Continuation of Christianity debate.

[2dimes]

Fair enough change the question to something reflecting that.

Because the he's so good at being anything he could be nothing is rediculas.

Again, I can use a chair to reach higher even though I would not be able to reach as high if I sit on it.

[vtmarik]

I'm just going to sit back and enjoy.


http://www.dontbeleftbehind.com/


Carry on....

[P Gizzle]

I'm just going to sit back and enjoy.


http://www.dontbeleftbehind.com/


Carry on....

ouch.....

[DIRESTRAITS]

Yay! P Gizles here! now this thread can finaly die

[manicman]

Fair enough change the question to something reflecting that.

Because the he's so good at being anything he could be nothing is rediculas.

Again, I can use a chair to reach higher even though I would not be able to reach as high if I sit on it.

That is a terrible comparison. What we are showing is a logical contradiction between two important church beliefs. God is incapable of evil and god is capable of anything. What you are stating is just nonsense.

[P Gizzle]

you who God doesn't love?


Steelers fans.....

please discuss......



i now pronounce this thread and death, man, and wife.....

[Backglass]

What astounds me is that people will swallow any belief system beacuse they do not have the capacity to think for themselves.

All religion is an idea, just because that idea is old does not mean it should be believed in fact the opposite because our forfathers were basically quite inept (except for a few outstanding specimens). All religions are cults. I laugh when a main stream christian tells me another smaller religion is a cult. All religions have borrowed ideas off other religions to gain more followers. Religion is a way to control the masses and supress individual thought and action. They are not all necessarily evil or bad but there actions can cause misery on an astronimical scale.

<Applause>

Very well said, and welcome to the forums.

the most disheartening aspect of religion is people living for the afterlife, and using it as a personal justification for pissing all over the environment. The belief that this world is imperfect only makes it more so. Live now, that's all there is; these are the days, they always were.

Yup.

"Since time immemorial, the powerful have used religion to distract the oppressed, to encourage them to focus on the next world so that they will acquiesce to the injustices of this world. If you would have your slaves remain docile, teach them hymns."

[jay_a2j]

REPOST:

Man was created on day 6, animals were created before man. (I forget which day) No one knows how long each day was, a 24 hour day or as stated elsewhere in scripture, "a day to God is like a thousand years".

Thus, a day could have been much longer than 24 hours.

[jay_a2j]

I'm just going to sit back and enjoy.


http://www.dontbeleftbehind.com/


Carry on....

ouch.....

Yeah, too bad that comic is so far from the truth, it looks like a Clinton speech.

[2dimes]

Fair enough change the question to something reflecting that.

Because the he's so good at being anything he could be nothing is rediculas.

Again, I can use a chair to reach higher even though I would not be able to reach as high if I sit on it.

That is a terrible comparison. What we are showing is a logical contradiction between two important church beliefs. God is incapable of evil and god is capable of anything. What you are stating is just nonsense.

No.

I am saying the concept that "If he can be anything then he can be nothing." is nonsense.

Do feel free to have a different opinion. Or better yet discuss a different question like the one you think I am talking about.

[Guiscard]

2Dimes I think I might try and explain BOTH the paradox's they are reffering to here a bit more simplyas it seems like you're getting confused.

1) You accept that God is Omnipotent (I assume) - that he has the power to do anything. Therefore, it is in his power to cease to exist.

2) The problem of evil - Judeo-Christians attribute the qualities of Omnipotence and Omnibenevolence (always doing good) to God. These two, however, cannot go hand in hand. On the one hand God always wants good to happen, and so should not let evil happen. He is omnipotent and so it should be in his power to stop evil. Therefore he is either omnibenevolant but not omnipotent (he wants to stop evil but can't) or omnipotent but not omnibenevolant (he is all-powerful but doesn't want to stop evil).

The general counter of the problem of evil is that it is 'all part of God's plan' or that it is simply a lack of good, rather than a genuine presence of evil. In either case, I like to look to Dostoyevsky's character of Ivan in The Brothers Karamazov who declares that a God who allows such atrocities as the slaughter of innocent children is not a God worthy of worship.

'People talk sometimes of bestial cruelty, but that's a great injustice and insult to the beasts; a beast can never be so cruel as a man, so artistically cruel....

I've collected a great, great deal about Russian children, Alyosha. There was a little girl of five who was hated by her father and mother.... You see, I must repeat again, it is a peculiar characteristic of many people, this love of torturing children, and children only.... It's just their defenselessness that tempts the tormentor, just the angelic confidence of the child who has no refuge and no appeal that sets his vile blood on fire....

This poor child of five was subjected to every possible torture by those cultivated parents. They beat her, thrashed her, kicked her for no reason till her body was one bruise. Then, they went to greater refinements of cruelty -- shut her up al night in the cold and frost in a privy, and because she didn't ask to be taken up at night... they smeared her face and filled her mouth with excrement, and it was her mother, her mother did this. And that mother could sleep, hearing the poor child's groans! Can you understand why a little creature, who can't even understand what's done to her, should beat her little aching heart with her tiny fist in the dark and cold, and weep her meek unresentful tears to dear, kind God to protect her?... Do you understand why this infamy must be and is permitted?... Why, the whole world of knowledge is not worth that child's prayer to 'dear, kind God'!...

Imagine that you are creating a fabric of human destiny with the object of making men happy in the end, giving them peace and rest at last, but that it was essential and inevitable to torture to death only one tiny creature -- that baby beating its breast with its fist, for instance -- and to found that edifice on its unavenged tears, would you consent to be the architect on those conditions? Tell me, and tell the truth."

"No, I wouldn't consent," said Alyosha softly.

[2dimes]

Ok then you are right "he can be anything so he can easily be nothing".

[vtmarik]

REPOST:

Man was created on day 6, animals were created before man. (I forget which day) No one knows how long each day was, a 24 hour day or as stated elsewhere in scripture, "a day to God is like a thousand years".

Thus, a day could have been much longer than 24 hours.

"God created the world in 6 days"
"The gods created the earth from the bones and blood of the giant Ymir"
"The world was created by Gaia"
"The world was sneezed out of the nose of the Great Green Arkleseizure"

All creation myths come from ancient peoples trying to figure out how it all came to be. The story of Genesis comes from a group of people attempting to explain how the world was created. It isn't any more provable than the thousands of other creation stories that pepper the world.

Get over yourself already and accept the fact that Christianity A) isn't the only game in town and that B) A lot of mythologies and religions predate your Bible and the concept of your God by a good number of millenia.

[MeDeFe]

And how about the paradox of omnipotence vs. omnibenevolence, 2dimes?

[heavycola]

Xians try to circumvent any paradoxes their beliefs throw up with sophistry and semantics.
Example:

The argument from first cause: everything has a cause, therefore the universe has a cause and that cause was god.

Obvious question is, if everything has a cause then what caused god?
Theistic answer: Nothing. He is a necessary and timeless being.
^^^^ This is, of course, absolutely meaningless.

Consider all these paradoxes, and then ask: what if god is imaginary? They all vanish, instantly. All of them.

[Kokunai]

After reading most of your posts, Kokunai, I have a few questions for you that I could admittedly say I am most curious to find answers too.


My first question is how you have come to know the extent of Gods abilities, being able to dictate with precision what he can (and I imagine cannot) do.

My second question is in regards to his omnipotence. If we accept that God is omnipotent, we must also accept that god is capable of anything, which includes not being omnipotent and all seeing. It's a paradox that is quite confusing, and I would like to hear a rational solution to it. In addition to this question, I would like to ask why God was required to sacrifice his only son as a means of forgiving us for our sins. If God is omnipotent, why couldn't he have just forgiven us with the wave of his metaphorical hand?

My third question deals with the historicity and accuracy of the life of Jesus. How do you rectify that no existence of Jesus exists, in either physical or textual form, until 30 years after his supposed death? Moreover, how do you rectify the times in which the accepted Gospels were written (nearly 30 years after Yeshua ben Yosef el Nazrii was supposedly crucified!), the fact that these accounts do not match up (it must be noted that "interpretation" and "opinion" are not valid methods of recording objective history, and accepting such would be precedent to accepting all stories of fanciful origin), and the only writings that come make any mention of Yeshua el Nazrii Christos comes from Saul of Tarsus which only makes mention of the Crucifiction, Death, and Resurrection? How does this account for the added stories that the Gospels of Mark, Matthew, John, and Luke give us? Remember, interpretation, unsubstantiated anecdote, and opinion are not valid ways of recording history.

I would also ask that in conjunction of the above question you provide evidence and reason why no record of the Slaughter of the Innocents occurred, the Sermon on the Mount (which attracted hundreds, if not thousands), or why a record of his Trial and Sentencing do not exist.

1. The Bible explains most of it.

2. If he chose to he could. Your problem is your relying on our own constraints to define God. Can't put him in a box.

3. Much of the history we accept as history was only recorded after the events. The event took place, the bible mentions it. Is it not possible that the bible mentioned it as well as other sources but the Bible is only source in existence? The Slaughter was very much a small matter. Your talking a town, and a small one at that. Not exactly breaking news if the town was not important. Depends on the estimates but some say it may have been less than 100 deaths.

I think there are many things that have happened in history that may have never been recorded the fact that we have one source is amazing for some of the things in the OT and then later find archaeology that supports the statements. Is in not possible that no other sources survived?

[Kokunai]

However, religion has provided a foundation for civilization for many centuries and will continue to do so till then end. To think you can explain away religion is folly.

Example:
The Mayan religion - bloodthirsty sun-worshipping. They didn't realise that the sun wasn't a whimsical god but a giant fusion reactor millions of miles away. You do know this (i hope), and would never believe in their gods. Yet it was a foundation for their civilisation. Xianity is no less bonkers, objectively speaking, and has doubtless been a foundation for western civilisation (lol @ Ghandi). Time to outgrow it now though.
Look at Jay's belief in the 'rapture'. It's saddening - nothing more than grasping at straws, as if instead of facing death and coming to terms with it you start believing that god is going to whisk you up to heaven any day now. It might provide comfort to these people, i suppose, but it's delusional and that cannot ultimately do anybody any good. Look at the fundagelical beliefs about Israel, the Palestinians and the 'end times'... nothing good can come of that nonsense. And yet religion provides all the framework these people need to further their bigotry and insane agendas.


And i think i can offer an explanation for religion. Originally it spread through group natural selection. Those tribes with a common religious purpose, that were ready and willing to work together and show courage in battle under their god, were better equipped to survive than others. Simple beginnings. The 'religious gene', for want of a better phrase, spread.

My comment is not aimed to say that any one religion would not be at some point dismantled but that religious beliefs will continue to be a major part of society and civilization.

Good point, I would agree with you about most religions. But the spread of Christianity was different than any other religion. It was fiercly opposed, hundreds of thousands were killed in it's infancy. Christianity has had some of the fiercest threats to it's existence, that man could throw at it.

[Kokunai]

If God is all powerful then he should be able to forgive the sinner regardless of punishment or not. That's the nature of being all powerful.

God did have the power to forgive without the death of Jesus, but then the Bible prophecies of Jesus would not be true, making it so we could not trust Him. But God stuck with the plan to send Jesus to die for our sins, so therefore you should believe the entire Bible as the direct and true Word of God.

So god sent Jesus to fulfill his own prophecy and despite being omniscient, god made this prophecy in the first place knowing it would lead to a lot of trouble that could easily be avoided. Plus god could have taken the memory of the prophecy out of humanity's minds to get around that trouble because god is all powerful. And even besides all these logical errors on the part of god who is supposed to be without error, you still have no evidence to prove that this is true since your last point I rebutted.

I already addressed this.

[Kokunai]

If God is all powerful then he should be able to forgive the sinner regardless of punishment or not. That's the nature of being all powerful.

God did have the power to forgive without the death of Jesus, but then the Bible prophecies of Jesus would not be true, making it so we could not trust Him. But God stuck with the plan to send Jesus to die for our sins, so therefore you should believe the entire Bible as the direct and true Word of God.

Caleb that is circular reasoning and your not answering the question.


The reason Christ had to die is, in order to be just God had to have an atonement for the sins, He chose blood to be that atonement. You can see this throughout the old testament as they sacrificed animals to atone but these were not permanent. Christ had to die because we needed a perfect sacrifice for the sins we committed and still commit to this day.

God is all-powerful but he is also righteous, part of being righteous is perfect justice. Without a payment for sins (or violation of the law) there would be no justice that payment is the blood of Christ. In order for the payment to fulfill God's righteous nature it had to be a perfect sacrifice, Christ was perfect in that he never sinned, he could have, but he didn't. None of us can earn our way because none of our deeds can ever make us righteous, and because of that we had to have a way provided to us.

Okay first of all most religious people tend to think that justice and what is right is decided by God so he doesn't have to change his actions to fit his standards, he can change his standards to fit his actions.
And if justice and rightness are independant even of god then howis it justice that someone who never sinned died to help out a sinful people?
Should we put babies to death as punishment for murderers and rapists? It looks like the really sinful crowd got a free pass on this one.

We all got a free pass. Only you have to take the offered pass from the hands of the Saviour through faith.

[Kokunai]

My second question is in regards to his omnipotence. If we accept that God is omnipotent, we must also accept that god is capable of anything, which includes not being omnipotent and all seeing. It's a paradox that is quite confusing, and I would like to hear a rational solution to it.

I don't understand the question. It certainly appears you're just trying to argue here.

Do you accept that I can reach the higher shelf by using a chair, yet I am shorter and can not reach as high if I'm sitting down instead of standing. What a parodox.

An appropriate dodge to my other questions, by strawmanning but a single question.

You seem to be unable to think beyond a linear plane of thought. If we accepted that God was omnipotent, we would accept that he is capable of anything, including non-existence. Moreover, if we accepted that God was additionally omni-benevolent, we would alternatively need to accept that God was incapable of evil, which would negate omnipotence. One of these attributes cannot rationally exist in conjunction with the other.

It's a paradox that I was wondering if Kokunai could rationally explain away, but instead I get a strawman argument from you.

Your definition of evil may be what is messing up your thought. He is the creator of all things the good and the bad. He says this himself. Omni-benevolence? Where do you get that from? Nowhere does he claim to not destroy or avenge actions and people. He says he is wrathful, jealous, vengeful, and he has become angry before. That does not keep him from being righteous though. His righteousness is because that anger will be directed at the thing that offends him.

[Bertros Bertros]

The Slaughter was very much a small matter. Your talking a town, and a small one at that. Not exactly breaking news if the town was not important. Depends on the estimates but some say it may have been less than 100 deaths.

Reading that back I hope you realise how ridiculous it sounds. Saddam Hussain was tried and executed for the killing of 148 people in one small town, Dujail. Was that also a very small matter?

[Kokunai]

What astounds me is that people will swallow any belief system beacuse they do not have the capacity to think for themselves.

All religion is an idea, just because that idea is old does not mean it should be believed in fact the opposite because our forfathers were basically quite inept (except for a few outstanding specimens). All religions are cults. I laugh when a main stream christian tells me another smaller religion is a cult. All religions have borrowed ideas off other religions to gain more followers. Religion is a way to control the masses and supress individual thought and action. They are not all necessarily evil or bad but there actions can cause misery on an astronimical scale.

Wrong, man can corrupt using religion and some religions yes they were designed to control. Christianity however teaches a different dogma altogether. If I thought you were seriously interested I would add more but I think you want to argue hence your first statement.

[Kokunai]

The Slaughter was very much a small matter. Your talking a town, and a small one at that. Not exactly breaking news if the town was not important. Depends on the estimates but some say it may have been less than 100 deaths.

Reading that back I hope you realise how ridiculous it sounds. Saddam Hussain was tried and executed for the killing of 148 people in one small town, Dujail. Was that also a very small matter?

Lol, did you just compare modern media coverage to the equivalent of ancient coverage? Wow, I am through talking to you.

[Bertros Bertros]

The Slaughter was very much a small matter. Your talking a town, and a small one at that. Not exactly breaking news if the town was not important. Depends on the estimates but some say it may have been less than 100 deaths.

Reading that back I hope you realise how ridiculous it sounds. Saddam Hussain was tried and executed for the killing of 148 people in one small town, Dujail. Was that also a very small matter?

Lol, did you just compare modern media coverage to the equivalent of ancient coverage? Wow, I am through talking to you.

Good.

Edit: I say that with all sincerity. Your rhetoric is so insufferably self-important and smug its laughable anyway.

Re-Edit: Oh and in response to your sidestep. No I didn't, I wasn't referring to it in terms of the media coverage, rather the severity of the event. But it's interesting you view the Bible as "media coverage" of the time, so in your eye's it's as reliable source of factual information as say the New York Post.

[Kokunai]

2Dimes I think I might try and explain BOTH the paradox's they are reffering to here a bit more simplyas it seems like you're getting confused.

1) You accept that God is Omnipotent (I assume) - that he has the power to do anything. Therefore, it is in his power to cease to exist.

2) The problem of evil - Judeo-Christians attribute the qualities of Omnipotence and Omnibenevolence (always doing good) to God. These two, however, cannot go hand in hand. On the one hand God always wants good to happen, and so should not let evil happen. He is omnipotent and so it should be in his power to stop evil. Therefore he is either omnibenevolant but not omnipotent (he wants to stop evil but can't) or omnipotent but not omnibenevolant (he is all-powerful but doesn't want to stop evil).

The general counter of the problem of evil is that it is 'all part of God's plan' or that it is simply a lack of good, rather than a genuine presence of evil. In either case, I like to look to Dostoyevsky's character of Ivan in The Brothers Karamazov who declares that a God who allows such atrocities as the slaughter of innocent children is not a God worthy of worship.

'People talk sometimes of bestial cruelty, but that's a great injustice and insult to the beasts; a beast can never be so cruel as a man, so artistically cruel....

I've collected a great, great deal about Russian children, Alyosha. There was a little girl of five who was hated by her father and mother.... You see, I must repeat again, it is a peculiar characteristic of many people, this love of torturing children, and children only.... It's just their defenselessness that tempts the tormentor, just the angelic confidence of the child who has no refuge and no appeal that sets his vile blood on fire....

This poor child of five was subjected to every possible torture by those cultivated parents. They beat her, thrashed her, kicked her for no reason till her body was one bruise. Then, they went to greater refinements of cruelty -- shut her up al night in the cold and frost in a privy, and because she didn't ask to be taken up at night... they smeared her face and filled her mouth with excrement, and it was her mother, her mother did this. And that mother could sleep, hearing the poor child's groans! Can you understand why a little creature, who can't even understand what's done to her, should beat her little aching heart with her tiny fist in the dark and cold, and weep her meek unresentful tears to dear, kind God to protect her?... Do you understand why this infamy must be and is permitted?... Why, the whole world of knowledge is not worth that child's prayer to 'dear, kind God'!...

Imagine that you are creating a fabric of human destiny with the object of making men happy in the end, giving them peace and rest at last, but that it was essential and inevitable to torture to death only one tiny creature -- that baby beating its breast with its fist, for instance -- and to found that edifice on its unavenged tears, would you consent to be the architect on those conditions? Tell me, and tell the truth."

"No, I wouldn't consent," said Alyosha softly.

On 2. If you decide that God's actions are evil does that make them so? No, all his actions are righteous. We just do not have the mind of God to know the big picture. I could answer this but you won't accept scripture.