc 10:2 The heart of the wise inclines to the right, but that of a fool to the left.
A Nation which leaves God behind is soon left behind.
"The Lord never asked anyone to be a tax collector, lowyer, or Redskins fan".
Oldman, I'm not intending to prove or disprove anything. I'm merely pointing out that what a huge chunk of humanity has created to explain natural events is purest hokum and superstition. Just because things "are" does not imply, much less prove, that they had to have been created by some eternal and all-powerful being. Nor (and how this started) does any book of tales become the dictated message of that being just because somebody's great ancestor starting saying it was.
Hell, I wrote two books. How much of either of them came from God? You tell me. But if you say none of it, how the hell can you say every word of the other one did? Books is books, brother. They all contain morality messages.
Religions, I claim, were invented to give some people power over others. From the times of "Give up your goat as sacrifice - and now that it is holy, only I the High Priest may eat it" to "Tithe us this portion of your income so we can build a new marble and gold temple for the use of us High Priests." It has not changed. Nor has the inevitable result of "My Yahway or the highway and this way to the beheading block."
Morality programs like Buddhism and Taoism are well and good. There's a best way for humans to interact, and laying that way out is beneficial. If we could just somehow avoid what seems to be the hard-wired instinct to create gods in our own image, we'd be a lot better off.
OldHat, my postulated Og didn't know a whole lot about orographic uplift, so he credited the appearance of clouds and rain to...well, something invisible up there. Which quickly morphed into somebody invisible up there. Somebody just like himself, but clearly all-powerful and all-knowing. In short, a god in his own image.
That's a scenario a whale of a lot more probable than any construct and web of highly improbable contradictions we made up to support the first manufactured one.
I don't care. My point was that you were wrong about your claim as to the origin of religion.
What began as a mass of ever-embellished verbal stories in Aramaic and other languages is finally collected in about the year 600, with about a third of them being discarded or rejected before being written down in ancient Greek. Later dubiously translated into ancient Latin and even more centuries later into Chaucerian English, early German, and other languages. Then continually revised, re-translated, abridged, and essentially re-written from scratch.
Until today, we are told to accept it word for word. (Coming soon: The Bible in Ebonics!)
But it’s the WORD OF GOD, they say. So is the Quran, the Talmud, as well as the texts of Buddhism, Taoism, and at least a dozen other “isms” of the thousands of other religions practiced in history and around the globe. Is yours the one and only “right” religion? Yes, say the believers of each and every one of them. Is your book the one and only word of god? Yes, say the believers of each and every one of them.
Does that mean the Bible is a “greatest hits” or reader’s digest abridged version? grin
IMO, the bible was, and in it's many variations, is a political document meant to settle all the Christian tribes' differences at the time it was written and create a stronger, more coherent church. Remember at that time that Christianity was so strongly committed by the various branches of the religion that they were willing to go to war to defend their version of "christianity"... As luck would have it, at that particular time there were leaders wise enough to see the timing was right to assemble the various teachings of Jesus Christ before they were totally lost... the politics came in when they had to compromise with all the different religious sects' leaders who believed strongly that their "version" of the facts that had been passed down through tradition and retelling of the tales was the accurate one... the compromise was difficult and took quite some time before the politics of the writing was settled. Considering the battles that were waged during the meetings to discuss this world altering mission to get this book written, it is a miracle it was ever written at all...
Never underestimate your ability to overestimate your ability.
Jag and others. It is not the unbelievers who are afraid. Religion is there with all its promised comforts of the hereafter precisely because we as humans are afraid of death. So we try to soften it by making up stories of how wonderful it will all be after we die.
In actuality, it ought to be just the opposite. The reality is that when we die, we absolutely cease to exist. ALL the evidence says that we simply...stop. The good news is that we will never know we are dead. It would be impossible to be aware of anything, including that we are unaware. It is in fact exactly like falling asleep: we do not notice the moment when we stop being conscious precisely because we are unconscious.
That should be a comfort. It is a comfort to me. I think that if I were in fact able to "look back down upon myself" from soul height and realize that I was dead, it would be a horrific trauma. I'm confident that won't be the case, for which I am deeply grateful. The sad thing is that all you believers won't know you were wrong and none of those promises will happen. I won't know I'm right and you won't know you're wrong.
Lastly (and maybe I'll give this an everlasting rest, ha!) I will say that I am not an atheist. An atheist is an anti-religion zealot, just as eager to convert as the most fervent missionary. I am not that. I am simply a non-believer who was raised in the most rigorous Catholic way - until I started asking what seemed to be rational questions. And got what were patently absurd answers, one whopper after another to "explain away" every earlier whopper. And it all unraveled. I'm still pointing out the absurdities. And slyly smiling.
In actuality, it ought to be just the opposite. The reality is that when we die, we absolutely cease to exist. ALL the evidence says that we simply...stop. The good news is that we will never know we are dead. It would be impossible to be aware of anything, including that we are unaware. It is in fact exactly like falling asleep: we do not notice the moment when we stop being conscious precisely because we are unconscious.
That should be a comfort. It is a comfort to me. I think that if I were in fact able to "look back down upon myself" from soul height and realize that I was dead, it would be a horrific trauma. I'm confident that won't be the case, for which I am deeply grateful. The sad thing is that all you believers won't know you were wrong and none of those promises will happen. I won't know I'm right and you won't know you're wrong.
We will all have the chance to test your hypothesis. If you are correct none of us will "know" or "care". If Christians are correct we will all know and care very, very much.
'And Agrippa said to Paul, "In a short time would you persuade me to be a Christian?" And Paul said, "Whether short or long, I would to God that not only you but also all who hear me this day might become such as I am—except for these chains." ' (Act 26:28-29 )
Jag and others. It is not the unbelievers who are afraid. Religion is there with all its promised comforts of the hereafter precisely because we as humans are afraid of death. So we try to soften it by making up stories of how wonderful it will all be after we die.
In actuality, it ought to be just the opposite. The reality is that when we die, we absolutely cease to exist. ALL the evidence says that we simply...stop. The good news is that we will never know we are dead. It would be impossible to be aware of anything, including that we are unaware. It is in fact exactly like falling asleep: we do not notice the moment when we stop being conscious precisely because we are unconscious.
That should be a comfort. It is a comfort to me. I think that if I were in fact able to "look back down upon myself" from soul height and realize that I was dead, it would be a horrific trauma. I'm confident that won't be the case, for which I am deeply grateful. The sad thing is that all you believers won't know you were wrong and none of those promises will happen. I won't know I'm right and you won't know you're wrong.
Lastly (and maybe I'll give this an everlasting rest, ha!) I will say that I am not an atheist. An atheist is an anti-religion zealot, just as eager to convert as the most fervent missionary. I am not that. I am simply a non-believer who was raised in the most rigorous Catholic way - until I started asking what seemed to be rational questions. And got what were patently absurd answers, one whopper after another to "explain away" every earlier whopper. And it all unraveled. I'm still pointing out the absurdities. And slyly smiling.
I'm in much the same boat as you, but I chose to go back to church a few years ago for one reason- my contract is with God, not the people who run his church and the men and women who have done so much damage to his church and damaged his teachings in the process...
I was having a discussion with a woman I met at some gathering- can't recall what is was for- and the subject of religion came up. She described herself as a "recovering Catholic" , which I thought was entirely appropriate given the church's history and failures to follow their own doctrine in their methods and practices...
Bob
Never underestimate your ability to overestimate your ability.
We could read from the First Book of Ezra - except that it was one that the Synod of Hippo "voted out" of the Bible.
If the Bible is inspired by God, and one of its books got “voted out” by man, does that negate the rest of it...? If the Bible is inspired by God, and one of its books got ”voted out” by man, does that mean that all of the rest of it is no longer inspired by God...?
We could read from the First Book of Ezra - except that it was one that the Synod of Hippo "voted out" of the Bible.
If the Bible is inspired by God, and one of its books got “voted out” by man, does that negate the rest of it...? If the Bible is inspired by God, and one of its books got ”voted out” by man, does that mean that all of the rest of it is no longer inspired by God...?
So, is it "inspired by God" or the literal Word of God?
Could be an important point in all of this.
The desert is a true treasure for him who seeks refuge from men and the evil of men. In it is contentment In it is death and all you seek (Quoted from "The Bleeding of the Stone" Ibrahim Al-Koni)
If they wrongly left out one that was inspired, maybe some that they wrongly left in aren't.
I really will stop now. The whole thing is like trying to change the mind of anti-gunners with facts. They don't care about logic and fact, they base everything on wishful thinking and emotion. So do believers.
You don’t believe...? OK, cool. But claiming that your position is based on logic and facts is erroneous. You’ve simply stated your thoughts, your emotions, and your opinions on the matter. As have the rest of us.
You don’t believe...? OK, cool. But claiming that your position is based on logic and facts is erroneous. You’ve simply stated your thoughts, your emotions, and your opinions on the matter. As have the rest of us.
But he was inspired, and apparently that's the litmus test, no?
I really will stop now. The whole thing is like trying to change the mind of anti-gunners with facts. They don't care about logic and fact, they base everything on wishful thinking and emotion. So do believers.
That is very far from the truth. I do agree that ultimately Christianity is based on faith, but it is naive to believe the facts are against Christianity.
We could read from the First Book of Ezra - except that it was one that the Synod of Hippo "voted out" of the Bible.
If the Bible is inspired by God, and one of its books got “voted out” by man, does that negate the rest of it...? If the Bible is inspired by God, and one of its books got ”voted out” by man, does that mean that all of the rest of it is no longer inspired by God...?
You are assuming the supernatural does not exist. if the Bible is inspired then God would supernaturally protect it's integrity.
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