In light of the fact that the world is indeed quite crude and rude, it's hard enough to believe in a spiritual essence to life, this is true.

But the Biblical fables have God lower himself to that very same level by either "having" or "allowing" his son to be crudely nailed to a pole to pay for the salvation of man.

You're not just asking me to believe that the world is crude and rude, but you're asking me to believe that God is too!

I'll be perfectly honest with you Cowboy, when you get me thinking along these lines you actually make the atheist's arguments look extremely intelligent.

What kind of a decent perfect all-GOOD God would have created a dog-eat-dog world in the FIRST PLACE?

That's a very serious question that atheism easily answers, "It's simply, there is no such thing as God".

That is a POWERFUL solution to the problem of so-called "evil" right there.

The Christian story requires fallen angels being at war with God and all sort of silliness.

And then we have the scientific evidence that the world was "dog-eat-dog" long before mankind ever came onto the scene pretty much blowing the "fall from grace" fable out of the water right there.

How could mankind's fall from grace be responsible for what already existed before he did?

Trying to PIN all the rudeness and crudeness onto mankind doesn't make any sense.

And again, why would God LOWER himself to those same stupid standard by associating "Salvation" with a rude and crude act like having his totally innocent son crucified to pay for our sins.

That doesn't help anything. That just brings God right down to the same rude and crude level! God stooping to human standards of rudeness and crudeness to make his point?

I don't buy it.

On the contrary humanity needs an "uplifting" God, not a God who's just going to contribute to the same rude and crude mentality that men already have!

I just came from a web site the other day that was pointing out the fact that the biblical stories don't contain one iota of information that could not have been the simple-minded thoughts of the men who wrote these fables.

In other words, where is there any "Divine Wisdom" in any of this?

I don't see it!

God didn't have Jesus crucified. God sent Jesus to give us the new covenant between man and God and to fulfilled the old. It was the people that did not believe he spoke that truth that crucified him. So wrong again, please try again if you wish.

What in the world are you talking about? The world may have been a dog eat dog before man showed. Man was put in the garden of Eden where the paradise was, not here. Then they were kicked out of the Garden of Eden and put here where it was a crude dog eat dog world. It wouldn't make much sense to kick them out of one paradise to place in another, now would it?

This cannot work Cowboy.

You're trying to free God from any responsibility for the crucifixion and place all the blame for it on mankind.

SO TYPICAL!

That cannot be made to work.

You can't have Jesus being crucified by men when this wasn't "God's Plan", and then having God say, "Oh well, now that you've done this I'll make it so that you have to accept this crucifixion on your behalf to pay for your sins".

That's ridiculous.

Either Jesus was the "Sacrificial Lamb" of God to pay for our sins, or he wasn't.

You've got to make up your mind on that one and stick to it.

You can't have the "Blood of Jesus" washing away your sins, if that blood represents nothing more than mankind butchering Jesus on their own accord because they didn't believe him.

Moreover, you have this very same God commanding men to do just that! This is the same God who commanded men to kill heathens with no mercy!

You have men basically trying to obey the commandments of this very God when they were crucifying Jesus.

In fact, you have men basically trying to obey the commandments of this very God when they were trying to stone the woman to death at the well for committing adultery!

In short, all of the violent behaviors that are taking place in these absurd stories are nothing more than mortal men trying to do precisely what this biblical God had commanded that they should do!

Men wouldn't be killing each other as "heathens" if they didn't already believe that some God told them to do so. They wouldn't be stoning people to death as "sinners" if they didn't already believe that some God told them to do so.

It was this very religion that had people behaving in these ways in the FIRST PLACE!

An atheist can't help but wonder if these men would have been so screwed up if it wasn't for their stupid religious myths in the FIRST PLACE!

No sorry Cowboy.

The whole idea of killing heathens and blasphemers was supposedly this God's idea in the FIRST PLACE!

God would have no one to blame but himself for this act.

When you ask me to believe in these absurd fables you're truly asking me to believe that God is dumber than rocks.

mans laws and Gods laws, both included in the bible and often confused

Accepting Jesus into your heart isn't specifically accepting the crucifixion and or any sacrifice on your part. Jesus is lord of all. He has instructed us to not do certain things. And the old testament prophesied Jesus coming. So should have been no surprise he showed up one day. So no right off the bat they should have known this was the messiah prophesized in the old testament. If they would have been obedient they would have known that the coming of Jesus was to happen and the ending of the old covenant. Was all prophesied. God informed us of it happening before it happened, again how is it God's fault? He told us something was going to happen, it happens, and they accuse Jesus of spreading blaspheme, again when all this was prophesied about before hand. And also in the new covenant there is no need for sacrificing for forgiveness. Once we have accepted Jesus as lord and savior, all we need is to ask full heartedly for forgiveness.

Nothing from the Bible makes any sense Cowboy.

And no, it doesn't make any sense to me that God would place his children in a hostile dog-eat-dog environment if his GOAL is to teach them righteous behavior.

Why place them in an environment that gives just the opposite examples in nature?

That would be utterly stupid.

Yes, indeed, place them in paradise so they can CLEARLY SEE that ALL EVIL comes solely from THEM.

If we looked around at nature, and saw that only humans do nasty things, and that all of the natural world was "GOOD", then I might be inclined to consider a religion that blames all evil and sin on mankind too!

But place me in a world where everything is "naturally evil", then why should I feel that I'm responsible for all the bad things in the world?

So no, I disagree with you. God most certainly should have abandoned Adam and Eve right there in paradise and let them see for themselves that all evil flows directly FROM THEM!

If they straighten up and fly right there's nothing ELSE to FIX, because they are clearly the source of the problem!

But placing them in an environment where everything would clearly be screwed up anyway, even if they weren't there, then how are they ever supposed to figure out that they are the SOURCE of imperfections?

So I would argue that a truly wise God should have done just the opposite of what you think makes "sense".

How many atheists have you already heard who have pointed out how sick it is that animals eat other animals?

So clearly if God did what you suggest, then it backfired on him because all he's done is convince his children that the world would be screwed up even without them, so how could they possible recognized that they should be ones to blamed for all this crap?

No, that makes no sense at all as far as I'm concerned.

One is only a child of God if they are born again. We are God's creations yes, but not the children of God less you wish to be.

You're really out in left field today Abra. What in the world are you talking about?


There is no source of imperfections. Adam and Eve aren't the source of any imperfections. Abra, the Garden of Eden and earth are two totally different places. They didn't bring the imperfections into this world. They got us kicked out of the garden of eden, that is all. The imperfections in this world are here for punishment. Because again, if there were no imperfections, this world would be perfect and without blemish, it would be the garden of eden. And we are put here for disobedience to our father.

I don't believe in a God that is as pathetic and inept as your religion demands.

Sorry.

If you were sorry, you wouldn't have used the words "pathetic" or "inept". If you were sorry, you would have found a polite way to say that you don't agree with his beliefs.

That was polite.

But perhaps you are right. Maybe I used to the term "sorry" in an attempt to be polite.

On second thought, why should I be sorry that I don't believe in a pathetic and inept picture of God?

No, I'm actually glad that I don't.

And now I'm "sorry" for the confusion.

I guess I just feel sorry for Cowboy because he seems so intent on trying to convince people in his religion.

It seems to me that he is defending his religion from unfair and impolite attacks. No reason for you to feel sorry for him, it seems you are his primary debate opponent. If you really feel sorry for him, stop using words like "pathetic" and "inept" to describe God and you'll probably notice he won't feel so moved to defend his faith.

To begin with people need to stop thinking of religions as being "personal property".

An ancient culture wrote up scriptures claiming to speak for the creator of all humanity. That automatically gives all humans the right to offer their own personal opinions and views concerning what they personally think about these stories.

I honestly and sincerely believe that these stories are pathetic and inept. That's my honest sincere view of these ancient fables.

There is absolutely no need for anyone in the modern world to get "defensive" about that.

All that Cowboy needs to do is say something like, "Well you have the right to your views".

Buy he doesn't do that. Instead he continues to prod with insinuations and accusations that I'm somehow "refusing to obey our father".

Or like MsHarmony suggests, she still 'loves' people who do 'bad' things. Where the insinuation is that if a person refuses to believe in the bible they are choosing to do a "bad" thing.

And that was a major point that was brought up by dragoness:

"Oh but there is hatred and discrimination taught in Christianity."

The hatred and discrimination is the constant accusation that non-believers are doing something "bad" and the "bad" thing they are doing is refusing to acknowledge and obey God by accepting that the ancient Hebrew stories are the word of God!

No one needs to 'defend God'.

And no one should feel offended if someone doesn't believe that the ancient Hebrews speak for God. Even if the reasons that they give are because they feel that those stories are utterly absurd and inept.

If that's their reason, then that's their reason.

This whole idea that people need to "defend" the Bible as the "Word of God" is a crazy idea in and of itself.

If a person wants to believe it for themselves then fine.

But going around accusing other people of rejecting God if they refuse to believe it is crossing the line.

I should be able to say that I reject the entire Old Testament as nothing more than a Zeus-like fable. I believe that if Jesus actually existed he was probably some form of a Mahayana Buddhist Bodhisattva. And I personally believe that the New Testament are rumors that are either gross superstitions, or an outright plan to use the rumors of Jesus to prop the Old Testament right back up again using Jesus as a scapegoat with the idea that he was some sort of messiah.

That is a valid view.

People should just respect that view. They could say, "I don't personally see it, but if it makes sense to you then more power to you"

And they should accept that this is my view instead of trying to argue for the orthodox view and then turning around and accusing me of making 'unfair attacks" on their religion.

I mean, come on.

If they want to shut me up, the best way to do it is to simple say, "Well I don't agree with your Buddhist view of Jesus but if it makes sense to you then I'm not going to argue with that, nor accuse you of rejecting God simply because you have a different view of ancient history than I do"

Then we could live together peacefully.

Or like MsHarmony suggests, she still 'loves' people who do 'bad' things. Where the insinuation is that if a person refuses to believe in the bible they are choosing to do a "bad" thing.



This is not what I intended to insinuate

Three things I absolutely believe,

1 Noone gets to the father except through the son
2. Gods grace saves us
3. The bible is the inspired word of God(not meaning that it is a first person accounting of his values and his commands but that it is written by HIS instruction to include lessons on how mankind behaves and how mankind SHOULD behave)


all these things means, by extension, that one need not ever have even read a BIBLE to receive Gods grace so not believing the bible(which would certainly include anyone who had never READ it in the first place) is not a precursor to doing something bad anymore than reading it is a precursor to doing something good

people will do 'good' and 'bad' with or without the bible or with no READING ability whatsoever,,,it is not SOLELY dependent upon any book but moreso on how IN TUNE we live our lives with how God intends us to

so no, Believing the bible isnt enough to be good nor is not believing it bad


having it available and spending the energy to refute it rather than understand it however, is unwise, in my opinion , and not likely to bring one any Closer to God


there are unwise things and there are 'bad' things

unwise things are like junk food, they have no intrinsic spiritual value

'bad' things are like meth, they only harm the spirit

If that's the case why does God's own "word" say fear of Him is the beginning of knowledge and wisdom? Why does it say to fear Him if there is no fear in Christianity? You can't have it both ways Cowboy.

what is fear but knowledge of potential bad consequences and intelligence to steer clear of them


and why is that a bad thing, a certain amount of it keeps us alive,,

The word translated as fear is yir'ah, which means "fear (of God), respect, reverence, piety". So the scripture is telling us that if we have the proper respect and reverence of God, that's the beginning of wisdom.

As for actual fear (terror/dread) of the Lord, only those who will be punished need to fear the judge.

Cowboy wrote...
"What in the world are you talking about? The world may have been a dog eat dog before man showed. Man was put in the garden of Eden where the paradise was, not here. Then they were kicked out of the Garden of Eden and put here where it was a crude dog eat dog world. It wouldn't make much sense to kick them out of one paradise to place in another, now would it? "

Sometimes I wonder if you truly read your own oft quoted book.

mankind was not placed in the garden. Adam was made from dirt and placed in the garden to the east..(and eve after him)... On the day after god rested (i.e on the eigth day).

Mankind was created on the 6th day male and female (after the image of god)...

Which is why I refuse to buy into the 'sin' of adam and eve...

Did you actually read what he wrote... He did not call GOD 'pathetic' and 'inept'...

He stated that the god portrayed in the current version of the oft quoted book was 'pathetic' and 'inept'... I tend to agree... Which is why I know that book contains some falseness... Only mankind would have made such a confusion of the word of god... God is not confusion.