I absolutely love my children, more than my own life.

If I were to allow my children to be harmed in such a way as has been described in this post, just because they did not ask me for help...

I would not be a loving and protective parent.

In this story, were only the girls God's children?

Just a note: Seems like these are good points that also address Mirror's snake handling question in that thread...

But on much of the Old Testament it appears that only the descendents of Abraham are ‘God’s children’ all the rest seem to be heathens that God doesn’t seem to care much about. Even in the New Testament it was important to establish that Jesus was the son of Joseph who was a direct descendent of David who was the son of Abraham. Even though Joseph didn’t even father Jesus, it was still important that as a surrogate father he had the correct bloodline. Evidently women don’t’ matter because there is no mention of Mary’s bloodline. In fact, at one time the Catholic Church did not see women as ‘valid’ creations of God. They were considered creations man ‘of’ men (not by men, but of men since Eve was created from a rib of Adam). So the Church at one point actually viewed women as being property of men, and did not consider them to have ‘separate souls’. However, they probably realized over time that this could be a potential major problem and finally gave up that view.

In any case, there is plenty of evidence in the Old Testament where God sides with ‘his people’ based on their nationality and/or lineage. All of the Egyptians where considered to be heathens, for example. Also then Joshua led the people to the ‘promised land’ the people living there were also considered by God to be heathens as well. God didn’t go through them one-by-one as individuals trying to figure out who’s naughty and nice, he just condemned them all as a group.

So very strong arguments can be made that the biblical God really is just the God of Abraham and his descendents. Much like the godfather in a mob, the biblical God may well be a ‘family-god’. So it may not be a choice to become a Christian like everyone had been taught to believe. When it says thing like, “Whosoever believes will have everlasting life” that may have well be directed only to the Jews. After all, that’s who it was being addressed to at the time. It’s quite a huge assumption to then take those statements out of context and assume they can be applied to the world at large. The rest of the stories in the Bible just don’t imply this should be the case at all. All the other stories are extremely lineage dependent, including the birth of Christ himself!

Christians who aren’t direct descendents of Abraham may be wasting their time worshiping his family God. Clearly this God wasn’t interested in the Incas, or the Mayans, or the American Indians, or Greeks, or the Vikings, or the Japanese, or Asians, etc, etc, etc. It can be strongly argued that the God of the bible is only interested in ‘his chosen’ people. All the rest are heathens whether they choose to be or not just because they don’t have the correct lineage. They aren’t part of the biblical God’s chosen "family".

Abracadabra,

No, I'm sorry. I think you were greatly let down by the church, because God worked a great deal outside of the Israelites. God established two ways to become an Israelites. Birth to an Israelite woman or conversion. This is important, because Israel was designed to allow conversion. Rahab and her family lived among the Israelites, presumably they became Jews. I base this on Hebrews 11:31, which tells us that Rahab didn't perish. God sent Jonah to prophecy to the people of Ninevah, they were not Jews. God punished Nebuchadnezzar, who was not a Jew. Elijah healed a Gentile Syrian general who asked. God primarily worked within the Israelite people, but as God told Abraham, God was going to save the world through Abraham's line. If you remember, Jesus healed a Gentile woman's daughter and proclaimed that the Gentile woman had more faith than any Jew he had met.

The importance of Jesus being from the line of David was because of the prophecies. Those prophecies were how the Israelites could confirm who the Messiah was.

Almost all Christians agree that Luke describes the bloodline of Mary, through her husband Joseph. It's commonly believed that Mary didn't have any brothers. This is supported by the Talmud, which mentions a Mary born to Heli in Bethlehem (a city with about 100 residents), but no sons of Heli. In that situation, the father in law would adopt one of his sons in law to become his son. That way the fathers line didn't end. So when you see the two geneologies, we know that Matthew is Josephs (once again, supported by the Talmud) and we know that the geneology in Luke was that of Mary's. The appearant similarities in the geneologies are due to the fact that Mary and Joseph were cousins.

It’s come to my attention that you can’t trust any church to know what they are talking about.

It’s is perfectly clear that the Bible is ambiguous any anyone can make it say anything they want.

Everyone creates their own Bible by interpreting it to mean whatever they would like to believe is means.

From a personal religious point of view this can be a good thing.

The problem comes in when they start trying to convince others that ‘their’ interpretation is the only correct one. That’s what causes all the problems with specific “Christians”.

As soon as a person claims to speak for “Christianity”, or become defense about it, that can only mean that they have deluded themselves into believing that their interpretation is correct and everyone else is wrong.

And when they claim to have ‘proof’ that of this, all they are really doing is trying to proclaim that their interpretation has merit whilst everyone else is wrong.

It’s clearly an egotistical thing when people start thinking that they own the mind of God.

At that point I think it seriously fails as having any spiritual value. It becomes an idol of the ego instead of a means of worshiping of a spirit.

A person can’t claim to own the mind of God and worship it at the same time. Those two concepts are irreconcilable. To worship God requires a respect for all of God’s creation, which in turn, requires a respect for all other beliefs.

You continually claim that you ‘respect’ the beliefs of others, but that’s incompatible with your proclamation that the Bible is the only true word of God. That’s an automatic denunciation of all other faiths. You can’t claim to ‘respect’ the faiths of others, whilst simultaneously claiming to hold the only true word of God. That’s an oxymoron.

The bottom line is religion is faith-based, but you and Feral don’t speak like as if it is ‘faith’. You people keep trying to push it like it is a proven scientific fact. And that’s what causes you all your grief.

All interpretations of the Bible are valid, and that includes the interpretation that it’s just manmade mythology. No interpretation has a leg-up on any other interpretation.

Religion is faith-based. Period. It’s what you make it.

What people object to is when *some* misguided Christians try to claim that it's absolute truth, or proven fact. This is when they cross over the line of faith into the world of outright lying. And they aren't just lying to other people, but they are seriously lying to themselves as well.

As soon as you claim to know something and you no longer view it as a faith, you have lost your religion.

Abracadabra,

I gave specific examples of when God worked outside of the Israelites. So, when you say "It’s is perfectly clear that the Bible is ambiguous any anyone can make it say anything they want. "...that's a gratuitous assertion. I have offered evidence to support my position, but your position is only supported by your assertion of fact. I hope you understand, this isn't personal, I just object to your use of gratuitous assertions in your post. And since your post is a gratuitous assertion, I can refute your entire post with a gratuitous assertion of my own. "Nuh Uh!"

This story is most likely an urban legend like so many ghost stories you hear. But even if we would assume that it is a true story, there is no reason to give credit to any specific particular religious concept of God.

I have been saved by what could have been called a miracle myself, so I know that miracles do happen. It was no legend either, it was a personal experience with witnesses.

I am very thankful and grateful for the protection, but I do not give credit to any particular religious idea of God.

I believe we can and do have protection and protectors but I don't pretend to know who they are or what religion, if any they profess to be from. (Jesus, Budda, or whoever)

Here is what happened:
I was sitting in a bar talking to some friends. Suddenly I heard a voice inside my head... it was my own voice.. the one you hear when you are thinking in words..

The voice said very loudly and very clearly: "There is someone in my car!" It was so strong and so powerful, I could do nothing but repeat the words out loud. I said, "There is someone in my car!" I repeated these words about three times. My friends were puzzled at my sudden outburst. "How do you know that?" They asked me. I said "I don't know, I just know that there is someone in my car."

My car was parked across the street in the darkness. I went to check it out, but so sure I was right, I took three men with me. We went up to the car and it looked empty. We could not see much in the dark. They said "There is no one in your car." And they wanted to go back inside.

I said, "Open the door so the light will come on and look in the back seat." We did.

There was a man hiding in the back seat.

I was so stunned, I did not even think to call the police and have him questioned. He said that he was just trying to find a place to sleep." (Lame excuse now that I think about it.)

The man sort of stumbled out of the car and disappeared into the darkness of the alley. Nobody thought to go after him. Everyone was so surprised.

Later as I thought about it, I think that he was there to do me harm, and my inner voice sent me a clear loud warning that I could not ignore.

Since that experience, I have never been afraid. I have faith from my experience. That is the second time I was rescued by something.

Jeannie

Spider, please explain what you mean by a gratuitous assertion.
I don't understand what your are saying. And what do your specific examples of God working outside the Israelites have to do with Abra's last post? I'm really confused.

All you’ve done is show that the Bible is indeed inconsistent. In some places God says to go ahead and slaughter the heathens because they don’t believe in him. In other places he praises a woman who doesn’t even believe in him.

Contradictions galore. You can use the book to support anything you like. That’s what makes it so dangerous. It ceases to become a religion about a God and becomes a personal weapon of men who have there own egotistically motivated vendettas. Look at what Hitler used it to support! He was a Christian.

Had he actually won the war maybe a new Bible would have been written proclaiming that God told Hilter to kill all the heathens.

Books always contain the stories of the winners, not the losers. And that includes the Bible. We have no record of how the heathen that Joshua’s army murdered had to say. I’m willing to bet they would have a story to tell that wouldn’t be pretty.

Even the white man in America used the religion to justify murdering the savage native heathens that lived here before he came to conquer it. That’s the problem with the religion, it’s too focused don breaking things into two groups – Those who are soldiers of God, and those who are enemies of God.

The real truth is that man uses the biblical God as an excuse to murder, control, and condemn those who refuse to conform to his will, not God’s will.

Your desperate search for Biblical contradictions is still without fruit. You see, the people God told the Israelites to kill weren't killed for being heathens. I'm not sure who told you that, but it's absolutely not the truth. God had them killed, because they were evil. Evil as in murdering their own children by cooking them alive. And if you actually want to look at the Biblical history of the Israelite conquest of the promised land, you will find that God warned those people before the Israelites got there. If they had fled, they wouldn't have been killed. If they had surrendered, like the Gibeonites did, they wouldn't have died. God tried for 400 years to bring the Canaanites into line, to make them stop human sacrifice. Then God gave them a warning. Then they had the chance to surrender. It seems to be to be very generous. I find it interesting that you would find God guilty, but you said you found the belief that "If someone bothers you, warn him once and then destroy him" to be such a beautiful belief. God clearly gave many chances...as many as could be fit into 400 years.

Abra,

I am speaking to you as someone who cares. Stop your fruitless search for inconsistances within the Bible and actally search the scriptures like the Bereans did. Instead of trying to find inconsistances, look for truth. Your search will be greatly rewarded.

Jeanniebean,

You will need to read the exchange Abra and I were having before to understand what we were talking about.

As for a Gratuitous Assertion, that is a statement of fact, for which no supporting data is provided. Supporting data could be statistics, documentation or logical arguments. It's important to keep in mind that even if a statement isn't a gratuitous assertion (ie, the speaker offers supporting data), the assertion isn't necessarily true.

I think Spider mentioned that the people Joshua murdered were worshipers of Baal. Baal "the only begotton son of Phoenecia."

*****************************************************
Baal is the god of rain, thunder, and lightening.

The religion of the god Baal was widely accepted among the ancient Jews, and although it was put down at times, it was never permanently stamped out.

Kings and other royalty of the ten Biblical tribes worshiped the god. The ordinary people ardently worshipped this sun god too because their prosperity depended on the productivity of their crops and livestock. The god's images were erected on many buildings. Within the religion there appeared to be numerous priests and various classes of devotees. During the ceremonies they wore appropriate robes. The ceremonies included burning incense, and offering burnt sacrifices, occasionally consisting of human victims. The officiating priests danced around the altars, chanting frantically and cutting themselves with knives to inspire the attention and compassion of the god.

In the Bible Baal is also called Beelzebub, or Baalzebub, one of the fallen angels of Satan.

*********************************

More information at:
http://www.pantheon.org/articles/b/baal.html

*****************************

Note:
Fallen angels: What were they really? Aliens? Beings from another dimension?

You can gain some insight into these stories by reading another "Christian" book where you will find followers of Jesus. It is called the Urantia Book.


http://www.truthbook.com/index.cfm?linkID=1661

The Urantia book is a strange book that tells a more detailed story of creation and the life of the mythical Jesus. Someone went to great lengths to write this huge book.

It speaks of the creator gods and how they would destroy entire races that they decided were inner bread with fallen angels or other impurities. They, the creators, had the right to destroy anything they felt was a mistake. They committed genocide all the time.

It is an amazing work. I think it could make a great series of movies. I have actually met Urantia Christians. They are just as fanatic about it as Bible Christians.

You’re not telling me anything I don’t already know Spider. If I wanted to defend the Bible, trust me, I could do a much better job at it than you do.

What you fail to realize is that I’ve come to the realization that the Bible is not of God. You can support the stories if want to, that’s easy. Especially if you are attempting to convince yourself. Fooling ourselves is the easiest thing to do.

The bottom line is that I realized the major contradiction of all. An all-wise, all-loving, all-knowing perfect God could never possibly be the blundering idiot that the Bible describes. It’s as simple as that.

You claim that a whole civilization was ‘evil’ as in murdering their own children, etc. But that’s truly absurd. That’s what the winners of that war would like you to believe to justify the fact that they slaughter those people. You can’t justify a that God told people to stone sinners to death. Such a God is cannot possibly be all-wise, all-perfect, and all-knowing.

You’ve simply convinced yourself that this God can do no wrong no matter what. You’ve convinced yourself that anything that is done in the name of this God is justifiable. That’s precisely where Hitler’s mind drifted off to!

I hold my stance than any doctrine that claims to be the ‘word of God’ is extremely dangerous, especially one that condones slaughtering heathens because they were ‘evil’. That’s the kind of talk that got genuinely innocent women burned at the stake for having been ‘witches’.

Not only that, but to believe in this book you must believe that men can be ‘possessed’ by evil demons that can be exorcised. Even Jesus was said to have case ‘evil demons’ out of the bodies of men.

Those concepts are medial mythology. We have absolutely no evidence of anyone ever being possessed by any evil demons. We now understand mental illnesses, and that people can lose control of their minds, but it’s not because they are being possessed by evil demons.

So to believe in Jesus one must believe that a person can be possessed by evil demons. Moreover, if a person is possessed by an evil demon then how can they be held for anything the demon might do while in possession of their body?

The idea that God has lost control off his own creation and that evil spirits are lurking in the dark to pounce on souls is an ancient methodological idea.

You can take any fairytale and justify it if you want. You would be hard pressed to prove that the Wizard of Oz wasn’t real. And if you wanted to support that it was I’m quite sure you could.

Just like Creative Soul has suggested about the flying spaghetti monster. You can support anything you like. My only question is why would you want to support a God who abandons people and cast them into hell just because they don’t by into these outrageously crazy stories.

But then again, if you can believe in Noah’s ark and the flood, then I guess you can believe in anything.

I think a game-playing God would have done well to have let Noah and his family die right there and their and give up. Clearly his creation was already proven to be a total failure at that point. Why even bother keeping a handful of people alive just to prolong the agony of a grossly flawed inherently evil species.

If this biblical God was so ‘all-perfect’ and all-wise, you’d think he would have stopped the whole show right there and started all over again from scratch. After all, if he always was and always will be, then he must be used to starting over again from scratch eternally. Makes you wonder if he ever got it right?

Or it could be something as simple and obvious that a book that claims to be about a ‘perfect’ God depicts that God to be so incredibly imperfect.

Some things, are so obviously self-inconsistent that their very existence is self-destructing.

I personally feel that the logical argument that the biblical God’s behavior is far from anything that a supposedly all-wise all-perfect supreme creator would be, that this is the most powerful evidence that it can’t possibly be from such an entity.

Moreover, the logical argument is also profound, that the biblical stories make perfect sense when viewed as the demagoguery of men who were attempting to build a religion to control the masses and give them an excuse for their wars.

From my point of view these are two completely separate logical arguments. One states that the bibilcal stories are an absurd picture of a supposedly all-wise supreme creator. And the other one states that it makes perfect sense when viewed as fables written as demagoguery by men.

The first argument is the strongest. The stories are simply too stupid to be from an all-wise creator.

The second argument merely gives the justification of why men would create such a thing.

Abracadabra,

You have simply offered two additional gratuitous assertions. You assert "The stories are simply too stupid to be from an all-wise creator"...what evidence do you offer to support this conclusion? None. Therefore, I can refute it without offering evidence or logic. "Nuh uh!"

Your second statement "And the other one states that it makes perfect sense when viewed as fables written as demagoguery by men. "...once again, no evidence. No logical arguments for why you come to this conclusion. Therefore, I can refute it without offering evidence or logic. "Nuh uh!"

No wonder you believe the way you do. Apparently you can’t see anything unless it is taught to you by someone else.

The evidence is obvious. All all-perfect creator that has to get himself nailed to a cross to save his own creation is far from perfect. Unless, of course, you think that’s a perfect situation.

Keep in mind that his creation was entirely his own doing. Any rules, and conditions that he placed on his creation were his own. If you create something, and it turns out the only way you can save it is to get yourself nailed to a cross, I think you’d have a very hard time explaining how that was such a prefect creation.



Again, what evidence do you need?

The religion clearly states that all men are sinners and must seek redemption through this religion.

It offers the grand prize of everlasting life for those who bow down and worship it (the religion of course).

For those who aren’t tempted by the lust of this free gift, the religion goes on to claim that whoever refuses to bow down and worship this religion will be rejected by their very own creator, and cast into eternal damnation never to see the light of day or know love again.

Ask yourself. Does this sound like a threat that a perfect all-loving, all-wise, compassionate intelligent supreme being?

Or does it sounds like the typical egotistical rhetoric of men who are lusting to gain control and power over others?

There’s no question in my mind whatsoever. An all-perfect, all-wise, all-loving creator would have no need to threaten anyone for not loving it. It could simply offer ever-lasting life to those who do so voluntarily and those who choose not to will simply perish peacefully to never be heard from again.

There’s simply no reason for a supreme all-powerful, all-wise, all-loving, perfect God to threaten people into loving it. Nor would it have anything to gain by sadistically sending those souls off to be tortured for all of eternity for not falling in love with it.

It just simply makes no sense at all. Even mere mortal humans can figure out better schemes than this supposedly all-perfect God came up with.

Now before making any more of your empty accusations that I’m merely making gratuitous assertions please explain to me what’s in this scheme for God?

In what way will God benefit from having souls being tortured for all of eternity in some horrid hell fire?

Unless you can come up with a way that God will benefit from torturing souls for all of eternity you have nothing to support this picture of a supposedly all-perfect all-powerful God. To suggest that God won’t benefit from this suggests that this supposedly all-powerful God has no power to stop it and thus can’t prevent it. If it doesn’t serve God’s interest why would an all-powerful God even bother doing something he doesn’t want to do unless he has no choice (which implies that he lost control of his own creation).

The whole picture is an oxymoron. It’s a story about a supposedly all-powerful God who doesn’t seem to have any power at all. He even had to get himself nailed to a cross. That’s a pathetically terribly situation for an all-powerful God to have no control over. He would have had to have planned the whole thing. Otherwise it’s an oxymoron to try to claim that he’s all-powerful, all-wise, and in-control. This is a story of a God who’s creation went haywire and totally out of control. He even had to douse it with water at one point.


These are the strongest arguments ever against the whole picture. You only pass them off because you know they can't be contested.

Well, it does have a beautiful symmetry.

God creates the universe.

God loves the universe.

God dies for the universe.

God gave the ultimate proof of his love, he was willing to die in the place of us for our sins. That's perfect love. Being willing to sacrifice your own perfect life so that those who hate you can continue living their imperfect lives. Not to mention forgiving your attackers as they kill you. That's a level of love that I would deem perfect. Could you love the people who tortured you to death, as they were mid-torture? As they mocked and spit on you? As they lied about you?



Those are strawman arguments. Salvation comes through Jesus Christ, not through any religion. The relationship one has with Jesus is personal. It's been accepted since the early church that salvation can come to one who has never been to church or never been baptised, as happened to the thief on the cross next to Jesus.

If there are a host of heavenly beings called angels, or gods or creators running the universe, I am sure they have some sort of federation or organized government. In any organized government with individuals, there will be those who disagree, and rebel against the highest power.

I think the Universe is full of these beings who would claim to be Gods and I think there are a host of these beings who create worlds. I think they bicker and fight amongst themselves just as humans do.

I think they are all connected to the one conscious body that gives them life, but that none of these creators or gods can walk up to me and claim to be the one God and make me believe him or her no matter how powerful they are, or how beautiful they are or how much magic or miracles they can perform.

This being so, there is no proof, or book that can convince me that any of these beings embody the one and only god. It is just not possible.

Jeannie