Bushidobillyclub, I sincerely can respect what you shared here.

Bushidobillyclub ,God just wants REAL people, not Fakes.

Ok?

Just continue being Real,and
continue to seek answers about Truth, and the REAL Truth will come to You.

Including the REAL Truth about God.

To paraphrase Larry the Cable Guy: "Now that's good advice right there, I don't care who you are."

First, tree rings that match current observations, Ice cores that match the tree rings which match the observations, which match the isotopic radio dating which matches . .. sense a theme here, that is just the age issue. Evolution, which match taxonomy, which matches genetics which matches the fossil record which matches geological observations . . . .

Its all been presented here before, the lack of understanding simply falls on the ostrich with head in sand. Or the Monkey with hands over eyes, or the human who doesn't read the journals and study the science with an open mind.

I agree I just sense this is advice which is not followed without bias by the adviser.

science is all about stripping away ALL bias, then proceeding forward in a methodical way. That is the only way to get to the root of the issues that go against common sense, to really dig into the reality of the unintuitive.

Interesting. Could you provide me with the atmospheric data of 12,000 BCE so that I can check the accuracy of the measurements for the Isotopic ratio's.

How old is the earth?

Here is just one of many websites , that presents "both sides of the coin"

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-age-of-earth.html

Yes, we can . . . its call strata. Particulate matter accumulates at known rates on the ground .. . ever sweep up dust?

This is why things are cross checked. For you to ignore this should require you to counter the data with a working theory of your own that matches BETTER to the data . . . something no creationist has EVER done.

Look, I dont need to convince you it has been tried before I have no hope it will work. But others that have less bias may read these words and see the truth in them . . . and not trust what I say but be curious enough to pursue the knowledge with an open mind and vigorous study.

You are incorrect here in so many counts it's not even funny.

MorningSong asked me if I had read the entire book clear through. I said no, absolutely not.

Now you take that to me that I have never read it at all. That's a complete falsehood. I've read more than enough of it to know that it is self-contradictory and in many cases totally unbelievable with respect to supposedly being the word of an all-wise God. I don't believe that an all-wise God would have done the stupid things that I did read in the Bible. Including sending his Son to die on a pole for mankind. I personally think that would be an extremely unwise thing to for a supreme being to do on so many levels.

For one thing it shows us that this supposedly divine God doesn't have any morals than the crude men who lived in those ignorant times. The idea that God seeks vengeances through blood and guts scenarios is utterly absurd to me. This reduces God to nothing more than a barbarian. He solve problems using crude blood and guts methods. Where's the wisdom in that? I don't see any wisdom in that a all my friend.

Also, you say that I have chosen not to believe in the bible. I beg your pardon but believing in the bible is not a choice for me. The bible is in conflict with itself. What is it that am I to believe?

It's impossible for me to believe in the entire biblical story. On the one hand the bible claims that God is all-wise, and the ultimately supreme intelligence, but then it turns around and tells story after story after story, where this supposedly all-wise God solves all his problems using crude ignorant very unwise methods!

What's to believe? It's a total contradiction!

What do you want me to do Eljay? Pretend to believe in something that appears to me to be so totally absurd that it can't possibly be true?

You have no clue how many times in my life I have gone back to the Bible to try to justify it. And YES! It must be justified! If it can't be justified then how can I say that God is just?

If I can't say with confidence that the biblical description of God is just it can only be because I don't BELIEVE that the biblical description God is just. Well, duh? If I don't believe it, I don't believe it!

You know that at one point in my life I wanted to be able to TEACH the biblical account of God. At that time I naively BELIEVED that it was the word of God. After all, my parents told that it was the word of God, my entire extended family all believed that it was the word of God. The nice friendly preacher at out church assured me that it was the word of God, and every member of the congregation would smile and verify that the Bible is indeed the word of God. We had nice ladies like MorningSong who would confess that they know God exists and there is nothing to worry about.

I had absolutely no reason to believe that it wasn't the word of God!

That is, until I started reading it for myself!

I could have taken two paths right there and then Eljay! Let's talk about CHOICES for a moment!

I could have chosen to be SELFISH. I had gone to the alter and accepted Jesus Christ as my savior. Everyone was so proud of me. The whole congregation was pleased. I was 'saved'. I was a born again Christian.

I could have been selfish and just stopped right there proclaiming to the world that I had been saved and praise Jesus!

But alas, I chose not to be selfish. I chose to share the word of God with the rest of the world. Maybe that was a bad choice Eljay. Maybe choosing to serve the biblical God was a bad choice.

What happened?

Well, one of the first things that happened was that I began to ask questions about what the bible was saying. After all, we're supposed to read the Bible right? And we're also suppose to study it. In fact, I even took Bible Studies classes at our church! To begin with I wasn't happy with their explanations.

Moreover, the deeper I probed into wanting to get at answers the more I realized that these people who supposedly believe in God could not provide answers to these questions. They confessed that they did not know. They would often point me to the preacher. Soon the preacher even dreaded seeing me coming! Even he could not answer these questions. He's answer would often be, "We must have faith" along with a hand on my shoulder and a short prayer. Well that's no answer at all. That just a confession that even the preacher doesn't understand the answers to these questions!

It was my hope to be able to get to the bottom of things and explain precisely what the word of God is saying. What I discovered is that it is unreachable. I could not teach or justify the biblical story to a non-believer with confidence, and the reason is quite simple. The Bible DOES NOT provide the necessary answers.

Then I had to look in the mirror and ask my self, "Why am I believing in something that I can't even truly believe in enough to teach it to others?"

I had to ask the really tough question Eljay. I had to ask myself whether I truly believe this stuff, or whether I'm just pretending to believe it for the sake of getting myself 'saved'.

Do I love Jesus? How the hell could I love someone whom I never met? That's a joke. Anyone who says that the love Jesus is a liar. If they are worshiping Jesus it's only because they want to save their own butt from eternal damnation and they think he can do it!

And therein lies the crux of the matter Eljay. Before a person can believe in Jesus them just first believe that there is something they need to be saved from!

What are we being saved from? God's wrath!

Who is Jesus? Jesus is God!

Now we come to a circular set-up. What we have here is a circular story of a God who set things up so that we must worship him to be saved from his own wrath and this is somehow supposed to be all our fault?

Well, I've thought about this for DECADES Eljay. Literally DECADES of very DEEP thought. So don't anyone even dare to suggest that I walked away from this without giving it much thought.

The bible is a mind-controlling brainwashing gimmick. It was written and devised by men for many reasons as it evolved throughout history. From the very get-go it was a story about fear. Worship God and do as he says or you will be punished. That was the story of Adam and Eve. Moreover, this story also placed Eve in the doghouse as having been the one to corrupt Adam (the innocent man). So women had just better shut up because they have already caused enough problems!

Yes, it's true! This makes perfect sense when viewed as a story made up by the male leaders of tribes. Women ask too many questions. You can shut them up by telling them that God expects them to be the helpmate of man. Clearly they are secondary having been made from a rib of Adam, and woman was also the one who led Adam into sin. Shame on the women, they better not sass or backtalk the men whom they are suppose to be helpmate too!

Later on as the bible evolves, the male chauvinism is expanded upon the laws of God are carved in stone. Non-believers are cast as heathens and must be MURDERED by the masses if necessary!

Here we have man creating a religion using God as an excuse for his wars and for murdering anyone who disagrees with his religion and his AUTHORITY! Yes, this is man's authority not God's. Mankind just invented this religion so he could pretend to have the authority of God behind him!

The bible makes PERFECT SENSE when viewed in this way. I can understand the bible perfectly when I see it having been written by men for their own purposes. This is like Toto having pulled the curtain back to expose the little man who's pulling all the levers.

Now go back and imagine that an all-wise all-intelligent being wrote this book? I'm sorry, but there are so many reasons why that makes absolutely not sense at all. There is no reason for God to have the motivation that these men had!

Moreover, where did Jesus ever tell anyone to murder heathens? How could he have been the same God who lusted so profoundly to have heathens murdered? He even denounced the stoning of sinners. He even denounced taking revenge as in an eye-for-an-eye and a tooth-for-a-tooth! He taught to turn the other cheek?

Here's a supposedly UNCHANGING God who has had a completely persona overhaul?

That's just yet another contradiction to the premise that this God is dependable and unchanging!

NOTHING adds up Eljay. Nothing.

Everything points to the stories being clearly created by men for their own agenda, and none of it wash clean as being from a Holy Divine Being!

Finally, I'm not alone in my assessment.

Albert Einstein came to the exact same conclusions. Isaac Newton also came to precisely the same conclusions and what most people don't even understand is that Isaac Newton devoted as much time and energy to studying the Bible as he did to studying science!

Why don't they teach us in church that the most brilliant minds in history have concluded that the Bible can't be true? They don't want us to know that the most intelligent people of all don't even believe it.

Carl Sagan made a good point. He said that the stage is far too big for the biblical plot. He was referring to the entire universe. But I think his observation even holds just for planet earth! The biblical story is far too regional, and it most certainly does contain many of the Mediterranean folklores. In fact, it really isn't all that much differnet from Greek Mythology actually. Hardly any different at all. Blood sacrifices were common in almost all man's religious myths clear around the globe. Yet their Gods all wanted something different. So it can't be because the 'real' God needs to have blood sacrifices. It much more reasonable to recognize that blood sacrifices is something that men can easily build superstitions around.

Why should the real creator of this universe just happen to be so obsessed with solving everything with blood sacrifices to the point where he had to send his only begotten Son to become one?

No Elay, I couldn't believe in the Bible to save my soul. It's just not a believable picture.

It's not a choice. I can't believe that God is that crude and stupid. It's as simple as that.

Especially when the premise is supposed to be that God is all-wise and all-intelligent!

It flies in the face of it's own premises.

There is nothing all-wise or all-intelligent about always solving problems with bloodshed.

It's not a choice for me Eljay. It's not that I refuse to believe the Bible. I'm saying that it's basically unbelievable. To ask me to believe in the bible would be like asking me to believe that I can jump off a skyscraper and not be hurt when I hit the pavement below.

At the very best I could LIE and say that I believe it. But would I truly believe it? Of course not!

Well, it's the same way with the Bible Eljay. It's not a choice. I can't just say that I believe it and pretend that I do when I don't. It's not a choice. It's a totally unbelievable story that is so self-contradictory that it can't possible be true.

It can't be true. Period.

I sometimes actually do give the 'what-if' scenario that it might be true! But it's really wrong of me to do that. Because it's impossible for it to be true. In order for it to be true it would need to go against it's own premises that God is all-wise, etc. But if it goes against it's own premises then it wouldn't be true. Therefore it can't be true under any circumstances. God can't be both all-wise and unwise at the same time. But in order for the Bible to be true, he would need to be both of these things simultaneously.

Just like he would need to be BOTH, unchanging, and quite changeable.

Jesus himself flies in the very face of the persona of the God of Abraham.

Jesus cannot be the God of Abraham if the God of Abraham was UNCHANGING. And I'm talking about in moral character and in what he wants from us.

Clearly Jesus taught the opposite things that the God of Abraham DEMANDED that we do!

The God of Abraham said that it was our DUTY to murder heathens and stone sinners to death!

Jesus said to turn the other cheek.

They can't both be the same UNCHANGING personality.

It's can't be true. Period.

It's not a choice to believe it, Eljay. I have no choice in the matter. It is an unbelievable story. It's not my choice. I can't choose to believe in something that totally contradicts itself.

And just as a finally word. You talk about reading the Bible. What I discovered is that the VAST MAJORITY of Christian never read the Bible in it's entirety either. Most of them claim to believe in something yet they have no clue what they are even claiming to believe!

All they are believing is that if they accept Jesus Christ as their Savior they'll be saved. They couldn't care less what the rest of the Bible even says! They just want to be saved. They don't feel a need to justify the stories. They are even taught not to question God's motives anyway. That's considered to be rude and unacceptable. You don't question God's motives!!!

Well, it's easy to say that you believe in something that you don't question. But if you don't even question it, then how can you say that you truly believe it?

Don't want to hijack the conversation, so this is just a "drive-by" post.

In order for me to accept that the earth is only 6,000-10,000 years old, I would have to disregard pretty much 100% of what I know about the physical universe and how it works.

So from an inverse perspective, where is the proof that 100% of what I know about the physical universe is false?

Of course that's just a rhetorical question - whose only purpose is to illustrate the use and significance of "100%" as it relates to the argument.

As you were.

SURE.

But at what point do you claim 10/10 chance of something being right?

In math all the time we will say something is a given when in fact it does have a small chance of being wrong, or right or whatever the case may be.

The fact is, there is a chance that the Flying spaghetti monster exists . . . . assigning a probably at all requires us to, like you said, throw out everything we know.

But sure we COULD do that, and have a very long, very small number as our probability.

how about
.000000000000000000000000000000000000000
0000000000000000000000000000000000000000
0000000000000000000000000000000000000000
0000000000000000000000000000000000000000
00001 chance?

Or maybe just .000000000000000000
0000000000000000000000000000000000000000
000000000001

Honestly you have a greater chance of quantum mechanically tunneling through your kitchen wall.

When the probability extends the likelihood for it to occur with certainty to be vastly past the life of our universe then I call BS, and will with certitude say 100% Blah at lest in THIS reality. lol


The problem with creationism . . . is we cant even assign a probability no matter how extreme. That is why it is not even wrong.

At the end of the day, the flying spaghetti monster is much more likely and at least fits the data .. . because the wily spaghetti monster puts the observable data there to trick us . . . and so we can account for it with that twisted piece of humor where creationism doesn't even deal with the data.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Spaghetti_Monster

They just dont like it because its not pretty and they want to believe that they were created by a supreme being fully formed. They wish to negate the ape process all together. Where are these Adam and Eve bones then? Are they just conveniently lost? They would only be 6000 years old. How would we even be able to tell Adam and Eve bones from normal bones? Would they glow in the dark? Would they be radioactive?

Actually - you have the exact same problem with Isotopic dating as you do with the accounting of Creationism. And here's why.

With Isotopic dating - you have the occurance of one element changing into another through the loss of material from the nucleus. The accuracy for this test states a premise that you must have two different examples to test from that were created at the same time. Well - how do we assure the test elements were created at the same time? We can't. So. 50-50 chance that the results of the experiment are worthy to extrapolate our theory back into time - 100 percent chance we can derive accurate data by studying the ongoing change of the test elements. Problem with that is that hardly anyone will be around for even the half life of the isotopes, let alone long enough to witness the chance change that is anticipated to occur.

As to the bible - you have a 50-50 chance that the writers of the text are either right, and what they wrote is the truth, or they are wrong - and what they wrote is myth. extrapolation back and time has the same reliability that any staed fact for Isotopic dating does - no one is alive to testify what was witnessed. However - looking forward, if what was written comes to pass, than the accuracy for the text is supported by the occurance of what was predicted.

Explain to me now - how one is more valid than the other. Which of these two remains more likely to exhibit is self as "absolute" outside of the testimony of man? Since I was not there to witness the writing of the bible to assert for myself that these men were in deed inspired by God - and you were not there to witness the experiments done on elements that cannot be verified to have begun their degeneration at the same point in time, tell me who's right?

Is your faith in the presumptions of science more valid than mine in the testimony of eyewitness of scripture?

Here's what I claim is fact. The validity of either of our beliefs is absolutely subjective, based on the acceptance of our world view. You can attempt to refute that statement if you wish.
Aside from that. If you haven't stopped crying yet - you're a fool.

Abra, you wrote ( in an earlier post) and I quote:

" It has never been revealed to me who Jesus Christ TRULY IS."


Abra....
God
Has ALREADY REVEALED HIMSELF TO US IN HIS WORD .

From the first page to the last page of His Word, God reveals Himself.

But Abra....

God will NEVER Reveal Himself to someone ,who already THINKS he KNOWS WHO GOD IS!!

Wanna Know WHY ,Abra?

Cause God will NEVER FORCE you or anyone, to Believe on Him.

He leaves that choice up to Man to decide.

Remember...God gave Man a FREE WILL !!!

God wants man to come to Him WILLINGLY..no other way!!!



So Here is the KEY , Abra :

You GONNA HAVE TO WANNA KNOW GOD!!

If you don't wanna... you never gonna know God.

It's as Simple as that.

BUT Abra....if perchance one day you DO decide you wanna REALLY KNOW THE TRUTH ABOUT GOD... AND WHO HE REALLY IS?
And NOT just settle no more for Who you just THINK God is?

Then that is when you are gonna know God.

And Abra.....when you DO FINALLY ONE DAY...DECIDE TO TAKE A STEP TO REALLY GET TO KNOW GOD ?

That is when God will ALSO then take a step towards you....and lead and Guide you into the TRUTH about Him.

But until then,God is just waiting on YOU ,to FINALLY GIVE UP TELLING HIM WHO YOU THINK HE IS....and decide, that You NOW REALLY WANT to Get to Know Him...for REAL.

Abra...do you want to keep floundering and ranting on and on and on and on and on , about a God you have not even taken the time to get to Know....

OR

do you wanna get to TRULY KNOW God now .

It's all up to you, Abra.

And If You ARE RealLY REALLY READY to mean BUSINESS with God Now,just ASK Him to show you the TRUTH about Him Now..and He WILL.

You just gotta wanna now ......that is all God is waiting on.
You.
To TRULY WANT to Know Him.

Again, God is NEVER gonna FORCE you to Get to Know Him.
Ever.

However, God will try to get your attention, but then leave the desire to know Him, ENTIRELY up to you.

Always.

Abra;

You know that I am not asking you to believe the bible - I'm asking you to be accurate when you are quoting it or refrencing it, and not assuming that christian behavior is determined by the actions of those who claim to be. I see no diference in the lack of credibility on Tribo's part as I do yours - but his portrayal of what the text states is accurate, and he does not establish false truths with pretext. If I were to do that with evolution you'd be all over my post. And rightfully so.

I can't disagree with you how discouraging it is how many professed christians have not even read the entire New Testament, let alone the entire bible. If that were a prerequisite to even walking into a church building for services - that anyone entering these premises must have read the New Testament, I dare say that you would have an overwhelming abundance of church buildings in Realator listings. You'd likely have few - if any christian churches at all. However - this does not have anything to do with the validity of the New Testament.

So - why have you not at least read the whole New Testament? Or have you? You know my story. It took until I was in my mid-30's before I even bothered to answer that question for myself. Meanwhile - all through my life up ti that point I had an opinion about it. No justification for my opinion - but that didn't stop me from having one.

I would not even begin to argue against the reasons you have stated for not believing. I know that there have likely been a small handful of days when the thought of these things were dismissed lightly when they crossed your mind. In just the short time that we've crossed path's in our lives - I find you on the threads here in the religious section on a daily basis - so this is obviously something very important to you. As I'm sure you realize it is to me. despite what you may think - your interest matters to me - which is why, as a christian who has devoted no less time than you have thinking and studying on these things - I bring up the inconsistancies in your thinking when you attempt to represent how a christian thinks, or how the text is interpreted and viewed by a believer.

I've said this before - I'll say it again. What point does it make trying to justify the "why of God" when you are aware of the "what of God".

I rarely disagree with your objections to why God judges or allows consequences to occur - they make no more sense to me than they do you, but you are silent on the "what should God have done instead". In my line of work - pointing out problems is a massive waste of time without having an idea of an alternative solution. Even one that is absurd. When I have an actor tell me that he is uncomfortable doing something on stage and doesn't give me an idea of what would be comfortable - I just tell him that he might as well exit them, cause I can't help him. I'll just let someone else say his lines.

So then - now that you've pointed out all the problems - what is the solution. What should God have done instead?

Your so wrong eljay, im not even going to go into it. I will say one and only one thing that blows your argument out of the water . . . .

When we look at the results if it where 50/50 then we would see that they match the other fields of study only 50% of the time . . . . So when the tests are done accurately why do we then see it match up to the same degree of accuracy . . .

Instead we see pretty functions which graph nicely . . and makes sense.

You sir are not correct. Once again you fail to understand data analysis.

I think its time for me to go study so have fun all.

Alright Eljay, you devoutly religious folks always start in on dating methods because it is more or less the "last frontier" between what scientists have repeatedly demonstrated to be reality and what your belief system cant seem to muster the strength to handle. Our understanding of the shape and pattern of the history of life depends on the accuracy of fossils and dating methods. So I understand that this is no small issue. However the ONLY argument I ever see your crowd making is that "its all inaccurate, can not be trusted and your interpretations of this data are somehow more credible and justifiable." Seeing as I had to explain to you what Cro-magnum man was exactly, maybe you are not making that assertion. I dont know. But you cant ignore this data and stick your head in the sand. It warrants your attention. As a former math teacher, you should find it interesting I hope.

You simply can not sit here and declare that hundreds of millions of fossils that currently reside in display cases and drawers around the world are ALL inaccurately dated.That is paranoia plain and simple. Perhaps some would argue that these specimens, huge skeletons of dinosaurs, blocks from ancient shell beds containing hundreds of specimens, delicately preserved fern fronds, have been manufactured by scientists to confuse the public. This is clearly ludicrous. So unless you are attempting to assert that all of these findings found in museums throughout the world are simply all the same age then I dont know how exactly you are trying to support your beliefs. Were all of these fossils somehow buried in the rocks by some extraordinary catastrophe, perhaps Noah’s flood? How exactly could all the dinosaurs, mammoths, early humans, heavily-armored fishes, trilobites, ammonites, and the rest all live together? How could all of the marine creatures drown in the flood of Noah? Sea creatures dont drown! Its crazy speak. Rejecting fossil data cannot be supported by proof.

You can refute the mountains of scientific data and evidence until the cows come home but clearly all you are demonstrating is that its far easier for you to make these claims yet a whole hell of a lot harder for you to demonstrate how these findings are erroneous or inaccurate in some respect. Go ahead, pick a respect. The fossils occur in regular sequences time after time; radioactive decay happens, and repeated cross testing of radiometric dates confirms their validity.

I've certainly read all of the gospels. I haven't read the entire New Testament, at least not in whole. And the reason for this is because when I sit down in earnest to try to do that I simply can't get very far before it becomes totally meaningless. They sound like they are just stating things that they'd like us to believe but they aren't given and decent reasons for why things should be that way.

Once you've seen the little man pulling the levers behind the curtain it's hard to believe what the puppet figurine is telling you. Why should you believe it?

You want to ask question of this figurine directly but you CAN'T because it's just a book. All you can do is take what the authors are spoon feeding you, and what they are spoon feeding you often CONFLICTS with what they spoon fed you earlier in the book!

You also can't separate the New Testament form the Old. You're fooling yourself terribly if you try to do that. Jesus is NOTHING on his own. Absolutely NOTHING. His entirety claim to divinity rests entirely on believing in the Old Testament FIRST!

In fact, if you can't read the Old Testament FIRST and BELIEVE IT! Then you truly have no right to even look at the New Testament. You must believe and accept the Old Testament FIRST! Otherwise the New Testament is meaningless. Trying to do it backwards is truly the joke of Christianity.



There are so many.

First off, why is God even allowing a fallen angel to screw with his creation?

If the wages of sin are death and sin is disagreement and disobedience to God then why isn't this fallen angle dead? That's the first contradiction right there.

Moreover, why is a fallen angel even required? Wasn't mankind evil enough of his own to fall from grace without the help of a fallen angel?

Who's at fault for mankind's fall? Man? Or the devil? If it is entirely the responsibility of man, then why even make up a devil in the first place?

I'll tell you why! Because the story was fabricated by mankind and they needed to invent the concept of evil demons to scare people with that's why!

In fact, the idea that Jesus when around casting demons out of people is pretty silly don't you think? If a person is possessed by an evil demon then how could they be held responsible for that? Why should a person be responsible for having been possessed by an evil demon?

Clearly if Jesus can cast the evil demon out of the person then the person never deserved to be possessed by it in the first place.

The story makes absolutely no sense Eljay. It only makes sense as a truly silly superstition. But it makes no sense at all in terms of a genuine supreme being allowing ghosts and goblins to possess the souls of men.

So right off the bat, if I were going to create a race of beings I would do it in an terrarium when there ware no evil demons and just let the race of beings that I'm creating answer for THEMSELVES. There's absolutely no need for any devil or evil demons. Either man is evil, or he is not! If he needs an evil demon to make him evil then he's a victim rather than a culprit!

So right off the bat, I'm at odds with the whole story.

Secondly, why is God creating women secondly as an afterthought? Why introduce the prejudice and bias based on gender? Even today we teach each other than such prejudice and bias is improper. Yet God seems to not only condone it but DEMAND IT!

If I were God I would have created Adam and Eve as a totally egalitarian couple and frown on anyone who incites bigotry based on gender.

And probably MOST IMPORTANTLY OF ALL,... I would NEVER asks anyone to slaughter an animal or anything to appease me for their disobedient of me. To me that sends an utterly WRONG MESSAGE. It's suggests a myriad of terrible things. It says that it's ok to kill animals for ceremonial rituals. It says that it's ok to disobey as long as you are willing to kill an animal to pay for your disobedience. It's basically a free ticket to buy the right to disobey!

What kind of a message is that to send to people? It's no skin off their nose if they have to slaughter an animal to pay for disobedience!

Hell's bell's if I were going to demand something as an appeasement for disobedience I would demand some kind of community SERVICE! I would make them to something POSITIVE and CONSTRUCTIVE to make atonements for their bad behavior. I would have them so busy doing positive and constructive things that they wouldn't have time to sin!

Make them grow a Garden and tend it! That'll keep them busy for a while. It only take one stupid night of heavy drinking to roast a sacrificial lamb. And what is learned by that?

Also, if I was going to inspire a book to be written it would FOCUS more own how to properly raise children than anything else. And I'm talking about how to MENTOR them with love, patience and understanding. I'm not talking about how to scare them into being BLINDLY obedient.

On the contrary my Bible would be all about UNDERSTANDING!

I also wouldn't change my tactics half way through the thing.

I would teach people in the first half of my book to stone sinners to death and kill heathen, and then teach them in the second half of my book not to stone people to death and to turn the other cheek.

I'd pick one moral value and stick to it!

I'd probably agree with Jesus. But that conflicts with the CURRENT Old Testament.

You can't just talk about the New Testament and ignore the Old.

Either Jesus was the God of Abraham or he was NOT.

If not, then fine. Let's rip the frigg'in Bible in half and toss out the Old Testament as being a completely FALSE GOD!

The only problem is that Jesus is suppose to be that FALSE GOD!

The Bible taken as a whole is an oxymoron.

Jesus cannot possibly have been an incarnation (or even the Son) of the God of Abraham. He's WAY TOO DIFFERENT!

I might actually be half-tempted to become a Jesus Freak myself if you can emancipate Jesus from the Old Testament. But I'm afraid that's not possible. As soon as you do that his crucifixion is meaningless.

The Bible must be taken as a whole. There's no two ways about it.

That's unfortunately because the New Testament alone might have had some merit in some sense. But the crucifixion is entirely dependent on the God who lusts for blood sacrifices to pay for disobedience.

It's just not a doable religion.

It's not a choice. Eljay.

I can't choose to believe in Jesus without also believing in the Old Testament. And I can't possibly believe that the real creator of this universe is like the God depicted in the Old Testament.

It's not a choice. It can't be true because it is based on oxymoronic propositions. The biblical God would need to be simultaneously all-wise and all-stupid. Or simultaneously all-powerful and all-helpless. Or simultaneously all-perfect and totally-flawed.

These are all blatant contradictions.

Therefore there's nothing to believe.

What exactly is it that you actually believe Eljay?

That Jesus Christ died to pay for your sins?

But who did he pay?

Himself?

He was the one who demanded blood sacrifices to pay for sins!

Was that a wise thing to do?

Not likely since it ended up that he has to sacrifice himself to himself.

What an idiot!

Seriously, think about it!

An all-knowing, all-wise, all-perfect God designs a universe in such a way that in order to save it he has to have himself nailed to a pole?

Is that a wise God?

I think not.

I found another cause for stoning.

For a woman who is not a virgin on her wedding night

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 22:13-21



Um okay, if Im understanding this cryptic wording, if this broad doesn't have a hymen, they are going to stone her to death. Not all virgins have hymens to begin with and some have them but they rupture prior to actual intercourse. So I wonder how many girls were murdered over the ages simply because they didnt bleed a little after penetration or because some stupid elder could not find evidence of an intact hymen.

Well, not only that but what kind of a God would ask people to stone a woman do death based on the idea that she might not be a virgin.

This is "God's word"?

I'm being asked to believe that God is really like this?

Is this Jesus Christ asking these people to stone this woman to death?

Is Jesus Christ the same God as the God of the Old Testament?

If not, call Houston! We've got a problem!

Plus these would have been GIRLS. Women were betrothed probably in their teen years. So they were in effect stoning girls probably as young as 14 years old. Basically they would stone to death a suspected non virgin OR a woman who had been raped. To me it is unfathomable. This god was a misogynist.