Is God a tyrant? (If he exists)

[Jenyar]

I would say any oppressed race anywhere seeks (if not outright expects) a saviour, whether divine or not. "Hope dies last," as the saying goes. If God had wanted to, he could have come as a Mithraic deity or whatever suited the time period.

After all, could it have ended any worse than cruxifiction anyway? (I know - here's where I get the long speech about prophecy, importance of the sacrifice, yadda yadda yadda.) By the way, lots of races feel they are "promised" something. Divine promises are more handy because, like a War on Terror for instance, they can be claimed without any evidence.

God came as no other than Himself, or "I am" - He was a foreigner to the pantheon of the day, like Baal and Asherah, and He purposely established His authority over them. People had forgotten their creator, even if they retained the "idea" of Him. To God, the purity (holiness/separateness) of those who followed Him from those who followed the imaginations of the rest of the world was paramount. His promises were essentially beacons along which Israel needed to travel to reach the intended destination (and they frequently missed them).

Of course all cultures can hope for a saviour, but not all cultures have reason to expect one. This shows the importance of the Bible. Divine promises are good and well, but they need to be confirmed. Even the test of a prophet was whether his prophesies came true or not. But the point is moot anyway, because it seems you have chosen not to believe that any God's promises have been fulfilled anyway, in other words, you don't believe the rest of the Bible - so your case against God is circumstantial.

If this salvation is of universal concern, I don't think it's a stretch to say God should have at least fucking mentioned the rest of the world. God must have known (by at least observing our modes of interaction) that favoring one race of people over another will inevitably end with catastrophe.

Don't confuse choosing with favouring. Besides, the Bible makes it abundantly clea that the whole world is involved from the start. A very simplified scheme of the Bible would look like this:

Gen. 1-11: God is directly involved with the world, but they unanimously reject Him (culminating in the dispersion at Babel).
Gen. 12 - Malachi: God chooses the faithful Abraham to establish a kingdom that would once again recognize God. He remains involved with the world through Israel.
(cf Genesis 12)
3 I will bless those who bless you,
and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth
will be blessed through you.
New Testament: God is involved through the faithful:
(cf Ephesians 3)
6This mystery is that through the gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise in Christ Jesus.

Israel wasn't chosen at the cost of other nations, but for their benefit. They would be instrumental to God's plan for the world, and God's involvement with both Israel in specific and the world in general culminated in Christ. God would accomodate the rest of the world through Israel by using them as an allegorical, religious and physical example - the same reason that Christ established the church (they are collectively called "Zion").

Leviticus 19
33 " 'When an alien lives with you in your land, do not mistreat him. 34 The alien living with you must be treated as one of your native-born. Love him as yourself, for you were aliens in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

Look at the Holy Land right now. Why is it one of the most violent places on earth? Because three different groups of yahoos believe God "promised" them land.

I would chalk this up to bad parenting skills on God's part. After all, what happens if a parent puts all his/her attention toward one child and completely ignores the other?

They are three different groups of people assume too much and believe too little. It shows exactly what happens when you refuse to accept that Christ has made any difference. In any case, to see the conflicts in places like Ireland or Israel to merely a religious matter is a gross oversimplification of a very complex problem. There are terrorists in religious and secular circles (like the Black-eyed peas say in their song).

Yes. When a group of people believe God ordered them to war (as the Bible says), then yes, God is the facilitator of that war. "Regulated" is a pretty euphemism for "commanded." We are told God ordered every man, woman, child, and animal killed. What am I missing here? That he needed the Jewish people to survive? That he had some divine plan? That horrendous violence was necessary in order to make them work hard for their faith?

Horsepucky.

You're ignoring the context to facilitate your argument. As I've said, the Israelites lived in a special relationship with God. They had universally accredited prophets and their generation witnessed more than a few large-scale miracles. The Amalekites instigated and continued to wage a war of killing and plundering non-combatants for at least 400 years. None of the miraculous defeats by the Israelites convinced them that they were up against not just them but their God as well. They "lived by the sword". When the Kenites received Saul's warning any Amalekites who feared the invasion would have left as well. The Amalekite city was their stronghold, and was "devoted to God for destruction" (cf Lev. 27:29).

The prerogative was God's and only God's. Nobody after Christ can claim that God ordered a religious war, since Christ was quite literally the final word.

Rome Statute of the International Court

* (iv) Intentionally launching an attack in the knowledge that such attack will cause incidental loss of life or injury to civilians or damage to civilian objects or widespread, long-term and severe damage to the natural environment which would be clearly excessive in relation to the concrete and direct overall military advantage anticipated;
* (v) Attacking or bombarding, by whatever means, towns, villages, dwellings or buildings which are undefended and which are not military objectives;

Women and children are not military objectives. God ordered a war crime, as we define it today. (I can sense the coming counter-argument... "Ah ha! But this was 2000+ years ago, long before the statute on war crimes.") But let's be clear - I'm asking why time period should have any bearing on the moral actions of God.

You're just using a limited form of the argument I used, "we know better now than they did then". By what authority do you propose our present statute on war crimes to be eternally valid? And what gives it its authority? If you go by the international Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, even taking the women and children prisoner would legally count as genocide.

On the other hand, God has both the knowledge and authority to decide when and whether judgment is warranted or not. While in our limited knowledge even considering killing women and children is always inexcusible, because we simply can never know the extent and consequenses of a person's actions - let alone a whole culture, or a whole planet. God does not measure guilt only legally (the Law was just our "schoolmaster"), but morally as well, and quite probably far beyond even our limited understanding of what morality is. In the end it comes down to this: God is not a human being - He created human beings. We have a limited perspective, which is only barely sufficient to judge ourselves by, and I propose nowhere nearly sufficient to judge God by.

"...the only case we have in the bible of something approaching genocide is in the book of Esther. Haman, a prominent official, develops a plot in which the internal people will be allowed to attack, kill, and plunder the internal Jews in the nation. This is very close to genocide, and it is quite ironic that Haman is called an Agagite, and said to be an Amalekite by Josephus in Ant. 11.209." (Agag was king of the Amalekites).
- from Shouldn't the butchering of the Amalekite children be considered war crimes?

Slavery was slavery 2000 years ago. Slavery was slavery 200 years ago. If God supported it then and opposes it now, he is nothing but a reactionary deity, likely the result of people's prejudice amplified to the highest level.

The issue of slavery is another debate (specifically about the generalization of the term), but I get your point: A God of absolute morals should apply His morals absolutely, no? But what about His prerogative to judge, to punish and to show mercy? You don't take the human factor into account at all, and God has to (or more accurately, chooses to). If God simply did not allow anything that went against His moral preferences, what would humanity be - what would "freedom" consist of? Contrary to your statement, God is not reactionary to our whims. There was a clear and avoidable path that lead to the destruction of the flood and Amalekites. Nineveh is good evidence of this fact, and even God's discussion with Abraham about Sodom.

Religions have a way of "erasing" past writing, especially of other religions they deem a threat. This is why we have only a handful of gnostic writings, even though those beliefs were likely widespread at some points in history.

So you propose the rule is that a minority will always eventually eclipse the majority? I think a better explanation is that "writing" was an expensive and time consuming activity reserved or kings and the literate. The threat posed by any ancient ideology wasn't based on its writings but on its accessibility and evident authority. Your example of gnosticism isn't very apt, either, since they parasited on Christian and Jewish mysticism. In contrast, Christianity didn't rely on fear or special mystical insight. Oral tradition held more authority than written material. The Bible survived as a text because it represented centuries of tradition, not because it supressed other texts. Nothing prevented the survival of other traditions but their own lack of momentum. A momentum the Bible atributes to "God's word".

I expect people to change - not an omnipotent God.

Why exactly did God need animal sacrifices at one point, and now he does not? Well, this is an easy one. Early religions included animal sacrifice. Men grew out of that phase, ergo (I finally got to use that word! Yay!) God grew out of it as well.

The Bible charts mankind's evolution, not God's. The more we learn, the less we believe in religious bullshit. At one time, people with mental diseases may have been termed "possessed." Today, in some cases, we have a pill that can calm them right down. Hence, we see fewer people putting stock in demons, etc. (At least in other industrialized nations. America seems to be lagging behind in this department....)

I agree with you about this kind of progression. In Biblical studies it's called "revelational history". This is how the progression of Satan from snake (in Eden) to accuser (in Job), to the antichrist (in Revelation) is understood. In the beginning of the Bible, "God" is the nebulous and mysterious elohim, then He becomes known as the concrete YHWH and by the end of the Bible He is the complex and all-encompassing Trinity. The same with the concepts of death and hell. The Bible was written in mankind's language, trying to express God's will. God does not change, but the language describing Him and his actions does, and so does our understanding. A Christian can no longer read the Old Testament without knowing what was known by the New Testament, and has become evident since.

I'll use your example of sacrifices, which is a very interesting study to make, by the way. Sacrifice was a commonly understood activity, but it took on a greater significance in the revelational history. It prepared the context for understanding more complex situations which clarified what God meant with sacrifice. They were to learn what is was about their sacrifices that God valued. Compare these two verses:

Isaiah 66:3
But whoever sacrifices a bull is like one who kills a man, and whoever offers a lamb, like one who breaks a dog's neck; whoever makes a grain offering is like one who presents pig's blood, and whoever burns memorial incense, like one who worships an idol. They have chosen their own ways, and their souls delight in their abominations;

Mark 12:33
To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices."

Pure semantics. Religion. Faith. The Bible clearly states that Jesus is the only way to salvation. Only. If you believe that, then you must engage in some really heavy lifting when it comes to apologetics.

Hell, even different sects of Christianity disagree on what salvation requires. How can you believe in something you can't even define? What exactly should I have faith in? You can cherry pick any Bible verse you want. The Bible can be used to support/defend/oppose/condemn virtually anything, because like most religious texts, it is vague, contradictory, and the work of several divergent interests supposedly colliding into one coherent vision. Hence, we have liberal Christians welcoming gay marriage, while conservative Christians outside wave banners reading "God Hates Fags." So much for consensus on what is to be believed.

That Jesus the only way to salvation is what defines being Christian. Not "just because", but because of His special place in the revelational history. Everything that went before and after Christ culminates in Him. In a sense, it's like saying, from Europe, the English Channel is the only way to England. There simply is no other way to bring the two ends together. There are many ways to one end and many ways to the other - but to guarantee salvation, there is only One.

People will try to use the Bible to justify or condemn virually anything. What you should have faith in is that God has initiated, continued and fulfilled His intention of redeeming everyone to Him. The focus should be on what Christ achieved, not on what people were saying or doing while He was achieving it. People who just condemn homosexuals ignores God's history of redemption. People who use the Bible's words about homosexuality as an excuse to condone their immoral behaviour similarly ignores God's will.

If you want the Bible to do the thinking for you, you are once again setting yourself up for disappointment. God taught us the importance of obedience, showed us our flaws, forgave them, and then ordered us to love.

Wonderful. What if I obey the law but deny Christ? Contrast those verses with: "I am the truth, the way, and the light. No one comes to the father but through me." Should that have an asterisk? (*Unless you obey the law. Then you'll be fine.)

Remember what I said about revelational history? One thing we learn through Israel is that obeying the law completely is near-impossible at worst, and insufficient at best. The law mentioned in Romans are not Moses' laws, but those morals you are so dependent on to show that God was in the wrong. Those very morals point toward God's will. They are so strong that you even feel confident enough to judge God himself by them, yet I'm sure you have experienced even in your own life they carry only a tentative authority over your own actions. They show that you know what is required.

But if God judges you by those requirements, will He find that you meet them?

I have no idea whether or not Israelis had the means to support any of the children, but let's think logically here. They just raided a small community (otherwise, why would there be women, children, and livestock present?). It is likely these people had supplies, food, etc. What were the women and children living on before the Israelites came? Something. Seize the supplies and feed the women and children. Would that have so difficult? Would that not have been more "merciful" and Christ-like?

They raided their stronghold. That's why there were women and children present. They did not do it for financial or social gain - they were forbidden to. Those who had faith in their soldiers staid there to be killed, the rest left with the Kenites to start a new community of looters and plunderers, by all the evidence.

genocide n : systematic killing of a racial or cultural group

Once again... Kiling every Amalekite man, woman, child, and animal = genocide.

If US soldiers in Iraq had been given those orders, what would we call it?

It's like hitting a bunker bin Laden is hiding in, except that there are women and children inside with him. Does that grant him immunity? Have you seen Rules of Engagement? If the GI's were given those orders by an insider - someone who knew that the women and children weren't innocent and that it would actually save lives to kill them, the insider would have been a hero, not a tyrant.

It wasn't systematic - this was a once off order. It wasn't because of their race or culture, it was because of their hostile attitude towards Israel and towards God.

Then God is, by definition, a tyrant. And a hypocrite.

He tells us to be merciful, yet he is not.
He tells us to turn the other cheek, but he does not.

God holds us to a higher standard of behavior than he holds himself.

God was not the one threatened by the Amalekites, remember? It was a personal attack against Him, but His people were suffering. Mercy was extended, and you know it. It did not include the true aggressors, but they had 400 years to decide whether they would live in peace or not.

Here's a thought. You are besieging God's plan, right? I mean, you won't accept Him as your saviour, and you won't believe any warning about His judgement from the Bible or from me. If God does one day judge you according to your own moral code (or better, a universal moral code, like love), would you expect fairness or mercy? If you say mercy, what prevents evil from entering heaven and making it just another day on earth? Should God lower His standards to accomodate Amalekites and so that you can feel better about Him, or uphold them so that heaven might exist?

Here's one question I always ask Christians: Hypothetically, what would it take - what atrocity, base crime, torture, unfathomable act of cruelty on the part of God - to make you question the Bible?

If a verse of the Bible read, "And, for mere amusement as He was bored with His creation, the Lord took the innocent babes, who dared to cry in his presence, and brought on them the pain of a thousand deaths, ripped the very flesh from their living bodies, cooked them alive, devoured their souls, and then sent them spiraling into the pits of Hell so that they might be raped for eternity by the eight-dicked worm of Satan," would you sit back for a second and think Hmmm, maybe this isn't the word of God?

Or would you go to work, formulating a complex explanation... of how "babes" really meant something other than "babes" and that "crying" was symbolic of their hatred of God... and how the whole episode "prefigured" the virgin birth?

Here's my answer. The Bible contains all kinds of atrocities and evils. It represents mankind as we know it. I would not expect it otherwise. Yes, I would question the Bible if it presented God as sadistic or malicious.

But it doesn't, and it remains for you to prove God is consistently tyrannical by nature, is not keeping His promise of life and salvation to by any standards, or that it is historically impossible to expect either love or mercy from Him.

 

[JustARide]

Jenyar,

Pardon if my responses grow shorter in the future. It's not that I am not interested in the question posed here (obviously, I've been posting regularly), but, as you said, we're simply coming at this from different perspectives. You are inclined the give the Bible the benefit of the doubt. I am not. Therefore, we're going to end up at a bit of a stalemate at every turn. Where I see pointless battle, you see glorious, symbolic victory for God's people.

I'm willing to soldier on at this debate if you want to continue, but I think we may be guilty of beating a dead Amalekite (sorry... couldn't help myself) for the last few posts.

the point is moot anyway, because it seems you have chosen not to believe that any God's promises have been fulfilled anyway, in other words, you don't believe the rest of the Bible - so your case against God is circumstantial.

My position is very simple. I do not believe the Bible.

But I would remind you, we are discussing the Bible within its own context here. And the question: Are the acts of God, as depicted in scripture, the acts of a vengeful, tyrannical deity? Not what I believe or don't believe.

My case is against the Biblical God, and I base that case on the Bible itself. I'm attempting to strip away all the poetic polish, artistic license, and likely instances of bias in order to examine the ACTS of God, and whether or not they seem at all just.

Israel wasn't chosen at the cost of other nations, but for their benefit.

Wouldn’t every nation like to have that status? I mean, how did Hitler gain such support in Germany? By telling Germans they were the “chosen ones,” the ultimate race, meant to lead the way. Or, to use a more innocuous example, what is the crowd reaction when rock stars scream the name of the city in which they are playing? Roaring approval. People, no matter their race, creed, or color LOVE to be told they are special, chosen, somehow above the rest. Believing that God actually did "pick" a race at one point only creates more division and hatred.

Of course, the very idea that Jesus somehow fulfilled the “prophecies” as some kind of Messiah was still very much in question shortly after his death(many, predictably, believed they would be heralding the arrival of a king, not a pacifist carpenter). It is only interpretation that leads Christians to the conclusion that Jesus did fulfill prophecy (which is usually sufficiently vague anyway). It’s like when people say, “Oh, the Bible says there will be great wars.” Well, no shit. Give me a prophecy that says, “At 9:34 AM on December 19, 2004, rabid squirrels will attack Washington, DC. “That’s a fucking prophecy.

In any case, to see the conflicts in places like Ireland or Israel to merely a religious matter is a gross oversimplification of a very complex problem. There are terrorists in religious and secular circles (like the Black-eyed peas say in their song).

Very true. OK, I’ll phrase the question this way: Has religion quelled or exacerbated those conflicts?

Surely, even you wouldn’t deny that, had the Bible said, “The land of Hawaii is God’s chosen land,” that people would still be fighting over Jerusalem. Religion is a major (if not the central) component in many of the world’s deepest and longest conflicts. It is a director of hatred around the globe. The controversy over Mel Gibson's "Passion" is a nice fresh example. Religion is always there to answer the question: "Whom should we hate?"

I am an agnostic, so do me a favor. Point to a place in the world right now where radical fundamentalist agnostics are causing big problems. Just one.

You're ignoring the context to facilitate your argument. As I've said, the Israelites lived in a special relationship with God. They had universally accredited prophets and their generation witnessed more than a few large-scale miracles. The Amalekites instigated and continued to wage a war of killing and plundering non-combatants for at least 400 years. None of the miraculous defeats by the Israelites convinced them that they were up against not just them but their God as well. They "lived by the sword".

The Israelites had a special relationship with God – according to THEM. I’m asking whether or not you’ve read any Amalekite literature lately.

If I wrote a book about God was behind our invasion of Iraq, how he was the moving force behind our “liberation” effort, and why it had to be, so that God could conquer the evil Arabs, and then buried that book in the sand for 2000 years, should the people who find it in the year 4004 take MY word as fact? Or should they consider the source? How might that change how they viewed the invasion? Quite a bit, I should think.

You're just using a limited form of the argument I used, "we know better now than they did then". By what authority do you propose our present statute on war crimes to be eternally valid?

OK, A) Our current systems evolves. It is not perfect.
B) It IS better than what we had in biblical times. (If you disagree, fine. I prefer a slave-free society myself.)
C) Our current system is not eternally valid. I hope that it expands, to include more rights for more people.
D) Any set of laws/rights/commandments is the result of the society that produces them. Most of those societies will likely claim God helped out in some way.
E) The best society possible is the one that best represents what current knowledge has to offer. So I claim no eternal validation for today’s system; I simply see it as the best we have done so far.

On the other hand, God has both the knowledge and authority to decide when and whether judgment is warranted or not. While in our limited knowledge even considering killing women and children is always inexcusible, because we simply can never know the extent and consequenses of a person's actions - let alone a whole culture, or a whole planet. God does not measure guilt only legally (the Law was just our "schoolmaster"), but morally as well, and quite probably far beyond even our limited understanding of what morality is. In the end it comes down to this: God is not a human being - He created human beings. We have a limited perspective, which is only barely sufficient to judge ourselves by, and I propose nowhere nearly sufficient to judge God by.

This is all well and fine, but God created us (presumably) knowing full well what our inclinations would be.

Going back to one of the early posts, why would God (whose moral understanding is so much greater than ours) NOT supply us with at least ENOUGH of that understanding that we would not kill each other constantly for trivial reasons? Why would he NOT want us to know Good from Evil? If Eve didn’t know evil, how could she know the full implication of what she was doing?

God gave us just enough sense to know HOW to build nuclear weapons, but NOT enough to stop us from using them. How about a little moral understanding down here, huh? Share the love, yo!

It’s not as if God set out a stringent moral code that he himself has followed, without deviation, throughout history. He’s changed his mind, employed the very tactics of the enemy, and yet it’s all our fault that we're so fucked up? Why give us a perspective that’s so, as you say, “limited”?

But what about His prerogative to judge, to punish and to show mercy? You don't take the human factor into account at all, and God has to (or more accurately, chooses to). If God simply did not allow anything that went against His moral preferences, what would humanity be - what would "freedom" consist of?

Very little. But it already does, in fact, if we are to believe the words of the Bible. We only have freedom here on earth. Once we die, we are told there are two places one can go: Heaven or Hell.

1. Who will make this decision? God.
2. What will be the requirements? No one really knows for sure because even individual religions cannot decide (and they’re using the same fucking book!)
3. Will we have any say? Any options? No.
4. Will there be the possibility of an appeal? No.
5. Can God be convinced of anything (i.e., change his mind with sufficient evidence)? No.

Christians believe we have freedom, but a pretty limited freedom if you ask me. 70 years or so of relative freedom on earth, followed by an eternal, non-reversible court judgment that will be based upon our belief in one ancient book (among the thousands) and how well we adhered to a set of rules that even Christians cannot agree upon?

A temporary, hollow freedom indeed.

Contrary to your statement, God is not reactionary to our whims. There was a clear and avoidable path that lead to the destruction of the flood and Amalekites. Nineveh is good evidence of this fact, and even God's discussion with Abraham about Sodom.

If every war was clearly “avoidable,” then why would God pledge to fight the Amalekites “generation after generation”? If free will is truly free, and the possibility always existed that the Amalekites might – just might – change their ways, why would God make such an early pronouncement? Wouldn’t he just order one generation killed and wait to see what happened?

In contrast, Christianity didn't rely on fear or special mystical insight. Oral tradition held more authority than written material. The Bible survived as a text because it represented centuries of tradition, not because it supressed other texts. Nothing prevented the survival of other traditions but their own lack of momentum. A momentum the Bible atributes to "God's word".

Christianity didn't rely on fear? Ever heard of the fucking Crusades?Inquisitions? Constantine’s bid to remove other religions, in favor of Christian domination? Telling people they're going to suffer eternally if they don't conform??

And, if we are to credit God with the survival of a religion over long periods of time, should we also conclude that other popular ancient religions of today are still going strong because of God?

Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, Islam – They’ve all been around for quite some time. Why? Surely, some of their influence (as well as Christianity’s) is due to the words, but I’m willing to bet that conquest, forced domination, luck, timing, and marketing have all been major factors as well.

I do not pretend that minorities will always trump majorities. They won’t. Whomever has the bigger weapons will most likely prevail.

I’m also willing to bet that Hell has a lot to do with Christianity’s longevity. You know why people don’t feel the need to quickly convert to Taoism very often? Taoism has no fear factor, no eternal damnation, no vengeful deity to please. Hence, no hurry.

Everything that went before and after Christ culminates in Him. In a sense, it's like saying, from Europe, the English Channel is the only way to England.

Actually, it’s just the shortest way to England from Europe, but nevermind.

There simply is no other way to bring the two ends together. There are many ways to one end and many ways to the other - but to guarantee salvation, there is only One.

According to the Bible. And according to you. But if you’re honest with yourself, you’ll realize that you (nor any priest, minister, rabbi, pope, etc.) knows anything more about what happens when people die than anybody else does.

These are guesses, based on complex interpretations of ancient books, written by … who else…. some other people. People. Fallible, human people. Realizing that was the greatest revelation of my life thus far. That one idea has freed to me to think beyond the bounds of today’s religions, beyond the bounds of today’s science… to hope for something more than a convoluted explanation that desperately tries to rationalize what it cannot understand. To open my mind to more than the petty, narrow-minded, dogmatic religions that fester throughout the world today.

It’s really fun! Give it a try if you have a free afternoon sometime.

People will try to use the Bible to justify or condemn virually anything. What you should have faith in is that God has initiated, continued and fulfilled His intention of redeeming everyone to Him. The focus should be on what Christ achieved, not on what people were saying or doing while He was achieving it.

Even if they were saying things like “Women shouldn’t speak in church” and “Death to all homosexual dogs”?

People who just condemn homosexuals ignores God's history of redemption. People who use the Bible's words about homosexuality as an excuse to condone their immoral behaviour similarly ignores God's will.

Well, I half agree with you. But I think you may be ignoring the sources those “people who just condemn homosexuals” cite… namely, tangible, quotable verses in the Bible.

Once again, back to Taoism. Why don’t we see anybody using the Tao Te Ching to condemn homosexuals? Because it doesn’t have any clear, strict, dogmatic verses that seem to condone these things. So it IS possible to construct a religious book that does not offer such great ammunition for homophobes. But the Bible does.

Your statements about “people who just condemn homosexuality” seem to suggest that you disagree with them, correct? Well, on what grounds do you make that decision? Or, as you might ask me, on what “authority” can you say, with any amount of certainty, that your modern take on homosexuality is correct?

Simple. Like me, you have taken the available information, processed it, and decided that the history of God’s redemption deserves more recognition than his once-upon-a-time condemnation of homosexuals. Well, others might disagree with you. And they will have their own interpretation of scripture to back them up.

If you want the Bible to do the thinking for you, you are once again setting yourself up for disappointment. God taught us the importance of obedience, showed us our flaws, forgave them, and then ordered us to love.

How does a warlike, vengeful God’s “order to love” carry any credibility? As far as I’m concerned, his son might be the only one with any slight amount of credibility there.

For instance, if Jesus had not said “turn the other cheek” but instead had ordered an all-out war against the unfaithful, don’t you think the whole “love your enemy” speech would have been tainted a bit?

I tend to trust people who are, you know, somewhat consistent.

But if God judges you by those requirements, will He find that you meet them?

Apparently God can judge me by any requirements he damn well pleases and I don’t have one iota of a say in that, nor do I have any concrete way of knowing those requirements, for sure, before I die.

It's like hitting a bunker bin Laden is hiding in, except that there are women and children inside with him. Does that grant him immunity? Have you seen Rules of Engagement? If the GI's were given those orders by an insider - someone who knew that the women and children weren't innocent and that it would actually save lives to kill them, the insider would have been a hero, not a tyrant.

Indeed. The bin Laden scenario you pose is a tricky one, yes? Most people will, of course, say, “Bomb the bastard.” But I don’t think that situation is analogous to that of the Amalekites.

Here we have a case of town-pillaging. Now, in those days, this would require hacking through it with swords and crude weaponry (certainly not bombs). In such a situation, I would take a wild guess and say that at least some of the women and children were cowering in corners somewhere (not out fighting with swords and shit). I’m guessing that, after the conflict was over, some lingering survivors (probably women and children) remained. God’s order did not spare them. It ordered a complete flushing out of all – innocent or not. Even the animals! Were the fucking cats lounging around the edge of town “evil” too?

Admit it. It’s written in barbaric terms, not merciful by any stretch of the imagination.

This would be like bombing bin Laden, going down to take a look at the smoking ruins of the cave, and finding a couple survivors – and killing them too.

God was not the one threatened by the Amalekites, remember? It was a personal attack against Him, but His people were suffering. Mercy was extended, and you know it. It did not include the true aggressors, but they had 400 years to decide whether they would live in peace or not.

Well, as I’ve said, this shit about “God’s people” is common nationalistic bullshit that usually reflects no more than the egos present in the nation in question.

Let me ask you this. If the Jews had died, and Christianity along with it, but another vaguely monotheistic religion had arisen, guided by people who said God was with them, and they happened to win some wars, and gain a foothold somewhere. Then they wrote it all down - would you believe God was truly with them just because they said so?

OK, I’m still asking. If the Amalekites were poised to attack, why not send another fucking pillar of fire? It worked the first time.

Here's a thought. You are besieging God's plan, right? I mean, you won't accept Him as your saviour, and you won't believe any warning about His judgement from the Bible or from me. If God does one day judge you according to your own moral code (or better, a universal moral code, like love), would you expect fairness or mercy? Should God lower His standards to accomodate Amalekites and so that you can feel better about Him, or uphold them so that heaven might exist?

No, wrong. I won’t accept the Bible-God’s “plan.” (Don’t get too full of yourself. Bear in mind it is only one of an infinite number of possible “plans,” if any plans exist at all.) As far as the question of God goes, I am an agnostic. Why? Because the world into which I was born confuses me. I see religions claiming exclusive rights to heaven, condemning others with no regard to the quality of the people in them. Therefore, I withhold judgment and try my best to live a loving life that causes as little pain as possible.

Religions tend to narrow people’s minds, usually to the point that they cannot even conceive of an opposing point of view, much less consider that any of their beliefs COULD be wrong.

I, on the other hand, extend that possibility to all. Jenyar, you may be right. I may be crazy. (Sorry, Billy Joel crept in there for a second.)

My problem is that I am unable to make the leap into any exclusionary faith because I’ve seen how much damage (both physical and psychological) they usually do. The Bible simply does not speak to me. I find neither comfort nor logic in its pages. Neither do many others – others that, if I might be so bold to say, are wonderful, thoughtful, loving people.

If God wants to send me (or Gandhi or Lao-Tzu or the aforementioned good people) to Hell for not believing in talking donkeys and snakes, then obviously, he will do so. We will have no say anyway. I simply envision a heaven (if such a thing exists) that does not consist solely of Ned Flanders-like automatons, who, in life, were afraid to think a single creative, independent, un-telegraphed thought. I hope for a God who is not so low that he endorses slavery and engages in the very behavior he would have us despise. Just a hope - that's all. I'll admit it is nothing more than that.

I just happen to have no ancient book to back up my hopes. *sigh* I don't need a book to be amazed at the world around me, in awe, and full of questions. I find that happens quite naturally. To quote my fav comedian again, "No middle man required."

Yes, I would question the Bible if it presented God as sadistic or malicious.

God endorses slavery in the Old Testament. Very openly, candidly, and without any reservation. Is slavery, or has it ever been, not evil? Describe to me a case in which slavery is/was just.

But it doesn't, and it remains for you to prove God is consistently tyrannical by nature, is not keeping His promise of life and salvation to by any standards, or that it is historically impossible to expect either love or mercy from Him.

I need not prove that God is consistently tyrannical. In fact, it is his inconsistency (reaching to all ends of the spectrum, both good and bad) that is the problem. I’m sure God may be in keeping with his promises by some apologist’s standards somewhere, but they are odd standards indeed.

God’s moral code allows for these interesting judicial choices:

*Being a drunken ass, sending your daughters to face a hungry mob instead of doing it yourself = slap on the wrist.

*Refusing to impregnate your deceased brother’s wife = instant death.

*Looking back at an evil burning city = being turned into a pillar of salt.

*Making fun of a prophet = being mauled by two bears.

*Eating fruit you were told not to eat, but having no sense of right and wrong upon which to judge that action = death, the pain of childbirth, an end to paradise.

*Not choosing the right religion, from thousands of not-entirely-implausible choices = eternal suffering.

If there was a judge alive today giving a convicted mass murderers “30 lashes with a wet noodle” and ordering “execution” for 15-year-old boys caught masturbating, would we consider him wise?

Only if that judge was God, I guess.

Josh

It’s just a ride. – Bill Hicks :m:

 

[Jenyar]

Jenyar,

Pardon if my responses grow shorter in the future. It's not that I am not interested in the question posed here (obviously, I've been posting regularly), but, as you said, we're simply coming at this from different perspectives. You are inclined the give the Bible the benefit of the doubt. I am not. Therefore, we're going to end up at a bit of a stalemate at every turn. Where I see pointless battle, you see glorious, symbolic victory for God's people.

I'm willing to soldier on at this debate if you want to continue, but I think we may be guilty of beating a dead Amalekite (sorry... couldn't help myself) for the last few posts.

We could agree to disagree, but I consider it a pity that you reject the "Biblical God" because of anti-religious prejudice, and not because of sound evidence. I still think we can make progress.

My position is very simple. I do not believe the Bible.

Here you state your prejudice, and directly afterwards:

But I would remind you, we are discussing the Bible within its own context here. And the question: Are the acts of God, as depicted in scripture, the acts of a vengeful, tyrannical deity? Not what I believe or don't believe.

Why even kid yourself about being "open-minded" if you have already made up your mind? I think I have raised valid arguments that acts that might be contrued as "tyrannical" does not a tyrannical God make. It's easy to create a strawman god out of an incident, and then denounce that god. It should take more than an argument by outrage to support your case. What you believe has everything to do with, because somehow you have come to believe that God is a tyrant.

Wouldn?t every nation like to have that status? I mean, how did Hitler gain such support in Germany? By telling Germans they were the ?chosen ones,? the ultimate race, meant to lead the way. Or, to use a more innocuous example, what is the crowd reaction when rock stars scream the name of the city in which they are playing? Roaring approval. People, no matter their race, creed, or color LOVE to be told they are special, chosen, somehow above the rest. Believing that God actually did "pick" a race at one point only creates more division and hatred.

There's difference. Hitler believed his super race was superior to other races. God made it clear that Israel was not chosen because of any superiority or virtue of their own. Their holiness came with the great burden of God's laws.

Deut 7 7 The LORD did not set his affection on you and choose you because you were more numerous than other peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples. 8 But it was because the LORD loved you and kept the oath he swore to your forefathers that he brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the land of slavery, from the power of Pharaoh king of Egypt.

Deut 8 19 If you ever forget the LORD your God and follow other gods and worship and bow down to them, I testify against you today that you will surely be destroyed. 20 Like the nations the LORD destroyed before you, so you will be destroyed for not obeying the LORD your God.

Deut 94 After the LORD your God has driven them out before you, do not say to yourself, "The LORD has brought me here to take possession of this land because of my righteousness." No, it is on account of the wickedness of these nations that the LORD is going to drive them out before you ... Understand, then, that it is not because of your righteousness that the LORD your God is giving you this good land to possess, for you are a stiff-necked people.

Very true. OK, I?ll phrase the question this way: Has religion quelled or exacerbated those conflicts?

Surely, even you wouldn?t deny that, had the Bible said, ?The land of Hawaii is God?s chosen land,? that people would still be fighting over Jerusalem. Religion is a major (if not the central) component in many of the world?s deepest and longest conflicts. It is a director of hatred around the globe. The controversy over Mel Gibson's "Passion" is a nice fresh example. Religion is always there to answer the question: "Whom should we hate?"

Once again you're too quick to blame religion for man's hatred. The issue is really whether people have actually listened to Christ's commandment of love. I also detest any kind of aggression that supposes to be divinely sanctioned. Killing people is nothing less than killing allies against the real evils of crime and hatred.

God made it clear that what He hates is immorality and injustice, and would eradicate it. He struck at the heart of evil, and replaced it with a heart of love. We embody that heart.

Ezekiel 36 25 I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. 26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.

It's a sad fact that some people enjoy exacting punishment in the name of God more than they enjoy loving in the name of God. They are people who don't realize the war has been internalized and is being waged at a moral level now. We can't invoke God to condone hatred, neither can we blame God for any hatred or injustice after we have crucified Him ourselves. You know it and I know it: the only divine directive is love. That is the gospel.

Instead of celebrating the victory God had provided, people are turning into Amalekites themselves.

I am an agnostic, so do me a favor. Point to a place in the world right now where radical fundamentalist agnostics are causing big problems. Just one.

Since when have agnostics become exempt from criminals behaviour? Just because you can categorize a problem area doesn't mean you have isolated the problem. There are radical New Agers, radical feminists, radical scientists and radical kids, just as there are many pacifists movements. People gravitate to things that fit their preferences. And they will stretch their affiliations to fit their motives. But someone who really believes in the reality of Israel's God must know He does not allow the His boundaries to be stretched very far. How much room for interpretation is there in:

'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind,' and 'Love your neighbour as yourself.'?

The Israelites had a special relationship with God ? according to THEM. I?m asking whether or not you?ve read any Amalekite literature lately.

If I wrote a book about God was behind our invasion of Iraq, how he was the moving force behind our ?liberation? effort, and why it had to be, so that God could conquer the evil Arabs, and then buried that book in the sand for 2000 years, should the people who find it in the year 4004 take MY word as fact? Or should they consider the source? How might that change how they viewed the invasion? Quite a bit, I should think.

Do you have any evidence that they were biased in favour of themselves? If the evidence showed that America was a weak minority in exile, and that you miraculously overthrew the Iraqi government and all its allies at the peak of their power, those people might have reason to believe you really were supported by God. And be sure to include in your book that you were under the same judgement as Iraq, and you were constantly dependent on God for your own liberation...

This is all well and fine, but God created us (presumably) knowing full well what our inclinations would be.

Going back to one of the early posts, why would God (whose moral understanding is so much greater than ours) NOT supply us with at least ENOUGH of that understanding that we would not kill each other constantly for trivial reasons? Why would he NOT want us to know Good from Evil? If Eve didn?t know evil, how could she know the full implication of what she was doing?

God gave us just enough sense to know HOW to build nuclear weapons, but NOT enough to stop us from using them. How about a little moral understanding down here, huh? Share the love, yo!

It?s not as if God set out a stringent moral code that he himself has followed, without deviation, throughout history. He?s changed his mind, employed the very tactics of the enemy, and yet it?s all our fault that we're so fucked up? Why give us a perspective that?s so, as you say, ?limited??

You make the mistake of thinking God created us to be warlike and hateful. That's exactly the point: He didn't. As you are evidence of yourself - we do have the moral capacity of understanding the consequences our actions. We have the moral knowledge to know not to kill each other for trivial reasons. But what if greed is no trivial reason for someone, what if injustice has no moral meaning for someone? Doesn't that mean they are in need of a moral education? And who better to give that education than the author of morality Himself? To move from a minority moral view to a majority understanding might necessitate some battles or even wars. In Biblical times the moral conquest was an external one - fought between cultures and the gods who embodied their morals. That's why I said the fight has now become internalized. We struggle with moral decisions within ourselves every day. That includes whether developing nuclear technology and using it responsibly and within the prime directive of love.

God did not evaporate mankind - He asked them to repent (i.e. to recognize His authority and turn away from evil) because He would judge them by moral lives. God did not evaporate the Amalekites - He showed them by defeat that He would not give their evil free reign and judged their future by their moral lives. God never changed, but that doesn't mean He doesn't change His mind - and when He did, it was to spare people from judgment. That doesn't mean they were exempt from judgment, just that their judgment was postponed.

When did He ever employ the very tactics of the enemy? Do you mean war? "He who lives by the sword will die by the sword, but who shows mercy will be shown mercy". That was exactly what happened in 1 Samuel 15.

Very little. But it already does, in fact, if we are to believe the words of the Bible. We only have freedom here on earth. Once we die, we are told there are two places one can go: Heaven or Hell.

1. Who will make this decision? God.
2. What will be the requirements? No one really knows for sure because even individual religions cannot decide (and they?re using the same fucking book!)
3. Will we have any say? Any options? No.
4. Will there be the possibility of an appeal? No.
5. Can God be convinced of anything (i.e., change his mind with sufficient evidence)? No.

Christians believe we have freedom, but a pretty limited freedom if you ask me. 70 years or so of relative freedom on earth, followed by an eternal, non-reversible court judgment that will be based upon our belief in one ancient book (among the thousands) and how well we adhered to a set of rules that even Christians cannot agree upon?

A temporary, hollow freedom indeed.

1. Who will make this decision? We do. In this life.
2. What will be the requirements? God. Surely this is evident.
3. Will we have any say? Any options? Yes, what you call "freedom".
4. Will there be the possibility of an appeal? You are appealing now, aren't you?
5. Can God be convinced of anything (i.e., change his mind with sufficient evidence)? Evidence of what? God would have saved Sodom and Gomorrah, like He saved Nineveh, if there were even 10 righteous people in it. The only evidence you need is that you are truly righteous.

Luke 18:8
I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?

If every war was clearly ?avoidable,? then why would God pledge to fight the Amalekites ?generation after generation?? If free will is truly free, and the possibility always existed that the Amalekites might ? just might ? change their ways, why would God make such an early pronouncement? Wouldn?t he just order one generation killed and wait to see what happened?

It referred to their continued aggression, not God's. "Because they have declared war against God's throne, God's throne will forever be at war with them". That does not preclude the chance that they might ever stop waging war, but nothing prevented God from knwoing their intentions either.

Jeremiah 18 7 If at any time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be uprooted, torn down and destroyed, 8 and if that nation I warned repents of its evil, then I will relent and not inflict on it the disaster I had planned.

Christianity didn't rely on fear? Ever heard of the fucking Crusades?Inquisitions? Constantine?s bid to remove other religions, in favor of Christian domination? Telling people they're going to suffer eternally if they don't conform??

The Crusaders relied on fear. So did the Inquisitors and maybe even Constantine. So these Christians did rely on fear. But you find nothing conding any of these in Jesus' message. Instead, you'll find He asked His disciples to put away their swords, because His kingdom was not an earthly one. As a way towards reconciliation with God, Chrst never relied on fear, and Christianity shouldn't either. There is an element of fear, but that is for God himself. If you heed God's warnings you have nothing to fear from His judgment.

Interesting that you use the word 'conform'. Does someone who is drowning "conform" to his recuer by grabbing his hand? Is the inevitability of drowning a threat?

Well, I half agree with you. But I think you may be ignoring the sources those ?people who just condemn homosexuals? cite? namely, tangible, quotable verses in the Bible.

Once again, back to Taoism. Why don?t we see anybody using the Tao Te Ching to condemn homosexuals? Because it doesn?t have any clear, strict, dogmatic verses that seem to condone these things. So it IS possible to construct a religious book that does not offer such great ammunition for homophobes. But the Bible does.

Your statements about ?people who just condemn homosexuality? seem to suggest that you disagree with them, correct? Well, on what grounds do you make that decision? Or, as you might ask me, on what ?authority? can you say, with any amount of certainty, that your modern take on homosexuality is correct?

Simple. Like me, you have taken the available information, processed it, and decided that the history of God?s redemption deserves more recognition than his once-upon-a-time condemnation of homosexuals. Well, others might disagree with you. And they will have their own interpretation of scripture to back them up.

I don't want to move our debate to homosexuality (unless your faith depends on it). I don't consider it natural (neither evolutionary or biblically speaking), but the Bible has the moral obligation to condemn things that are considered immoral. I'm not a homosexual, and I presume you are not, so even though we can judge immoral behaviour, homosexuals have their own personal relationship with God and might live perfectly moral lives. My faith does not allow me to condemn them anymore than I am condemned myself. I wish more people would realize that. The classic verse is 1 Cor. 6:9-10:

"Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God."

Notice that Paul does not describe degrees of immorality, and greed and slander are mentioned in the same breath. No doubt it seems hard to enter into God's kingdom, but as Jesus himself said: for man it might not be possible, but for God anything is possible. Under these circumstances Paul made that statement:

"This was the cancer in Greek life that invaded Rome, and brought the vaunted empire to destruction. Fourteen of the first fifteen Roman emperors practiced this vice; others guilty of it were Socrates and Plato. Nero castrated and married a boy called Sporus, which he held as his wife, and at the same time married Pythagoras and called him his husband! Barclay's conclusion may not be denied that:

In this particular vice in the time of the early church, the world was lost to shame; and there can be little doubt that that was one of the main causes of its degeneracy and the final collapse of its civilization. [The Letters to the Corinthians (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1954), p. 60.]"
- Coffman Commentaries

How does a warlike, vengeful God?s ?order to love? carry any credibility? As far as I?m concerned, his son might be the only one with any slight amount of credibility there.

For instance, if Jesus had not said ?turn the other cheek? but instead had ordered an all-out war against the unfaithful, don?t you think the whole ?love your enemy? speech would have been tainted a bit?

I tend to trust people who are, you know, somewhat consistent.

Maybe you just didn't read the Bible with enough attention. As I have tried to explain, God was "warlike and vengeful" in to His credit, so that nobody might misjudge the author of their salvation and think He tolerates evil, as you seem to think anyway. He consistently acts against it, even - especially - in His own people. But if He didn't love at all, things would have ended with the flood and we would not be having this discussion.

Jesus command to "turn the other cheek" is already difficult because it does not reflect our sense of fairness. Real justice is an eye for an eye - it embodies our understanding of "fairness". It was accepted by most cultures as it stands in the Code of Hammurabi.

Matthew 5
38"You have heard that it was said, 'Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.' [Exodus 21:24; Lev. 24:20; Deut. 19:21] 39But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.

Jesus was explaining the flip-side of what His sacrifice for us would mean. That He suffered the punishment required for all justice to be done, while exposing the human version of justice as flawed. By fulfilling the requirements of the law He transferred our guilt on himself so that we could turn the other cheek, and justice would still have been served. (This is explained far more clearly in Romans 7 and 8).

Apparently God can judge me by any requirements he damn well pleases and I don?t have one iota of a say in that, nor do I have any concrete way of knowing those requirements, for sure, before I die.

You're right in one sense, but quite mistaken in the other. God can judge you by any requirements He pleases. But if He is a hostile God why are we still alive? Except for the conclusion that God does not exist (which you seem to make on the grounds of disagreement, which does not really follow logically). But those requirements aren't nearly as nebulous as you have come to think. He only requires what you are already giving. You have convinced me, at least, that you value the kind of life He created us for. You don't wish to be biased in who you judge right or wrong. But why won't you trust God to be able to make that decision? You base your case against God on the assumption that He cannot give life back that He has taken - that He has no right to take lives that are innocent by legal standards.

Think about this: If God was truly a God of love, would you expect anything less than "anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment [of murder]", as a moral guideline? Read Matthew 5, you'll see Jesus goes through the ten commandments one by one, and explains what they intend.

3So when you, a mere man, pass judgment on them and yet do the same things, do you think you will escape God's judgment? 4Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, tolerance and patience, not realizing that God's kindness leads you toward repentance? (Romans 2)

Romans 8
33Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. 34Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died--more than that, who was raised to life--is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. 35Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? ...37No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

OK, I?m still asking. If the Amalekites were poised to attack, why not send another fucking pillar of fire? It worked the first time.

What would a pillar of fire do? Warn the Israelites? They had nothing to fear. Or warn the Amalekites? Against what, pillars of fire? If you mean to guide the Israelites through their territory unharmed, guess what:

Numbers 14 42 Do not go up, because the LORD is not with you. You will be defeated by your enemies, 43 for the Amalekites and Canaanites will face you there. Because you have turned away from the LORD, he will not be with you and you will fall by the sword."
44 Nevertheless, in their presumption they went up toward the high hill country, though neither Moses nor the ark of the LORD's covenant moved from the camp. 45 Then the Amalekites and Canaanites who lived in that hill country came down and attacked them and beat them down all the way to Hormah.

 

[JustARide]

We could agree to disagree, but I consider it a pity that you reject the "Biblical God" because of anti-religious prejudice, and not because of sound evidence. I still think we can make progress.

Yes, and your prejudice is that you already believe. Fair enough?

Why even kid yourself about being "open-minded" if you have already made up your mind? I think I have raised valid arguments that acts that might be contrued as "tyrannical" does not a tyrannical God make. It's easy to create a strawman god out of an incident, and then denounce that god. It should take more than an argument by outrage to support your case. What you believe has everything to do with, because somehow you have come to believe that God is a tyrant.

I considered myself a Christian for roughly 15 years. In that time, I would have likely accepted your argument that the Bible-God's sanctioned violence was necessary in order to acheive some great end. What changed my thinking was the revelation that we are all guessing, all believing in our own little gods because we crave safety, all rationalizing our acts based on our assumption that God endorses them. And from that, I extrapolated further... If we are merely guessing today, then how likely is it that ancient cultures, even more ignorant than we are today, were also guessing? Very likely, I'd say.

My argument is not based merely on outrage. In fact, it's quite simple. If someone came up to me on the street today and handed me a book about how God was ordering wars and striking people down for relatively trivial lapses in judgment TODAY, I (and you I'm guessing) would dismiss it in a second. So, why in the hell should I NOT dismiss the same thing just because it happens to be old? We easily dismiss everything else that's old... the ancient myths, outdated medicine, barbaric punishments, slavery...

You can concoct any blueprint you want of how God fulfilled every prophecy and kept his promises. It's not unlike that line Obi-Wan tells Luke...

(paraphrasing)
Luke: You told me Darth Vader killed my father.
Obi-Wan: Well, what I said was true.... from a certain point of view.

The Bible is a nice storybook, and it fits together well if you jam the pieces in hard enough. Go to any Matrix messageboard right now and observe the mad, desperate rush to explain what was, in reality, an inconsistent fantasy written by a couple of pizza-eating kung-fu nerds turned directors. Same thing.

How can you tell me you're sure that no tampering took place with the Bible? In all its versions, copies, recopies, translations, etc., are you telling me not one story was altered to fit a preconceived idea of how things should flow? Not one author reworded a prophecy ever so slightly, in order to make it seem as if it were fulfilled in some later chapter?

If the Bible is a perfectly interlocking puzzle where every action is preordained and every obscure prophecy miraculously fulfilled, why was there so much fucking disagreement when it was being asembled?

There's difference. Hitler believed his super race was superior to other races. God made it clear that Israel was not chosen because of any superiority or virtue of their own. Their holiness came with the great burden of God's laws.

Look, Israel can say whatever it wants about why God "chose" them and for what purpose. The fact remains: singling out races (just like choosing one child over another) never brings about unity. It divides. God should know that. Look at the religious conflicts in the Middle East right now; they are raging battles for god that, when simplified, look like this:

"My god can beat up your god."

And we've been having this argument for thousands of fucking years. I'm tired of it. I have a hard time believing that conflict is anything but man's ignorance pitted against man's ignorance. The idea that God is at the OTB betting on a side is ludicrous.

I also detest any kind of aggression that supposes to be divinely sanctioned. Killing people is nothing less than killing allies against the real evils of crime and hatred.

Then why single out the incidents depicted in the Bible as being true? Why don't they fall under the umbrella of "agression that supposes to be divinely sanctioned"? Because God had a plan? Because God had chosen one special race of people he wanted to survive? Because a vaguely worded prophecy somewhere seems to foreshadow it?

God made it clear that what He hates is immorality and injustice, and would eradicate it. He struck at the heart of evil, and replaced it with a heart of love. We embody that heart.

OK, God hates injustice. Let us read from Exodus:

21:20-21 (NIV): "If a man beats his male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies as a direct result, he must be punished, but he is not to be punished if the slave gets up after a day or two, since the slave is his property."

These are God's rules for how to handle your slaves. Now, call me crazy, but I don't see this as a real progressive step toward justice here. In fact, God is endorsing slavery by laying out the manner in which it should be executed. God is a tool of the status quo in this instance - not some divine light of truth, showing us the path toward love. Hardly God Vs. the Board of Education, is it?

Where's the hatred of injustice here? Why didn't God say something like, "It is wrong to own another human being"? Would that have been really difficult? God isn't exactly a civil rights pioneer, is he?

Now, what's more likely here.... that God really truly did feel it necessary to impart to people how they should treat their slaves... or that the writers owned slaves, wanted to rationalize their hiring practices, and had God endorse them?

It's a sad fact that some people enjoy exacting punishment in the name of God more than they enjoy loving in the name of God. They are people who don't realize the war has been internalized and is being waged at a moral level now. We can't invoke God to condone hatred, neither can we blame God for any hatred or injustice after we have crucified Him ourselves. You know it and I know it: the only divine directive is love. That is the gospel.

Depends on who you get your gospel from... Jerry Falwell, Martin Luther King, George W. Bush, or Saint Paul. It's all about interpretation, and you know it. I wish everyone thought love was the only "divine directive." Sadly, your book seems to have provided ample ammunition to pretty much every wack-job with an agenda.

Since when have agnostics become exempt from criminals behaviour? Just because you can categorize a problem area doesn't mean you have isolated the problem.

I'm asking... where in the world are people using agnostic ideas as reasons for violence? Is there anybody using spiritual uncertainty as a modus operandi for killing others?

Religious certainty, my friend, is what kills. How else do you get able-bodied young men to fly themselves into buildings, killling thousands of innocent people? Tell them God and virgin pussy awaits. The doubtful/unsure among us are not as proned to religious violence as the ones who are SURE that they are right. Yes, there are millions of other forms of violence, but at least I've eliminated one from my repertoire.

You know why the phrase "radical fundamentalist agnostic" sounds funny? Because radical or fundamentalist ideas are at odds with the very foundation of agnosticism to the point that "radical agnostic" is practically an oxymoron. How can someone who withholds judgment possibly have a strong desire to kill for his beliefs? He doesn't have any concrete beliefs to begin with!

As Bertrand Russell said, "Of course I am not willing to die for my beliefs. I could be wrong."

There are radical New Agers, radical feminists, radical scientists and radical kids, just as there are many pacifists movements. People gravitate to things that fit their preferences. And they will stretch their affiliations to fit their motives. But someone who really believes in the reality of Israel's God must know He does not allow the His boundaries to be stretched very far. How much room for interpretation is there in:

'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind,' and 'Love your neighbour as yourself.'?

Apparently a lot, judging from the plethora of denominations it has spawned.

Do you have any evidence that they were biased in favour of themselves?

NEWSFLASH: Everyone is biased in favor of themselves.

If the evidence showed that America was a weak minority in exile, and that you miraculously overthrew the Iraqi government and all its allies at the peak of their power, those people might have reason to believe you really were supported by God.

Weak minorities have defeated powerful governments before; it does not necessarily imply help from God. America was essentially defeated and driven out of Vietnam, despite having superior weapons, technology, funding, etc. That does not mean the Vietcong had God's backing - it meant they fought cleverly and brutally.

And yes, every nation's history will be a puffed up version of reality. Deal with it.

You make the mistake of thinking God created us to be warlike and hateful.

No, I'm saying it's our fault we're hateful. But God knew how we would act from the very beginning. God had to know the consequences of his actions as well, including the act of creating us.

If I'm a genetic scientist and I know that by creating a race of bloodhungry wolf-rats, I will unleash inevitable destruction, I'm going to think twice before I create them.

That's exactly the point: He didn't. As you are evidence of yourself - we do have the moral capacity of understanding the consequences our actions. We have the moral knowledge to know not to kill each other for trivial reasons. But what if greed is no trivial reason for someone, what if injustice has no moral meaning for someone? Doesn't that mean they are in need of a moral education? And who better to give that education than the author of morality Himself?

I'd prefer the local university, thank you.

That's why I said the fight has now become internalized. We struggle with moral decisions within ourselves every day. That includes whether developing nuclear technology and using it responsibly and within the prime directive of love.

Many do not believe the battle has been "internalized." That is merely your interpretation of scripture. Also, by placing humanity in two different phases (the external and the internal), you allow for God to commit acts in the OT that are abhorrent in the NT. By splitting history, you create a window wherein God can act differently for a certain period of time.

The very idea that God went through a stage of being pissed and angry and extroverted, and then calmed down and decided on an internal struggle, suggests that God is simply a big psychologist, trying his best to mold and shape us into something - and that, if humanity needed slavery 2000 years ago, he had to oblige and allow them to have that "phase." What kind of a consistent moral code is that?

God never changed, but that doesn't mean He doesn't change His mind - and when He did, it was to spare people from judgment.

OK, He doesn’t change, but he changed his mind. Now, let me break this down...

The act of changing one’s mind presupposes fallibility. It implies that his first inclination was incorrect, unwise, or misguided. Therefore, he reconsidered. Now, indulge me on this. How and why would an all-knowing God (who does not change and is consistent in his perfect judgment) change his mind? And is that very act of changing his mind not an admission that he is capable of making an incorrect, or at least less-than-perfect, judgment?

When did He ever employ the very tactics of the enemy? Do you mean war? "He who lives by the sword will die by the sword, but who shows mercy will be shown mercy". That was exactly what happened in 1 Samuel 15.

Jesus tells us to love our enemies, to “turn the other cheek.” This is ENTIRELY at odds with the eye-for-an-eye, take-no-prisoners policies of the OT God. Face it. You cannot simultaneously “turn the other cheek” and slice the other guy’s cheek off his face and call that a consistent philosophy.

Slaughtering the women, children, and animals of an opposing side is indeed adopting the ways of the enemy. Unless, of course, you believe God was never opposed to that kind of treatment anyway – in which case, I suppose it isn’t adopting the methods of the enemy per se, but rather using them all along.

--------

1. Who will make this decision? We do. In this life. (And we make that decision based on what clear, uncontroversial set of requirements? Tell me what I should do to please God, and follow that up by explaining how you can know that for sure.)

2. What will be the requirements? God. Surely this is evident. (How does this answer the question? The word “God” does not constitute a requirement, only a wildly controversial term that could apply to an infinite number of possibilities.)

3. Will we have any say? Any options? Yes, what you call "freedom". (Freedom to act as we will on earth, only to be judged by criteria we have no way of knowing for sure ahead of time.)

4. Will there be the possibility of an appeal? You are appealing now, aren't you? (No, because I have not yet been sentenced to anything. I have no idea what will happen when I die and neither, my friend, do you.)

5. Can God be convinced of anything (i.e., change his mind with sufficient evidence)? Evidence of what? God would have saved Sodom and Gomorrah, like He saved Nineveh, if there were even 10 righteous people in it. The only evidence you need is that you are truly righteous. (Evidence of an error in his judgment. And if God changes his mind, that means he must reconsider things, based on new evidence.)

Jeremiah 18 7 If at any time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be uprooted, torn down and destroyed, 8 and if that nation I warned repents of its evil, then I will relent and not inflict on it the disaster I had planned.

This would be all well and fine if nations acted as one conscious entity, but they do not. Does everyone in the United States have the same “intentions”? Should we be punished indiscriminately because we happen to belong to a nation that has not “repented”? Do entire nations ever collectively repent?

If you heed God's warnings you have nothing to fear from His judgment.

And what are God’s warnings? Specifically? To have faith in him? What kind of faith? And in what exactly? How can I judge his will from such a contradictory, over-analyzed, controversial source? How, from a book that has inspired love, compassion, hatred, divisiveness, cultural wars, confusion, etc. can I divine what I should do? Try to find the right interpretation maybe? What if my interpretation of his warnings is wrong? How will I know before Judgment Day?

I don't want to move our debate to homosexuality (unless your faith depends on it). I don't consider it natural (neither evolutionary or biblically speaking), but the Bible has the moral obligation to condemn things that are considered immoral. I'm not a homosexual, and I presume you are not, so even though we can judge immoral behaviour, homosexuals have their own personal relationship with God and might live perfectly moral lives. My faith does not allow me to condemn them anymore than I am condemned myself. I wish more people would realize that.

So I guess you have no right to condemn me either, right?

You’re just pretty sure that God will likely condemn me. Is there really that big of a difference?

That’s kinda like saying, “Well, I don’t have a problem with unbelievers, but the King does… and I agree with whatever the King says.”

Maybe you just didn't read the Bible with enough attention.

I always love this line.

Obviously, as evidenced by this lengthy discussion, it takes quite a bit of elbow grease to maneuver all those biblical pieces so that they fit, huh? Not exactly 2+2=4, is it?

You're right in one sense, but quite mistaken in the other. God can judge you by any requirements He pleases. But if He is a hostile God why are we still alive?

Here are just a few options:

1. The God who created us was fallible, and he has abandoned us or ceased to exist.
2. No God created us at all.
3. Matter and energy have always existed, though in different forms. We are merely one of those forms, a product of the everlasting Tao.
4. God did not truly enact the events of the OT, and it not a hostile God.
5. We are a dream inside God’s head.

I’m being facetious here. The point is: an infinite number of possibilities exist to explain our current circumstances… and being the fallible, limited humans that we are, we may never know even a tiny, tiny, tiny fraction of them.

And if, by chance, God is the hostile God of the OT, maybe he’s just planning his next big flood as we speak. How do you know?

Except for the conclusion that God does not exist (which you seem to make on the grounds of disagreement, which does not really follow logically).

Grounds of disagreement? What exactly are you talking about?

I am an agnostic. Very simple. I withhold judgment on the question of God. You could be right. The Bible could be right. I have no idea! I’m going solely on my own imperfect judgment here, as are you. Only I am willing to admit my fallibility when it comes to the question of God.

But those requirements aren't nearly as nebulous as you have come to think. He only requires what you are already giving. You have convinced me, at least, that you value the kind of life He created us for. You don't wish to be biased in who you judge right or wrong. But why won't you trust God to be able to make that decision? You base your case against God on the assumption that He cannot give life back that He has taken - that He has no right to take lives that are innocent by legal standards.

Well, first of all, I’m glad you think I value life. I do, and to the fullest. Here are my problems with the Bible-God and those who want to believe in him:

A) I see more harm done on this earth by believing in the Bible-God than I see good.

B) Because men waving the banner of God have caused much misery around the world throughout history, I am reluctant to believe in a God who uses/used human armies to accomplish his goals.

C) I find it difficult to believe God, being higher than us, wiser than us, more knowledgeable than us, would choose to engage in the basest of human activities, endorse the practice of slavery, demand pointless animal sacrifices (a la old pagan gods), and act as a military strategist for one specific race for a select period of history.

D) Belief in a specific, religion-defined deity narrows the scope of appreciation people have for life. It quiets and calms the mystery – the same mystery that gives life its vitality, its energy.

E) Belief in a judgmental god tends to produce judgmental people. Hence, the noticeable lack of Taoist terrorists.

So I take a look around. People all over the place are screaming, “God says this…” and “God says that…” and arguing over their books, their interpretations. You know how I find peace? Reading outside on a beautiful day. Listening to a Beethoven symphony and marveling at what a deaf man wrote a couple hundred years ago.

And I’m thankful. But I don’t know where I should direct that thankfulness, so I just meditate on it, allow it to go where it will. If (a) god can hear it, great. If not, fine. The one thing I’m not inclined toward, however, is pretending I know anything more about this flying space-rock whirling through time than anyone else.

Religions would have me asking...Does God want me to go to church on Sunday? What does God want me to wear? Should I eat meat on Fridays? Is it wrong to masturbate? Should I go tell my homosexual friends to deny their own impulses because an invisible deity told me they should?

These are questions I find little reason to dwell upon. Because, in the scheme of things, they seem quite inconsequential (if not outright silly) when compared with the greater injustices around the world today. Granted, that’s just my take. Case in point: I don’t trust the Bible-God because he seems to be more of a reflection of human biases and prejudices, not some truly transcendent figure.

What would a pillar of fire do? Warn the Israelites? They had nothing to fear. Or warn the Amalekites? Against what, pillars of fire?

I mean block them. A wall of fire blocking the evil Amalekites from attacking. The Bible is chock full of unlikely, miraculous events. I’m sure you can stretch your imagination here. Work with me, bro.

Whew. What an anti-climactic ending there.

Josh

It’s just a ride. – Bill Hicks :m:

 

[Jenyar]

Yes, and your prejudice is that you already believe. Fair enough?

Hey, I'm not the one who has suspended my decision. I have decided to have faith. You, on the other hand, claim "not to have decided yet", i.e. being agnostic. I was just pointing out that it seems like you already have decided something: that God is unknowable. If I can at least get you to admit that it is equally impossible to know that, we have made some progress. But the evidence seems to point that in spite of everything, it isn't impossible to know God.

My argument is not based merely on outrage. In fact, it's quite simple. If someone came up to me on the street today and handed me a book about how God was ordering wars and striking people down for relatively trivial lapses in judgment TODAY, I (and you I'm guessing) would dismiss it in a second. So, why in the hell should I NOT dismiss the same thing just because it happens to be old? We easily dismiss everything else that's old... the ancient myths, outdated medicine, barbaric punishments, slavery...

We have grown out of our infant's shoes.

"9For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child."

I'll repeat what I said: the Bible relies on history to provide weight to its authority - specifically, a remarkable history with God. God frequently invokes "Abraham, Isaac and Jacob" to emphasize who He is. God chose man, then man's descendants, then faithful man, who had children, who became a nation. It didn't happen "out of the blue", like a piece of propaganda ordering wars or condoning slavery.

The Bible is a nice storybook, and it fits together well if you jam the pieces in hard enough. Go to any Matrix messageboard right now and observe the mad, desperate rush to explain what was, in reality, an inconsistent fantasy written by a couple of pizza-eating kung-fu nerds turned directors. Same thing.

The difference between Santa Claus, the Matrix and floating agnostic green-eyed monsters is in the claims they make. You must judge something by the claim it makes. The Bible doesn't propose to be a story - it proposes to provide valid accounts of something that has been native to human experience since time began: a relationship with God. And it contradicts your uncertainty.

How can you tell me you're sure that no tampering took place with the Bible? In all its versions, copies, recopies, translations, etc., are you telling me not one story was altered to fit a preconceived idea of how things should flow? Not one author reworded a prophecy ever so slightly, in order to make it seem as if it were fulfilled in some later chapter?

There are really only a few versions, but they consist of so many manuscripts (over 5600 for the New Testament) that they can be cross-checked for accuracy very easily. The amount of effort, thought and practise has preserved it's essence despite the flaws of human language. Every translation is made from the most authorative manuscripts, and translation become more accurate as the science of translation progresses. See How the Bible came to us and Illustration of Bible text manuscript tree and variant readings.

Remember that we don't really work with prophesies anymore, they are foreign to us, so to understand them in today's scientific sense does them injustice anyway. Prophesies made a claim to a general and a specific event. If their authority only stretched to an event specifically predicted, why were they still regarded as authoritive afterwards? Why were they even included in the Bible if they had already come true and had no further relevance? Have you had a look at the prophesies that were said to be fulfilled in Jesus lately? Prophesies were a very cultural thing to Israel and Jewish faith - similar to an "inside joke" - one their rabbi's and priests tried to make sure people would "catch" when it was "fulfilled". The best example is Jesus' answer to John the Baptist in Matt.11:

When John heard in prison what Christ was doing, he sent his disciples to ask him, "Are you the one who was to come, or should we expect someone else?"
4Jesus replied, "Go back and report to John what you hear and see: [1] The blind receive sight, [2] the lame walk, [3] those who have leprosy are cured, [4] the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is preached to the poor. 6Blessed is the man who does not fall away on account of me."

[1],[2],[3] and [4] were prophesied by Isaiah but had never come true. Most Jews were therefore expecting them as a signs that would specifically point to the messiah. Another reason the words considered 'fulfilled' by the NT authors do not seem to match the Hebrew Bible exactly is because Jews were using the Septuagint in Jesus' time. But because of its use in Christianity they finally rejected it in favour of the Hebrew text or of more literal translations (Catholic encyclopedia: the Septuagint. It suddenly wasn't "good enough" anymore.

If the Bible is a perfectly interlocking puzzle where every action is preordained and every obscure prophecy miraculously fulfilled, why was there so much fucking disagreement when it was being asembled?

Maybe you have been expecting it to be perectly interlocking in a way it does not propose to be. You are not even perfectly interlocking as a human being, even though you are a consistent, functioning entity. Where you wouldn't function if your legs didn't fit on your hips, the Bible wouldn't function if it didn't represent history in the awkward way people experience it. But even if your legs didn't fit your hips, your mind would still be functioning as a whole - and that is the kind of perection the Bible represents. No matter how broken, insufficient and contradictory our bodies or our lives become, our thoughts can still be perfect.

Look, Israel can say whatever it wants about why God "chose" them and for what purpose. The fact remains: singling out races (just like choosing one child over another) never brings about unity. It divides. God should know that. Look at the religious conflicts in the Middle East right now; they are raging battles for god that, when simplified, look like this:

"My god can beat up your god."

And we've been having this argument for thousands of fucking years. I'm tired of it. I have a hard time believing that conflict is anything but man's ignorance pitted against man's ignorance. The idea that God is at the OTB betting on a side is ludicrous.

It is only in the post-modern age that world unity has even become a possibility - and not even a remote reality. This might be despite religious exclusivity, or because Christian premises are being applied at last. Such speculation is all good and well, but on this scale neither can be proved conclusively or used in an argument. What is happening now is because of everything, good or bad, that happened before - chaos theory.

It might not be PC anymore, but God wasn't uniting Israel with the rest of the world, He was obviously pitting them against it. God was establishing His will - and where it differed from man's will, conflict inevitably resulted. That's because there is no such thing as a moral middle ground. "Let God be true, and every man a liar." For God to establish right, there had to be conflict with what was wrong - it had to be faced. The same with slavery, but I'll get to that in a moment. Holiness is separation. Creation is separation - existence is what is as opposed to what is not. Other religions make much of this conflict, and try to resolve it by proposing that everything becomes one. But injustice and justice can never be reconciled without judgement, or do you disagree with me? You should learn from nature: evolution doesn't favour unity, it favours strength. Community is important, but so is suvival. And God is establishing an eternal kingdom. God can't compromise on purity, that's why He paid the price for our sins.

Then why single out the incidents depicted in the Bible as being true? Why don't they fall under the umbrella of "agression that supposes to be divinely sanctioned"? Because God had a plan? Because God had chosen one special race of people he wanted to survive? Because a vaguely worded prophecy somewhere seems to foreshadow it?

We would like to categorize everything that ever happened under an umbrella and label them 'good' or 'bad' - so that we can end up with an exhaustive list of do's and don'ts and become one happy family. Isn't that what legal systems have been trying to do wherever justice has become PC? But times change, as we have established. In the ancient world, everything was divinely determined. That was the paradigm they worked with, and it took Israel's prophets ages to get them to think further than that.

We would still like the world to work that simplistically, in a way that makes sense to us and fits our working paradigms. But that's nothing other than progressive fundamentalism. We are so overwhelmed by all the information available in the universe that if we have to include it all we either take on an agnostic view, and let the world make up its own mind about what it wants to be, or we decide what's important and take the "radical" route by making choices. Choosing a moral life means you have looked at the universe and decided justice and morality can exist and is worth standing for. Not everybody makes that decision - as terrorism proves.

Look, in a world where God didn't exist I would absolutely agree with you. Then people could invoke God for every evil they wanted and have an excuse. But this isn't what happened with Israel, and their world view is now lost in history. The Bible makes it clear that even when God sanctioned a course of action it was against Israel's "better judgment". They literally went into the Holy Land kicking and screaming not to. That's just not the same as the situation we have in the world today. We have people playing God - something that more humble people with better judgement have been fighting since day one - some fight it in the name of God (presuming equality with God is the original sin, after all), others fight it in the name of righteousness (which I presume you have some faith in).

OK, God hates injustice. Let us read from Exodus:

21:20-21 (NIV): "If a man beats his male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies as a direct result, he must be punished, but he is not to be punished if the slave gets up after a day or two, since the slave is his property."

These are God's rules for how to handle your slaves. Now, call me crazy, but I don't see this as a real progressive step toward justice here. In fact, God is endorsing slavery by laying out the manner in which it should be executed. God is a tool of the status quo in this instance - not some divine light of truth, showing us the path toward love. Hardly God Vs. the Board of Education, is it?

Where's the hatred of injustice here? Why didn't God say something like, "It is wrong to own another human being"? Would that have been really difficult? God isn't exactly a civil rights pioneer, is he?

Now, what's more likely here.... that God really truly did feel it necessary to impart to people how they should treat their slaves... or that the writers owned slaves, wanted to rationalize their hiring practices, and had God endorse them?

Slavery wasn't always politically incorrect, as you probably know. It started when people presumed power over other people. It might have been an extension of the natural order of evolution, I don't know. But it was wrong. The first mention we have of slavery is when Noah curses his son Canaan to slavery for some indecency he committed, the first sin after the flood. Some descendents of Abraham would always be slaves, and Israel were slaves.

Genesis 15
12 As the sun was setting, Abram fell into a deep sleep, and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him. 13 Then the LORD said to him, "Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own, and they will be enslaved and mistreated four hundred years. 14 But I will punish the nation they serve as slaves, and afterward they will come out with great possessions.

Deliverance out of slavery would not have been a good thing if God thought it was right. God reminds Israel hundreds of times of their own time as slaves in Egypt. In contrast to the laws of other ancient Near Eastern nations:

If a slave has taken refuge with you, do not hand him over to his master. 16 Let him live among you wherever he likes and in whatever town he chooses. Do not oppress him. (Deut 23.15)

But slaves were part of the family in Hebrew culture. They could inherit and they were treated as children. In a hierarchical society, being owned was as natural a being a son, and even though slaves were considered property they were treated as human beings. Their whole economy revolved around manpower, much like a company's wealth depends on its human resources today. If someone defeated you in battle, they won the right to own you. The real problem was misuse of that power - mistreatment. So the first laws about slavery was about their treatment. The Bible was unique in its time in that respect. I have reffered you to this website on slavery before.

God wouldn't gain anything by overthrowing the Israelites economy. The laws He gave them about slavery were very strict. It's not a sin to have people who work for you. Have you ever tried to run a farm? In those times you would be called a slave-owner. You give them shelter, you pay their wages, and in the end they and their families are dependant on you for their livelihood.

God did not suspend reality to create a perfect world. He never has. Sin would always creep into the lives of people, and it will affect the way they do things. You have already seen what happens when something that we think is alright is condemned outright. It doesn't aid people to become more loving towards each other. God worked on something that was more lasting: the attitudes by which people lived.

In the end morality isn't about right and wrong as much as it's about a way of approaching a life that is already unfair, with the goal of improving it towards an ideal - whether you can see it or not. And that requires faith.

Religious certainty, my friend, is what kills. How else do you get able-bodied young men to fly themselves into buildings, killling thousands of innocent people? Tell them God and virgin pussy awaits. The doubtful/unsure among us are not as proned to religious violence as the ones who are SURE that they are right. Yes, there are millions of other forms of violence, but at least I've eliminated one from my repertoire.

Misplaed religious certainty is no different than foolhardiness. Anybody can act out of certainty towards the wrong ends, and agnosticism (or calculated uncertainty) does not exempt you from it. You might have "eliminated it from your repertoire", but I doubt you tended more towards violence while religion was in your repertoire... Violence doesn't exactly aid a person's credibility with God.

No, I'm saying it's our fault we're hateful. But God knew how we would act from the very beginning. God had to know the consequences of his actions as well, including the act of creating us.

If I'm a genetic scientist and I know that by creating a race of bloodhungry wolf-rats, I will unleash inevitable destruction, I'm going to think twice before I create them.

What displays more love: Creating beings that have the means and potential to live and love as you intend them to, or not to create them because they might choose not to do what's best for them?

I propose that God only knew how we would act after we had decided on a course of action. I know some people believe in a watchmaker who has wound us up sin and all, but I do not and have no reason to. He did not form
us with our decisions already made, or we would not have had the ability to reason.

Many do not believe the battle has been "internalized." That is merely your interpretation of scripture. Also, by placing humanity in two different phases (the external and the internal), you allow for God to commit acts in the OT that are abhorrent in the NT. By splitting history, you create a window wherein God can act differently for a certain period of time.

How would you interpret Ephesians 6:12?

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil.

The very idea that God went through a stage of being pissed and angry and extroverted, and then calmed down and decided on an internal struggle, suggests that God is simply a big psychologist, trying his best to mold and shape us into something - and that, if humanity needed slavery 2000 years ago, he had to oblige and allow them to have that "phase." What kind of a consistent moral code is that?

Humanity did not need God's help to dump itself in a world of violence and hatred. God worked in opposition to forces that would take hold of us, and led people out of them. This entailed fighting a very real war in ancient times, when religion was equivalent to scientific reality. Even Israel had lost the ability to distinguish between spiritual and eartly matters by the time the Messiah came. But still He did not take away their ability to make choices. They weren't going to be redeemed against their will, and neither are you. I don't believe it was mere coincidence that Christ came at the dawn of the age of reason. But to many people religion has only been replaced by superstition anyway. You yourself mentioned the 'luck' as a factor in the rise of Christianity.

OK, He doesn?t change, but he changed his mind. Now, let me break this down...

The act of changing one?s mind presupposes fallibility. It implies that his first inclination was incorrect, unwise, or misguided. Therefore, he reconsidered. Now, indulge me on this. How and why would an all-knowing God (who does not change and is consistent in his perfect judgment) change his mind? And is that very act of changing his mind not an admission that he is capable of making an incorrect, or at least less-than-perfect, judgment?

There you go making things black and white again. Mercy does not suppose fallibility, yet it means not acting out punishment that was promised and deserved. Love does not mean fallibility, it means patience, restraint, tolerance - in other words, not acting when you mean to act. It does not mean the initial inclination was incorrect, just that you decided not to act on it. Justice alone can never warrant eternal life, since life itself is undeserved, but nothing prevents God from giving it out of love. And if you lost it, how would you regain it unless God could change His mind? God proclaimed His love for us, and what would that mean if he never took us into consideration? What would prayer achieve? But it's up to God in His infinite wisdom what He decides to do in the end.

And where did God ever misjudge people? His judgement has always been so spot on that we have trouble reconciling it with our precious "free will". And when He acted out of anger it was never without cause. The reverse argument would be, if God ever chose to love and realized it was a mistake, would He not be warranted to change His mind then? But He never did, and I don't see anybody raising objections about that...

Jesus tells us to love our enemies, to ?turn the other cheek.? This is ENTIRELY at odds with the eye-for-an-eye, take-no-prisoners policies of the OT God. Face it. You cannot simultaneously ?turn the other cheek? and slice the other guy?s cheek off his face and call that a consistent philosophy.

Slaughtering the women, children, and animals of an opposing side is indeed adopting the ways of the enemy. Unless, of course, you believe God was never opposed to that kind of treatment anyway ? in which case, I suppose it isn?t adopting the methods of the enemy per se, but rather using them all along.

I don't think you really thought it through. According to the Collins dictionary, "justice" means:

a) the principle of fairness that like cases should be treated alike
b) the principle that punishment should be proportionate to the offen

Right. But what does justice intend to achieve? An endless cycle of retribution? The meaning of justice actually loses its meaning if it fosters a ritualistic action-response approach to right and wrong. What are the ends of the law?. Isn't it to work towards good, not only to achieve peace but to maintain it? Look at America's legalistic society. There is a clause and a subclause for every possibility, but does it remove crime, or just try to point it out in no uncertain terms?

Maybe if the purpose of God's commandments were just to keep people in line so they would be good enough to get into heaven, it would have stayed that way, but it never was. It's purpose was to point out sin so that we could become morally responsible and live in a relationship with God, who wishes to be our heavenly Father, but won't tolerate sin. What the law did was alienate us from sin, but it didn't reconcile us with God either. He did that from His side, so that we could turn the other cheek even when faced with death. The law has no power over us anymore, even though it still points out sin.

This would be all well and fine if nations acted as one conscious entity, but they do not. Does everyone in the United States have the same ?intentions?? Should we be punished indiscriminately because we happen to belong to a nation that has not ?repented?? Do entire nations ever collectively repent?

The king spoke for the people, and everybody was held accountable for what everybody else did. That's the difference between tribes and countries. If you were part of a tribe, you were supporting its rulership and contributing to its wealth, or downfall. Communities weren't just incidental. And democracy didn't came around until the Greeks began thinking about it.

And what are God?s warnings? Specifically? To have faith in him? What kind of faith? And in what exactly? How can I judge his will from such a contradictory, over-analyzed, controversial source? How, from a book that has inspired love, compassion, hatred, divisiveness, cultural wars, confusion, etc. can I divine what I should do? Try to find the right interpretation maybe? What if my interpretation of his warnings is wrong? How will I know before Judgment Day? [/qoute]
What does the Bible inspire in you? The same seed in different soil... remember? If you really care about love and morality, why not compare it with the Jesus' message? Especially Romans would appeal to you, I think. It sure is controversial, but so is believing in ideals that have no basis in nature - such as the ability for moral reasoning, or selfless love. It doesn't depend on interpretation as much as you think, but on sincerity. The Pharisees were very good at interpreting scripture, but not very good at embodying it (Matt.23:23) If you want to learn what kind of faith is necessary, you'll have to read the Bible. Not just because it's the Bible, but because it's in there. I can tell you this though, from listening to you, that just picking up the Bible again will be one of the hardest tests of faith you'll ever have to face. One of truest indicators of your sincerity of seeking God. And I'll always be available for an honest debate

And if, by chance, God is the hostile God of the OT, maybe he?s just planning his next big flood as we speak. How do you know?

Genesis 9:11
I establish my covenant with you: Never again will all life be cut off by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth."

I am an agnostic. Very simple. I withhold judgment on the question of God. You could be right. The Bible could be right. I have no idea! I?m going solely on my own imperfect judgment here, as are you. Only I am willing to admit my fallibility when it comes to the question of God.

Unfortunately that's not good enough. The very concept of God includes His relationship with us. He is knowable because He makes Himself knowable, not according to what we would like Him to be, according to who He would like us to be. At least be honest with yourself; you don't withhold judgement because there is no evidence, only because you don't accept the evidence presented. I don't mean evidence of Him as such, that lies on the level
of a personal relationship, but evidence that faith could be a valid way of knowing Him.

Well, first of all, I?m glad you think I value life. I do, and to the fullest. Here are my problems with the Bible-God and those who want to believe in him:

A) I see more harm done on this earth by believing in the Bible-God than I see good.

You would see just as much harm without people believing God, sometimes more, sometimes less. Face it, lawless people will fill the gap with whatever angle they can find. If you want to start removing excuses for doing evil, why not start with the one presented by recognizing no authority to hold people accountable.

B) Because men waving the banner of God have caused much misery around the world throughout history, I am reluctant to believe in a God who uses/used human armies to accomplish his goals.

What about the armies that work for good in His name? Or the armies of people being oppressed by people in power? God doesn't use humans - what could we possibly "accomplish" that would do Him any good? He establishes a relationship that permits us to know Him, and when we know His love we're able to realize that everything we do out of love we do to our advantage and the glory of His name - and everything we do without love we do to the detriment of ourselves and His name. We're not tools, we're representatives.

C) I find it difficult to believe God, being higher than us, wiser than us, more knowledgeable than us, would choose to engage in the basest of human activities, endorse the practice of slavery, demand pointless animal sacrifices (a la old pagan gods), and act as a military strategist for one specific race for a select period of history.

No, what you find difficult is that God would associate Himself with people who engage in the basest of human activities. None of what God decreed made it possible for Israel to become worse people, and nothing that prevented Israel from becoming better human beings - He actively nurtured it.

D) Belief in a specific, religion-defined deity narrows the scope of appreciation people have for life. It quiets and calms the mystery ? the same mystery that gives life its vitality, its energy.

Maybe for you, but I don't know anyone who found that belief in a loving God removed the mystery out of life. I personally can't look at something like a sunset without marvelling about how little we appreciate the beauty and mystery God had infused everything with. On the other hand, no scientific explanation has never made me appreciate a sunset more than I could before.

E) Belief in a judgmental god tends to produce judgmental people. Hence, the noticeable lack of Taoist terrorists.

It could, if it was belief without understanding. I don't know what kind of a terrorists these would make:

Luke 6:37 "Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven."

Matt.7 "Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you."

and my favourite:
James 4:11 Brothers, do not slander one another. Anyone who speaks against his brother or judges him speaks against the law and judges it. When you judge the law, you are not keeping it, but sitting in judgment on it.

So I take a look around. People all over the place are screaming, ?God says this?? and ?God says that?? and arguing over their books, their interpretations. You know how I find peace? Reading outside on a beautiful day. Listening to a Beethoven symphony and marveling at what a deaf man wrote a couple hundred years ago.

You and me both...

And I?m thankful. But I don?t know where I should direct that thankfulness, so I just meditate on it, allow it to go where it will. If (a) god can hear it, great. If not, fine. The one thing I?m not inclined toward, however, is pretending I know anything more about this flying space-rock whirling through time than anyone else.

Trust me, God hears it. I know what I know by faith, and I have faith because of Christ, if nothing else. If His testimony doesn't convince you, then you have rejected all the facts there ever will be without the benefit of faith.

It convinces me because it confirms what I know to be true. For instance, I know that it's wrong to lie and right to tell the truth. How can I be so certain? Nobody has ever proved it to me, and if anybody could, I have believed it before anybody did, haven't I? I have faith in its truth. And that's just one instance of a greater truth contained in "morality", which also not scientifically verifyable.

Neither is beauty for that matter, and I tend to agree with Keats "Truth is Beauty and Beauty is Truth; That is all ye know and all ye need to know."

Religions would have me asking...Does God want me to go to church on Sunday? What does God want me to wear? Should I eat meat on Fridays? Is it wrong to masturbate? Should I go tell my homosexual friends to deny their own impulses because an invisible deity told me they should?

These are questions I find little reason to dwell upon. Because, in the scheme of things, they seem quite inconsequential (if not outright silly) when compared with the greater injustices around the world today. Granted, that?s just my take. Case in point: I don?t trust the Bible-God because he seems to be more of a reflection of human biases and prejudices, not some truly transcendent figure.

Everyone is faced with their own share of injustices. If those aren't yours, then you have no reason to confront them. But somehow you have gotten stuck in the legalistic red-tape surrounding Israel, and their moral crises. You accused me of seeing a "glorious, symbolic victory" when all you see is slaughter. If you are only willing to look for God's transcendence in the sins of humanity, why are you surprised that you don't find God there?

I mean block them. A wall of fire blocking the evil Amalekites from attacking. The Bible is chock full of unlikely, miraculous events. I?m sure you can stretch your imagination here. Work with me, bro.

It is a bit anti-climactic, I agree. But still, name one precedence for such an act?

But what would it achieve? Why not just take the whole of Israel up to heaven and be done with it? Why not prevent sin from being a possibility at all? Why don't we take all criminals to Australia and let the rest of the world live in peace?

I think you assume too much

PS. These posts are just getting longer and longer. Not that I don't enjoy writing them - I think I learn more writing from them than you do reading them; it takes much longer to defend something than to attack it, as I'm sure you realize. I just hope I can make you think about some of these things a bit further. I must seem very pedantic in all of this, but just don't think this doesn't aren't questions I haven't asked myself. I stake as much on being honest with myself as I'm sure you do. I just wish I could say more in less space, because time always catches up with me!

I appreciate the time you're taking to read my responses and replying to them. But please don't feel obliged to respond to every sentence!

JR.

 

[SnakeLord]

Apologies for butting in briefly, just wanted to make one comment:

Genesis 9:11
I establish my covenant with you: Never again will all life be cut off by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth."

While that's a very honourable decision on gods part, it doesn't stop any other form of mass annihilation of mankind.

 

[JustARide]

You, on the other hand, claim "not to have decided yet", i.e. being agnostic. I was just pointing out that it seems like you already have decided something: that God is unknowable. If I can at least get you to admit that it is equally impossible to know that, we have made some progress. But the evidence seems to point that in spite of everything, it isn't impossible to know God.

When have I said that I know (or don't know) anything for sure about God? I'm going on hunches here, man... guesses, nothing more. So my language is peppered with "It's is likely that..." and "My guess is...." As far as the "evidence" goes, all I have seen is that the world is divided into tiny factions, each believing in ancient books about fantastic miracles and supernatural phenomena that, let's face it, don't seem to be happening anymore. There is a difference between saying something is unknowable and something is "unlikely."

Since it is you who already "knows" so many things, whether by observation or faith, I believe the burden of proof is on you. I've already admitted that I could be wrong. You could be right. Now, are you willing to extend that same courtesy to me?

It didn't happen "out of the blue", like a piece of propaganda ordering wars or condoning slavery.

Yet it does those two things. So what's the difference? That it has a nice narrative about God's relationship with man mixed in?

The difference between Santa Claus, the Matrix and floating agnostic green-eyed monsters is in the claims they make. You must judge something by the claim it makes. The Bible doesn't propose to be a story - it proposes to provide valid accounts of something that has been native to human experience since time began: a relationship with God. And it contradicts your uncertainty.

Of course it contradicts my uncertainty; it's a book written for people who want to be certain about things they cannot understand. If God truly is interested in authoring a book, he could have made things a bit simpler here by not being so obtuse at every turn.

Think of it this way. Early on, humans discovered that 2+2=4. And ever since, it has been a clear, provable concept that mankind overwhelmingly accepts. Therefore, very few people find believing 2+2=4 to be a huge leap of faith; in fact it requires little faith at all. God seems to have chosen to make himself mystical and mysterious (or rather decided that we should be embroiled in confusion about him). Surely, he knew that a book full of vague, contradictory statements about him would be, in fact, worse than nothing at all.

Now, I have never once observed animals talking, burning bushes talking, the sun going dark for no reason, the world stopping, pillars of fire, ressurections of the dead, etc., and though these things may not be impossible per se, they do seem highly unlikely, given what science has attempted to explain thus far. These things do, however, appear quite often -- in stories. I see them in Homer, the Greek myths, etc. Yet nobody is lining up to believe in them.

I see people believing in the Bible because they are afraid, afraid of what they don't know. It's not that the Bible is just so unique that it captures the world's attention and makes 2+2=4 kind of sense to everyone - it's that is gives a nice anthropomorphic face to everything we don't understand (and validates our own bad behavior by showing us that even the Almighty engages in it as well).

Remember that we don't really work with prophesies anymore, they are foreign to us, so to understand them in today's scientific sense does them injustice anyway.

And why don't we work with prophecies today? Isn't it convenient how Christianity keeps all the miraculous stuff out of reach and unobservable by telling us that "that time is over"? Very clever. Probably a reason why it has outlived the religions that still make more supernatural claims.

Prophesies made a claim to a general and a specific event. If their authority only stretched to an event specifically predicted, why were they still regarded as authoritive afterwards? Why were they even included in the Bible if they had already come true and had no further relevance?

Prophecies are just the icing on the credibility cake. To seem to fulfill some adds to the wonder of the whole thing. Why do people read horseshit like "The Bible Code" and "Left Behind" today? Because it sounds fascinating and we can sit here and wonder, "Is it true?"

Back in biblical days, we were likely even more ignorant than we are today, hence the popularity of "prophecies." After 9/11, you had people concoting new prophecies, attributing them to Nostrodamus, and scaring people half to death about the end of the world. Pat Robertson predicted hurricanes would hit Florida if Disneyland allowed gays to celebrate there. Now, he was not only wrong (though predicting that a hurricane might hit Florida isn't exactly a stretch), but he maintains credibility in some Christian's eyes. How? Hell if I know.

Is it impossible that the same kinds of things happened 2000 years ago? Nope. In fact, it is more likely, considering how gullible most people probably were (and continue to be).

No matter how broken, insufficient and contradictory our bodies or our lives become, our thoughts can still be perfect.

Once again, it's one thing to have a human slip-up; it is another entirely to have God condoning slavery.

It is only in the post-modern age that world unity has even become a possibility - and not even a remote reality. This might be despite religious exclusivity, or because Christian premises are being applied at last. Such speculation is all good and well, but on this scale neither can be proved conclusively or used in an argument. What is happening now is because of everything, good or bad, that happened before - chaos theory.

Interesting you mention postmodernity. On the one hand, when viewed as a stage in our development, postmodernity suggests a possible unity (the internet, global market, etc.). When viewed as a philosophy or cultural movement, postmodernism produces a fragmented, near-meaningless world, where media has obliterated the line between "real" and "simulation."

I am curious, to what Christian premises do you refer? If you're talking about love, compassion, etc., I'm afraid those are not exclusive to Christianity. If you're talking about belief in your specific deity, then I hardly think that is going to lead to world peace. Maybe a fascist theocracy, but certainly not a worldwide democratic harmony and understanding.

As far as everything being a result of something else before it - well, there may be some quantum physicists that disagree with you, but that's another argument entirely.

It might not be PC anymore, but God wasn't uniting Israel with the rest of the world, He was obviously pitting them against it.

A ha!

For God to establish right, there had to be conflict with what was wrong - it had to be faced. The same with slavery, but I'll get to that in a moment. Holiness is separation. Creation is separation - existence is what is as opposed to what is not. Other religions make much of this conflict, and try to resolve it by proposing that everything becomes one. But injustice and justice can never be reconciled without judgement, or do you disagree with me? You should learn from nature: evolution doesn't favour unity, it favours strength. Community is important, but so is suvival. And God is establishing an eternal kingdom. God can't compromise on purity, that's why He paid the price for our sins.

I would say its quite possible that injustice and justice are never reconciled - or that possibly we are the only ones attempting to administer that judgment. For instance, if we die and that's the end of it - then you'll never know anyway. You will die. I will die. And we will both be reconciled into oblivion. I have no idea what happens when we die... I'm merely hoping for the best.

We are so overwhelmed by all the information available in the universe that if we have to include it all we either take on an agnostic view, and let the world make up its own mind about what it wants to be, or we decide what's important and take the "radical" route by making choices. Choosing a moral life means you have looked at the universe and decided justice and morality can exist and is worth standing for. Not everybody makes that decision - as terrorism proves.

I think most terrorists would disagree with you. To themselves, they are quite moral. They have simply adopted a different moral code - one they believe is authored by God.

The Bible makes it clear that even when God sanctioned a course of action it was against Israel's "better judgment". They literally went into the Holy Land kicking and screaming not to. That's just not the same as the situation we have in the world today. We have people playing God - something that more humble people with better judgement have been fighting since day one - some fight it in the name of God (presuming equality with God is the original sin, after all), others fight it in the name of righteousness (which I presume you have some faith in).

So, you're saying that the differentiating factor between Israel's God story and all the other God stories is that Israel lost arguments with God and ended up doing things it would not have sanctioned itself...

I know plenty of people who want to do one thing, think God is telling them to do another, and then force themselves to go God's way. I don't think that necessarily proves any ACTUAL divine intervention - only perceived divine intervention. The fact that the Bible adds a "twist" you haven't seen in any of the other stories doesn't prove anything, except that it may be a better story

Slavery wasn't always politically incorrect, as you probably know. It started when people presumed power over other people. It might have been an extension of the natural order of evolution, I don't know. But it was wrong.

Then why did God approve of it?

I don't care what societal norms were. During the civil rights movement, societal norms were not pleasant in the South. But people challenged it - that's what great reformers do. They stand up to society. They don't kow-tow to its prejudices, no matter the time period.

[Deliverance out of slavery would not have been a good thing if God thought it was right. God reminds Israel hundreds of times of their own time as slaves in Egypt. In contrast to the laws of other ancient Near Eastern nations:

Yes, God seemed quite concerned when Israelites were slaves.

But slaves were part of the family in Hebrew culture. They could inherit and they were treated as children.

Here we go again.

Fuck the "culture." Segregation was the order of culture in the South at one point - that didn't make it right.

In a hierarchical society, being owned was as natural a being a son, and even though slaves were considered property they were treated as human beings. Their whole economy revolved around manpower, much like a company's wealth depends on its human resources today. If someone defeated you in battle, they won the right to own you. The real problem was misuse of that power - mistreatment. So the first laws about slavery was about their treatment. The Bible was unique in its time in that respect. I have reffered you to this website on slavery before.

Ah, the economy dictated it. Well, then everything was fine, I suppose. What a Republican answer. Again from Exodus:

21:4 If his master have given him a wife, and she have born him sons or daughters; the wife and her children shall be her master's, and he shall go out by himself. 21:5 And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free: 21:6 Then his master shall bring him unto the judges; he shall also bring him to the door, or unto the door post; and his master shall bore his ear through with an aul; and he shall serve him for ever.​

So, here we have some more rules, and I'd appreciate it if you'd defend them based solely on merit - not on what the culture thought at the time. Here God is endorsing the splitting up of slave families, the idea that a slave's children belong to his master. (Wonderful!)

I love the language here too. If a slave says he "loves" his master, he can be "brought to a door" and have his ear "bore through with an aul!" Yeah, it sounds like a really fun family there. Lots of love, I'm sure.

God wouldn't gain anything by overthrowing the Israelites economy.

How handy for the Israelites.

You know many in the South said an end to slavery would mean death to the economy as well. Was that a valid argument for slavery?

The laws He gave them about slavery were very strict. It's not a sin to have people who work for you. Have you ever tried to run a farm? In those times you would be called a slave-owner. You give them shelter, you pay their wages, and in the end they and their families are dependant on you for their livelihood.

That doesn't make it a JUST system - only a system of convenience. And if God really had a beef with slavery, then he would have made it known. Damn the consequences. As you said earlier, God didn't seem to have much of a problem forcing the Israelites to do other things they really didn't want to do.

BTW, my grandparents are farmers. They do much of the work themselves. They've had a few workers, but in case you haven't noticed, we've come up with a different system now: fair employment.

The fact that hard work needed to be done is no excuse. Obviously, as evidenced by our current system, other ways of employment are possible. And instead of working toward that, God chose to keep to the status quo. What a shame.

God did not suspend reality to create a perfect world. He never has. Sin would always creep into the lives of people, and it will affect the way they do things. You have already seen what happens when something that we think is alright is condemned outright. It doesn't aid people to become more loving towards each other. God worked on something that was more lasting: the attitudes by which people lived.

OK, so let me get this straight... when it came to pulling out of your brother's wife, mocking Elisha's bald head, or looking back at an evil burning city, God had to take a hard line - had to show people the consequences of their wrongdoing. But when it came to slavery (owning people!), God decided to take a more dovish approach, huh?

Once again, that's like executing someone for masturbating, while ignoring the murderer down the street.

In the end morality isn't about right and wrong as much as it's about a way of approaching a life that is already unfair, with the goal of improving it towards an ideal - whether you can see it or not. And that requires faith.

I was with you until the end there. It may require faith - but not necessary the Christian brand.

What displays more love: Creating beings that have the means and potential to live and love as you intend them to, or not to create them because they might choose not to do what's best for them?

If God knows what's going to happen, then the correct word would be "will" not "might."

I propose that God only knew how we would act after we had decided on a course of action. I know some people believe in a watchmaker who has wound us up sin and all, but I do not and have no reason to. He did not form us with our decisions already made, or we would not have had the ability to reason.

That's a wonderful little theory. But once again... just your guess. And how do you know your decisions have not been telegraphed? How can you know for sure that what you perceive as your own reason guiding you is not merely what was "fated" to happen anyway?

And you certainly can't believe in prophecy and total free will at the same time. If someone has the power to predict something that will happen (as you seem to be saying the ancient prophets did), then where does the free will come in? Did Jesus not have free will? Was he fated to act as he did? What if he had not?

How would you interpret Ephesians 6:12?

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil.

As one line specifically chosen by you to defend your point of view.

But to many people religion has only been replaced by superstition anyway. You yourself mentioned the 'luck' as a factor in the rise of Christianity.

Hmmm, why do you think that's so? Just because, in our foolhardiness and sinful ways, we have mistaken superstition for religion?

How in the world could a book that has talking donkeys and snakes, pillars of fire, a vengeful god, magical fruit, men whose strength is determined by the lenghth of their hair, and giants ever be mistaken for superstition?

Yeah, that's a real chin-scratcher.

God proclaimed His love for us, and what would that mean if he never took us into consideration? What would prayer achieve? But it's up to God in His infinite wisdom what He decides to do in the end.

OK, so God does not change and is perfect in his judgment. But if we pray to him, he might change his course of action? How does this make any sense at all? If the guy knows everything and is perfect, then wouldn't every decision already be made? Isn't that why we even have the book of Revelation - to tell us all how it's going to end anyway?

Perfect judgment connotes certain things. For instance, let's say God sees a woman who just comitted a sin, but is sorry for it.... Now, how should she be judged? What would perfect judgment be?

Let's say she should either be condemned or forgiven. A being with perfect judgment would know at all times what the "perfect" course of action would be.... whether its condemnation, compassion, forgiveness, whatever... He would not have to sit there and think, "Hmmm, I'm not sure what the perfect judgment would be in this case..."

And where did God ever misjudge people?

Well, I'm guessing if you believe everything God did in the Bible was just and right, then you're going to say he never misjudged a person. Bit of circular logic there....


How can you say God never misjudged people?
-Well, the Bible says he didn't.
And how do you know the Bible is right?
-Because God never misjudges people.

His judgement has always been so spot on that we have trouble reconciling it with our precious "free will". And when He acted out of anger it was never without cause. The reverse argument would be, if God ever chose to love and realized it was a mistake, would He not be warranted to change His mind then? But He never did, and I don't see anybody raising objections about that...

His judgment is just sooooo perfect we can't comprehend it, huh? I guess that's a convenient way of saying, "It doesn't make a hell of a lot of sense."

Maybe if the purpose of God's commandments were just to keep people in line so they would be good enough to get into heaven, it would have stayed that way, but it never was. It's purpose was to point out sin so that we could become morally responsible and live in a relationship with God, who wishes to be our heavenly Father, but won't tolerate sin. What the law did was alienate us from sin, but it didn't reconcile us with God either. He did that from His side, so that we could turn the other cheek even when faced with death. The law has no power over us anymore, even though it still points out sin.

OK, once again. How did endorsing slavery "point out sin"?

I think it reinforced it myself.

You are correct that our justice is set up so that it contains a great deal of asterisks, clauses, subclauses, and the like. We are attempting to be fair, to work toward rehabilitation, not just punishment.

But I fail to see how reacting so violently to seemingly small problems (mocking Elisha) and so nonchalantly to big ones (slavery) that God acheived any kind of just end.

Hell, of course, is the ultimate punishment. But its purpose is not rehabilitative. Therefore, it is mostly revenge, not punishment. You punish people to teach them a lesson. You torture them forever, well, to torture them forever. And don't give me the shit about how we're all making that decision right now. You said yourself there is no way to reduce the requirements of Heaven to a simple, black-and-white list. Either way, we can't know for sure until we get there and then it's too late. Some system of justice.

This would be like running a society by not telling anyone exactly what is and is not against the law.... then arresting them suddenly when they break it.

The king spoke for the people, and everybody was held accountable for what everybody else did. That's the difference between tribes and countries. If you were part of a tribe, you were supporting its rulership and contributing to its wealth, or downfall. Communities weren't just incidental. And democracy didn't came around until the Greeks began thinking about it.

That does not change the fact that people, whether they say it or not, disagree within every society. They always have, always will. I don't care if you're a member of a tribe, a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship. There will be those, even if they are only quietly laboring away, that hate their leaders and what their community stands for.

If you really care about love and morality, why not compare it with the Jesus' message?

I have and I found it lacking. (I know that's hard for Christians to believe, but it does happen. It's kind of like when you criticize someone's favorite movie, I've found...)

I can tell you this though, from listening to you, that just picking up the Bible again will be one of the hardest tests of faith you'll ever have to face. One of truest indicators of your sincerity of seeking God. And I'll always be available for an honest debate

I would change one word in that statement. "One of the truest indicators of your sincertity of seeking Truth." Let me tell you - my search is one for truth, and if that leads me away from God or toward God, so be it. I will not restrict the possibilities before I've even examined them all. And I spent 15 years examining Christianity. I have a limited amount of time on this earth, so I am not going to continue on a path that has led me nowhere. I'm going to try every avenue with promise and hope something leads somewhere.

And, as I like to remind people, life is a two-way street. Perhaps one of the hardest tests of your faith will be putting down the Bible.

At least be honest with yourself; you don't withhold judgement because there is no evidence, only because you don't accept the evidence presented. I don't mean evidence of Him as such, that lies on the level of a personal relationship, but evidence that faith could be a valid way of knowing Him.

You may have discovered evidence sufficient for yourself, Jenyar. I have not. If you believe that elves cause the rain, then every time it rains, you see proof of elves. It's just that simple.

I see quite a bit of evidence, but I don't really see it leading toward the Bible or the Bible-God. Nor do I see it heading toward Zeus or Vishnu.

And I am being quite honest with myself, thank you.

No, what you find difficult is that God would associate Himself with people who engage in the basest of human activities. None of what God decreed made it possible for Israel to become worse people, and nothing that prevented Israel from becoming better human beings - He actively nurtured it.

Once again, advocating slavery and war is not "nurturing" anything good. And yes, I find it difficult to believe God would try to achieve his ends by endorsing the basest acts of humanity. A real means-always-justify-the-ends kinda guy, is he not? Apparently God is a big fan of Machiavelli's "The Prince."

Maybe for you, but I don't know anyone who found that belief in a loving God removed the mystery out of life. I personally can't look at something like a sunset without marvelling about how little we appreciate the beauty and mystery God had infused everything with. On the other hand, no scientific explanation has never made me appreciate a sunset more than I could before.

I am exactly the opposite. I find scientists' search for the truth fascinating, especially the cutting edge stuff, that is constantly proving our previous preconceptions wrong. I find science inspiring for precisely the same reason I find religion suffocating: science is willing to change, willing to grow, willing to change its entire course if need be. Religion is a rut, as far as I'm concerned.

I find I marvel at nature BECAUSE I don't know what produced it or why - not because I know that some invisible dude in the sky made it. I don't know if matter/life/God has always existed, or if it has not. I don't know why we find certain chords in music pleasant and others not. If I were to sit here and decide, once and for all, that the Bible-God can be the only explanation for all this, then yes, that would let the air out of life for me. I would have answered the biggest question of them all prematurely.

It could, if it was belief without understanding. I don't know what kind of a terrorists these would make:

Luke 6:37 "Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven."

Matt.7 "Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you."

and my favourite:
James 4:11 Brothers, do not slander one another. Anyone who speaks against his brother or judges him speaks against the law and judges it. When you judge the law, you are not keeping it, but sitting in judgment on it.

Again, it's up to you which verse you pick And the Bible gives you one for just about any occasion, whether it be a church service or a slave auction.

It convinces me because it confirms what I know to be true. For instance, I know that it's wrong to lie and right to tell the truth. How can I be so certain? Nobody has ever proved it to me, and if anybody could, I have believed it before anybody did, haven't I? I have faith in its truth. And that's just one instance of a greater truth contained in "morality", which also not scientifically verifyable.

Along those same lines of thought - I also have a gut feeling that slavery and war are wrong, and that children should not be killed. I find I have spontaneous faith in those things. Ergo, the Bible does not convince me for that very same reason.

Everyone is faced with their own share of injustices. If those aren't yours, then you have no reason to confront them. But somehow you have gotten stuck in the legalistic red-tape surrounding Israel, and their moral crises. You accused me of seeing a "glorious, symbolic victory" when all you see is slaughter. If you are only willing to look for God's transcendence in the sins of humanity, why are you surprised that you don't find God there?

I'm looking for a God beyond one who deals with our petty slaughters. One who is beyond "rage" and "torture" and all the evils we have produced, but hoped to transcend. "Go and kill every last suckling babe" and "If you beat your slave and he gets up after three days, then you shouldn't be punished" is not exactly it.

I think you assume too much

So do you, my friend.

I am assuming that all I have to guide me are my own faculties, right or wrong.

You are assuming an invisible being in the sky created us, a snake ruined everything, seas parted, donkeys talked, and that not believing all that should warrant the punishment of eternal torture.

I think you win the assumption game.

I appreciate the time you're taking to read my responses and replying to them. But please don't feel obliged to respond to every sentence!

Indeed, these things are getting voluminous. Well, as I said before, I can't continue this much longer. Next week I will be working overtime almost every day as it is Pledge Drive at the public radio station where I work. ("And for an extra $100 pledge, you will go home with this handy tote bag!")

I'm sure I could squeeze in a few responses, but we're getting into far too many different topics in one thread here. I appreciate the debate thus far, and your spirited defense. (I'm impressed, let me say.) But we might have to limit ourselves to one topic or just call it quits. Whatever you want to do is fine... Once again, thanks for the discussion. Definitely food for thought. I may be sarcastic, but rest assured, I'm paying attention.

Adios.

Josh

It's just a ride. - Bill Hicks :m:

 

[Greco]

Main Entry: ty•rant
Pronunciation: 'tI-r&nt
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English tirant, from Old French tyran, tyrant, from Latin tyrannus, from Greek tyrannos
1 a : an absolute ruler unrestrained by law or constitution b : a usurper of sovereignty
2 a : a ruler who exercises absolute power oppressively or brutally b : one resembling an oppressive ruler in the harsh use of authority or power





Main Entry: 1to•tal•i•tar•i•an
Pronunciation: (")tO-"ta-l&-'ter-E-&n
Function: adjective
Etymology: Italian totalitario, from totalità totality
1 a : of or relating to centralized control by an autocratic leader or hierarchy : AUTHORITARIAN, DICTATORIAL; especially : DESPOTIC b : of or relating to a political regime based on subordination of the individual to the state and strict control of all aspects of the life and productive capacity of the nation especially by coercive measures (as censorship and terrorism)
2 a : advocating or characteristic of totalitarianism b : completely regulated by the state especially as an aid to national mobilization in an emergency c : exercising autocratic powers : tending toward monopoly


Webster's definition of tyrant and totalitarian fit Got to a "t".

What was man thinking when he was creating God? Is God created in mans image? Is it a way for man to cleanse one self of sins by ascribing similar negative behavior to the "creator"?

 

[Jenyar]

When have I said that I know (or don't know) anything for sure about God? I'm going on hunches here, man... guesses, nothing more. So my language is peppered with "It's is likely that..." and "My guess is...." As far as the "evidence" goes, all I have seen is that the world is divided into tiny factions, each believing in ancient books about fantastic miracles and supernatural phenomena that, let's face it, don't seem to be happening anymore. There is a difference between saying something is unknowable and something is "unlikely."

I think I'm starting to understand a little better. This is just an observation: You place everything on the same level and judge it according to what you personally agree or disagree with. You can't relate to history in any other way than by what you understand about it now and how it relates to the present. By "evidence" you mean personal experience, so you're unwilling to believe or disbelieve other people's personal experience, because your moral view is that they are ultimately just as valid as your own, and just as personal.

On such a flat plane, slavery was always wrong, homosexuality was always proper, miracles have always been impossible, and churches are all divided.

Since it is you who already "knows" so many things, whether by observation or faith, I believe the burden of proof is on you. I've already admitted that I could be wrong. You could be right. Now, are you willing to extend that same courtesy to me?

Of course: you could be wrong, and I could be right This might seem stereotypically audacious of me, but I'll tell you why I won't admit the possibility of being wrong. Maybe you'll at least be able to attest to my reasoning, if not my conclusion...

I know rape is wrong. I can't know it from personal experience, because I've never raped someone. I don't need to hear it's wrong from someone with personal experience, either. I've made up my mind. That the legal system seems to agree with me is purely incidental. They don't have any more evidence that it's wrong than I do, and indeed in some cultures it isn't illegal. But we rely on the conclusions of society, maybe on the (it could be said) subjective experience of rape victims, but mostly on the personal conviction that we would not like to be raped.

I could use the same argument you used about God's judgement: it's wrong because it's law, and it's law because people said it's wrong. Does that mean I have proved the law is a self-sustaining illusion? Is rape really just wrong because I would personally not like to be raped, or is there something intrinsically wrong with it? You could say that, and it would be quite a valid statement, but I still won't admit that I could be wrong about it - you could say my "faith in the moral assertion" is too strong, even though I can't prove it to be authoritive.

Now, you could clear this all up by proving that rape is wrong, without using personal preference or law, because neither are scientifically reliable.

Of course it contradicts my uncertainty; it's a book written for people who want to be certain about things they cannot understand. If God truly is interested in authoring a book, he could have made things a bit simpler here by not being so obtuse at every turn.

I'm sorry, but it's only obtuse from your perspective. Have you considered that maybe God wanted you to change it? To borrow from a CS Lewis analogy: You can throw a fit until your blue in the face about the useless and entirely arbitrary length of a telescope - its ridiculous colours and contours, its inefficiency compared to the human eye based on what you know about of it, its dependence on human ability, its design flaws - but if you're not willing to look along it, you'll never see what it's pointed at.

Maybe your perception about the Bible is also a bit "secular", if I could use the word. It's not a book "authored by God" in the traditional publishing industry sense, with God as the commissioning editor. It's an analogy we are compelled to make because of our experience with books. But to be more accurate, what God "authored" was mankind. The Bible is God's book about us. It contains God's responses to us, and our response to Him. As a case study of humanity's walk with God, you would expect everything you read about in most accounts about people: wars, slavery, immorality, love, hatred, compassion, fear, faith... the whole spectrum of human experience, whether opposed to or aligned with God's will (which was revealed through His prophets). The protagonists is the Holy Spirit, the antagonist is sin.

The familiar juxtaposioned so nonchalantly against the unfamiliar throws (and puts) some people off, but then again, that's no so different than what the Bible already tells us very consciously: that God is unfamiliar to us, and it's a problem we're dealing with (I'm not crazy/I'm just a little unwell/I know/Right now you can't tell) every day of our lives.

What's ironic to me is that in most cases it's the ordinary things that bother people, not the miraculous - in fact, your suggestion that God use pillars of fire and talking donkeys more often is very common. Why doesn't God replace what we know with what we would like to know? Maybe He's more realistic about us than we are, and we're too idealistic about Him to deal with our problems as humans.

Think of it this way. Early on, humans discovered that 2+2=4. And ever since, it has been a clear, provable concept that mankind overwhelmingly accepts. Therefore, very few people find believing 2+2=4 to be a huge leap of faith; in fact it requires little faith at all. God seems to have chosen to make himself mystical and mysterious (or rather decided that we should be embroiled in confusion about him). Surely, he knew that a book full of vague, contradictory statements about him would be, in fact, worse than nothing at all.

Now, I have never once observed animals talking, burning bushes talking, the sun going dark for no reason, the world stopping, pillars of fire, ressurections of the dead, etc., and though these things may not be impossible per se, they do seem highly unlikely, given what science has attempted to explain thus far. These things do, however, appear quite often -- in stories. I see them in Homer, the Greek myths, etc. Yet nobody is lining up to believe in them.

I see people believing in the Bible because they are afraid, afraid of what they don't know. It's not that the Bible is just so unique that it captures the world's attention and makes 2+2=4 kind of sense to everyone - it's that is gives a nice anthropomorphic face to everything we don't understand (and validates our own bad behavior by showing us that even the Almighty engages in it as well).

That's certainly the pop culture opinion of religion - especially of Christianity. Religion was the science of mankind for much longer than empirical science has, and you definitely do find that it refects the way people thought the world worked in broader ways than just spiritual. But unfortunately it's also a flat earth/flat time fallacy. It might have been once, but is it always that and is just that? I don't think you're naive enough to think so. It must be a very tempting argument, because it puts religion in the same 2+2=4 box you speak of. One more reason that God enforced such a strict separation between Israel and the popular religions of their day. It wasn't a separation of experience as much as a separation of faith(although I won't be surprised if other religions lack such a blessed and miraculous experiential history - people's base their objections on the Judeo-Christian example because it's so prominent, and then proceed to use it as a stereotype for all kinds of religion).

If you do a little study on Jewish thought, you'll soon see they were very self-conscious about anthropomorphizing God from the beginning, and took pains to stress the inherent mystery of God, but saw it as a necessary mode of expressing what needed to be said.

And why don't we work with prophecies today? Isn't it convenient how Christianity keeps all the miraculous stuff out of reach and unobservable by telling us that "that time is over"? Very clever. Probably a reason why it has outlived the religions that still make more supernatural claims.

Prophecies are just the icing on the credibility cake. To seem to fulfill some adds to the wonder of the whole thing. Why do people read horseshit like "The Bible Code" and "Left Behind" today? Because it sounds fascinating and we can sit here and wonder, "Is it true?"

Back in biblical days, we were likely even more ignorant than we are today, hence the popularity of "prophecies." After 9/11, you had people concoting new prophecies, attributing them to Nostrodamus, and scaring people half to death about the end of the world. Pat Robertson predicted hurricanes would hit Florida if Disneyland allowed gays to celebrate there. Now, he was not only wrong (though predicting that a hurricane might hit Florida isn't exactly a stretch), but he maintains credibility in some Christian's eyes. How? Hell if I know.

Is it impossible that the same kinds of things happened 2000 years ago? Nope. In fact, it is more likely, considering how gullible most people probably were (and continue to be).

I'm busy with a study on Jesus' miracles at the moment, and one thing that has surfaced is that people misunderstand their place. Miracles haven't ceased. Some of the things that happen at missions will make your hair stand on end. But why only at missions obscure places where nobody can see them? History will show you time and time again: miracles are not sufficient for faith. They pointed the way, and once people were on the way they ceased.

The prophets mostly only told the people where they were going wrong. Predictions as such were only a small part of it, and in those cases they said more about faith than future. If you want to read what God had to say about prophets who claimed they spoke for Him, read Jer.23. Our relationship with God was the raison d'entre of all prophecies, and Jesus was the last of the traditional prophets. His miracles were intended to fulfill the prophecies that would point out His authority, but He himself pointed us finally towards God. That's why He said he himself would be the only sign a disbelieving people would get (Matt.16).

Once again, it's one thing to have a human slip-up; it is another entirely to have God condoning slavery.

God put a law on sin, and then delivered us from it. A lifeguard among drowning people is not necessarily himself drowning.

I am curious, to what Christian premises do you refer? If you're talking about love, compassion, etc., I'm afraid those are not exclusive to Christianity. If you're talking about belief in your specific deity, then I hardly think that is going to lead to world peace. Maybe a fascist theocracy, but certainly not a worldwide democratic harmony and understanding.

As far as everything being a result of something else before it - well, there may be some quantum physicists that disagree with you, but that's another argument entirely.

I mean that Christ's principles have universal validity. The difference is in the extent that it will be exercised. Belief in God - any god - won't make a difference if nobody is prepared to be the difference. The question is, what kind of love makes a difference? You like to even things out, tell me: is love always right by definition, or does one have to learn how to love truly?

I would say its quite possible that injustice and justice are never reconciled - or that possibly we are the only ones attempting to administer that judgment. For instance, if we die and that's the end of it - then you'll never know anyway. You will die. I will die. And we will both be reconciled into oblivion. I have no idea what happens when we die... I'm merely hoping for the best.

You think it will be oblivion. I have no idea what oblivion is. The Hebrews called it sheol, the Romans called it hades, we simply call it death.

I am living this life with no knowledge of how I came to be alive and conscious (except for the biological "reason"). That does not give me any grounds to dismiss it as an illusion (as some do), or to think it's all there is (as many do). There are simply too many "telescopes" (referring to my earlier analogy). And in this life, "merely hoping for the best" makes no difference to anything. If that's all I have to go by, that's what I will base my faith on.

You quite readily admit that we all die, with no one to adminster judgement (know the objective difference between life and death, in other words). If it was common knowledge that we all would live forever, and I said that, you would be on me like a Rottweiler for "condemning us all to death" as if we deserved it. Isn't it interesting that I agree with you entirely, but still think God can resurrect us from death/save us from hell?

I think most terrorists would disagree with you. To themselves, they are quite moral. They have simply adopted a different moral code - one they believe is authored by God.

Sharp as a knife, aren't you? So you agree that it's possible, and indeed neccesary, that we distinguish between relative and absolute morals? And not only that, that this kind of morality does not - and should not - carry authority on words or laws alone, but on an attitude that puts on a level that will be applicable under all circumstances, even the most dire and depraved ones?

Then why did God approve of it?

I don't care what societal norms were. During the civil rights movement, societal norms were not pleasant in the South. But people challenged it - that's what great reformers do. They stand up to society. They don't kow-tow to its prejudices, no matter the time period.

Agreed, but people only reform one or two things at a time, and with great resistance, especially when survival (or success) is their priority, and I'm sure God is well aware of our limitations. But we can deform a great many things at the same time without much help - you just let go and let nature or society dictate your actions.

But you won't admit that the God had reform in mind with the laws He provided for Israel. You can't, because you "don't care what societal norms were". If any of those reformers had your attitude about society, I doubt they would have made a dent in its functioning. We in South Africa have a different history than America, so I'll try to give an example you can associate with (you might not believe culture makes a difference, but I'm convinced of it. Let me know what you think of South Africa and I'll tell you why...)

Here are some words by Frederick Douglass (c.1817-1895), an American slave:

What I have said respecting and against religion, I mean strictly to apply to the slaveholding religion of this land, and with no possible reference to Christianity proper; for, between the Christianity of this land, and the Christianity of Christ, I recognize the widest, possible difference--so wide, that to receive the one as good, pure, and holy, is of necessity to reject the other as bad, corrupt, and wicked. To be the friend of the one, is of necessity to be the enemy of the other. I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land. Indeed, I can see no reason, but the most deceitful one, for calling the religion of this land Christianity. I look upon it as the climax of all misnomers, the boldest of all frauds, and the grossest of all libels. Never was there a clearer case of "stealing the livery of the court of heaven to serve the devil in."

They attend with Pharisaical strictness to the outward forms of religion, and at the same time neglect the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith. They are always ready to sacrifice, but seldom to show mercy. They are they who are represented as professing to love God whom they have not seen, whilst they hate their brother whom they have seen.

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass​

The last sentence is a reference to 1 John 4:20:
If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen.

Here we go again.

Fuck the "culture." Segregation was the order of culture in the South at one point - that didn't make it right.

Culture and context has an effect on how words are used and what they mean. Don't you understand this or don't you want to understand this?

Here's quote from an abstract of Daniel C. Snell's Flight and Freedom in the Ancient Near East (PDF):

Working from selected edicts, law-codes, and treaties, the chapter discovers that the predominant concern among these bureaucracies is their desire for runaways to be returned. The motivation for such concern has nothing to do with the slaves themselves ("non-persons"), only the problems they cause for commerce and politics and the restoration of property rights. Bureaucrats, in other words, are more interested in satisfying their masters than in championing justice and human rights.​

Contrast this finding with Deut 23.15:, where slaves who fleed from their masters were effectively freed:
If a slave has taken refuge with you, do not hand him over to his master. 16 Let him live among you wherever he likes and in whatever town he chooses. Do not oppress him.

[Lev 25:10; Isa 61:1; Jer 34:8 is] "cognate to Akkadian andurarum [from dararu, "to set free"], is influenced by it if not directly derived from it" (p. 123), ... "its use is vague and its context seems to imply that the remission had a place in the ideal vision of behavior among religious intellectuals and may not have had much reflection in social reality" (pp. 123-24). The upshot is that Israel's ideas about freedom are not necessarily unique, but that the development of Israelite thinking about freedom is.​

In other words, God was changing their religious attitude towards what they were already doing. An attitude that meant an interal locus of control (i.e. responsibility). If you want to ask why the abolishion of slavery was not one of the ten commandments, His first words were: "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery."

You have also been looking at this from the master's perspective, but think of what it meant from the slave's perspective (and against what slaves could have expected at the time). He had the same human rights as his owner (his owner could just as easily become bankrupt and sell himself as a slave to someone who could take care of his family) and the hope of freedom (which wasn't an inalienable human right the way we understand it, yet). And after they were freed, their master was obliged by law to "14 Supply him liberally from your flock, your threshing floor and your winepress. Give to him as the LORD your God has blessed you. 15 Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and the LORD your God redeemed you"

Ah, the economy dictated it. Well, then everything was fine, I suppose. What a Republican answer. Again from Exodus:

21:4 If his master have given him a wife, and she have born him sons or daughters; the wife and her children shall be her master's, and he shall go out by himself. 21:5 And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free: 21:6 Then his master shall bring him unto the judges; he shall also bring him to the door, or unto the door post; and his master shall bore his ear through with an aul; and he shall serve him for ever.​

So, here we have some more rules, and I'd appreciate it if you'd defend them based solely on merit - not on what the culture thought at the time. Here God is endorsing the splitting up of slave families, the idea that a slave's children belong to his master. (Wonderful!)

I love the language here too. If a slave says he "loves" his master, he can be "brought to a door" and have his ear "bore through with an aul!" Yeah, it sounds like a really fun family there. Lots of love, I'm sure.

Um... actually it's keeping together slave families. If he already had a wife, she could go free with him (read the previous verses). It was only if his wife was a slave herself, given to him later, that she would have to work of her six years before she, too, could go free. Otherwise the women would marry themselves into an "early retirement".

I don't understand your remark about the piercing of his ears. How do you suppose they did it? With a Surgeon general approved, sterilized acme(TM) standard earpiercer? After all, the servant had to "plainly say", in front of a judge, that this was his wish. Other cultures branded their slaves with hot irons.

How handy for the Israelites.

You know many in the South said an end to slavery would mean death to the economy as well. Was that a valid argument for slavery?

This is from much later - Hesiod's Works and Days, c. 750 BCE:

First of all, get a house, and a woman and an ox for the plough--a slave woman and not a wife, to follow the oxen as well--and make everything ready at home, so that you may not have to ask of another, and he refuse you, and so, because you are in lack, the season pass by and your work come to nothing.​

I don't know if it was a valid argument in the South, probably not, since the real issues were racism and the theft of human life and freedom. It had become a moral issue, which it was not in ancient times.

OK, so let me get this straight... when it came to pulling out of your brother's wife, mocking Elisha's bald head, or looking back at an evil burning city, God had to take a hard line - had to show people the consequences of their wrongdoing. But when it came to slavery (owning people!), God decided to take a more dovish approach, huh?

Once again, that's like executing someone for masturbating, while ignoring the murderer down the street.

You are forcing your interpretation beyond reason. You never once objected to there being kings in Israel (although God did, warning that they will make people slaves, no less), but their word for subject, servant and slave in a kingdom was one and the same ('ebed)! This refers to people under kings, under God, and under your employment. If such relationships were denied, there would have be no precedent for understanding the way such relationships would function under God. Everything in the Bible had lasting authority, and as I've said, everything under slavery is summed up "for you were slaves once".

And God did promise that He would turn the tables one day, but that's the part you don't agree with. Where justice gets done. God "owns" everybody, and if you run away from Him, who can give you refuge? We were slaves to death, but He bought our freedom. If you claim mastery over your own life, you will lose it, but if you lose your life because of injustice, like Jesus did, you will gain eternal life.

That's a wonderful little theory. But once again... just your guess. And how do you know your decisions have not been telegraphed? How can you know for sure that what you perceive as your own reason guiding you is not merely what was "fated" to happen anyway?

And you certainly can't believe in prophecy and total free will at the same time. If someone has the power to predict something that will happen (as you seem to be saying the ancient prophets did), then where does the free will come in? Did Jesus not have free will? Was he fated to act as he did? What if he had not?

I'm glad you mention Jesus. He certainly knew why He came to earth, that He would die at the hands of those He came to save. But still He prayed that if it were possible, that "the cup might pass". The difference, my friend, is between God's will and our will. Prophecy tells us about God's will, that's why it will be done one way or another - it's a truth that transcends time or choice - but free will is our own will, which can submit to God's will or not. I think of it as a light that God casts, and some things are outside the light of His will and other are inside His will, but still free. That light distinguishes between light and darkness, and at the same illuminates certain events that are God's explicit will.

Jesus had the choice not to die, but then He would not have been who He was, God would not have been who He was, and we would have had no Saviour. It's like someone who lives a perfectly moral life - it would not be a "moral life" if he did not make the decision to avoid an immoral life every moment of his life. Someone who had seen and experienced his life could then very accurately predict that he would die a "moral man". People with less faith in him it would not believe it until the moment he died, whether they had evidence of every moment of his life or not, and even the prediction would seem self-fulfilling in retrospect. Faith did not make it true, but "saw" its truth.

OK, so God does not change and is perfect in his judgment. But if we pray to him, he might change his course of action? How does this make any sense at all? If the guy knows everything and is perfect, then wouldn't every decision already be made? Isn't that why we even have the book of Revelation - to tell us all how it's going to end anyway?

If you compare Revelation with the Old Testament, you'll see that it merely "closes the chapter" on each prophecy with Christ. It simultaneously tells us what Christ has achieved and what its significance is. We know that there was a Law, then a Judge, and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to have faith in the prediction that there will be a Judgement. I'll use another example: in a court, the decision "has already been made" that the guilty will be punished, and the innocent will go free. Does that mean someone who has been innocent until now can relax and do what he wants because the decision "has already been made" that he will go free? To take it further, as Paul did, a person's life is only complete at his death - that's when you're "fate has been signed". Now examine the significance of these words:

Romans 8:10
But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness. 11 And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you.

..."born again".

Perfect judgment connotes certain things. For instance, let's say God sees a woman who just comitted a sin, but is sorry for it.... Now, how should she be judged? What would perfect judgment be?

Let's say she should either be condemned or forgiven. A being with perfect judgment would know at all times what the "perfect" course of action would be.... whether its condemnation, compassion, forgiveness, whatever... He would not have to sit there and think, "Hmmm, I'm not sure what the perfect judgment would be in this case..."

The Old Testament shows you exactly what would have happened if she were judged right there, so you wouldn't have to wonder. Then Jesus came to show us that, in fact, the law was much more strict than we ever imagined (in Matt. 5:20), and God was actually being lenient all along - but He also showed us exactly how we are redeemed and how to be truly repentant.

Well, I'm guessing if you believe everything God did in the Bible was just and right, then you're going to say he never misjudged a person. Bit of circular logic there....

How can you say God never misjudged people?
-Well, the Bible says he didn't.
And how do you know the Bible is right?
-Because God never misjudges people.

His judgment is just sooooo perfect we can't comprehend it, huh? I guess that's a convenient way of saying, "It doesn't make a hell of a lot of sense."

Refer to my example earlier about circular reasoning and law. You won't escape judgement that way. Justice does not discriminate, it's not hard for God to decide what our judgment should be. That's the easy part. The hard part (for us) is that the taint of sin meant death had a hold on us all. Everybody, every living thing, dies, righteous and unrighteous alike. And if that is the judgement we are supposed to accept, what does it matter? It is significant that Jesus basically repeated the Ten Commandments in His sermon on the mount (Matt.5) and said that we must do more than the law demands, because it is insufficient for demosntrating righteousness.

 

[rainbow__princess_4]

Hmmm... how about a hearty "hail the capitalists" and let's leave it at that?

 

[JustARide]

I think I'm starting to understand a little better. This is just an observation: You place everything on the same level and judge it according to what you personally agree or disagree with. You can't relate to history in any other way than by what you understand about it now and how it relates to the present. By "evidence" you mean personal experience, so you're unwilling to believe or disbelieve other people's personal experience, because your moral view is that they are ultimately just as valid as your own, and just as personal. On such a flat plane, slavery was always wrong, homosexuality was always proper, miracles have always been impossible, and churches are all divided.

When did I say any of that shit? I'm asking, “What is likely considering the circumstances?” It is you who are making pretty massive leaps here, bro. You’re calling my plane “flat” while I’m leaving my possibilities open (accepting that the Bible may be correct), but relying upon the evidence (i.e., both physical and mental observation) as it presents itself. Tomorrow, I might be proved a complete fool – and so might you.

I never said anything was impossible; quite to the contrary, I believe anything is possible. I'm just reading your book, finding that it isn't exactly very consistent (or inspiring) and that bugs you. You have decided to have faith - a term that, by its very nature, connotes that whatever you believe cannot stand alone on its merits. Now, you made that choice how? By reading a book, drawing from personal experience, any applicable science, reason, etc., and consciously deciding that God’s endorsement of slavery, war, and rape (Whoopsie! I’ve been leaving that one out…) were perfectly justified by the arguments presented within that book.

That you have straddled the universe and plopped it into a little jar called religion seems to me quite flat. The TRUTH, my friend, is that you know nothing more than I do. You have faith in a supernatural book. And why? Because it claims it is true.

Since questions of God and the Bible depend upon an abstract faith anyway, perhaps a more proper (and timely) question would be: “Does someone strengthen or weaken his conviction that rape (or any other crime that affects the freedom of others) is wrong by believing that God, maker of all, once endorsed it?”

Numbers 31:7-18 NLT: Moses, Eleazar the priest, and all the leaders of the people went to meet them outside the camp. But Moses was furious with all the military commanders who had returned from the battle. "Why have you let all the women live?" he demanded. "These are the very ones who followed Balaam's advice and caused the people of Israel to rebel against the LORD at Mount Peor. They are the ones who caused the plague to strike the LORD's people. Now kill all the boys and all the women who have slept with a man. Only the young girls who are virgins may live; you may keep them for yourselves.​

Now you may have a gut conviction that the above event actually occurred, and was in keeping with the acts of a compassionate God and his people, but I have a gut feeling it’s absurd.

So, is slavery always wrong in my little universe? Yes. You know why? Because nothing presented here or anywhere else has shown me that slavery was a necessity in any time period. I suppose that is rather narrow of me, but it reminds me of the one irony that racists, bigots, etc. usually point out: “By not accepting my intolerant views, you’re being intolerant.” I guess so.

Of course: you could be wrong, and I could be right This might seem stereotypically audacious of me, but I'll tell you why I won't admit the possibility of being wrong.

Typical. As a rule… the fewer reasons someone has to believe something, the more sure he is of it.

I could use the same argument you used about God's judgement: it's wrong because it's law, and it's law because people said it's wrong. Does that mean I have proved the law is a self-sustaining illusion? Is rape really just wrong because I would personally not like to be raped, or is there something intrinsically wrong with it? You could say that, and it would be quite a valid statement, but I still won't admit that I could be wrong about it - you could say my "faith in the moral assertion" is too strong, even though I can't prove it to be authoritive.

There are certain rules that seem apparent to us. You mention rape. From a humanist standpoint, what makes rape wrong is that it violates another’s freedom (i.e., “My freedom ends where yours begins.”) Then there are gut feelings we have toward the subject (whether they are evidence of some divine law or simply some strange byproduct of evolution, I don’t know). Now, rape is a tangible crime – one humanity has direct experience with (hence our reaction to it). We are forming opinions based on the real, the observable, the here and now. Forming opinions about an invisible deity (and what he did long ago) is quite another matter.

What makes the Bible-God so suspect is not that he disregards ancient laws laid down by savages, but that he largely conforms to them (in fact, going so far as to enforce them occasionally).

In fact, when you think about it, there hasn’t been a single new, creative thought about God for quite some time. People simply read ancient books which seem to pretty much satisfy their needs (eventual evening of the scales, reward/punishment, God’s love, etc.) and don’t give it much more thought.

Are you saying you won’t admit to the possibility that you may be wrong because you have a gut feeling? Because no matter what counter-evidence is presented something inside you tells you to believe? Well, that’s all well and fine, but with all due respect, when dealing with unproven supernatural beings found in old books, that doesn’t really mean a fucking thing. No more than if I said, "I will always believe in Zeus because I feel drawn to."

What's ironic to me is that in most cases it's the ordinary things that bother people, not the miraculous - in fact, your suggestion that God use pillars of fire and talking donkeys more often is very common. Why doesn't God replace what we know with what we would like to know? Maybe He's more realistic about us than we are, and we're too idealistic about Him to deal with our problems as humans.

Yes, maybe, maybe, maybe. Speculation is fun. I’m still waiting for a reason why believing in a warlike God is a positive thing.

That's certainly the pop culture opinion of religion - especially of Christianity. Religion was the science of mankind for much longer than empirical science has, and you definitely do find that it refects the way people thought the world worked in broader ways than just spiritual. But unfortunately it's also a flat earth/flat time fallacy. It might have been once, but is it always that and is just that? I don't think you're naive enough to think so.

I won’t pidgeonhole all religion, but suffice it to say, the Bible is a product of a barbaric society and it shows. Why should I believe a book written by people 1000X more backward, idiotic, and scientifically ignorant than we are?

If you do a little study on Jewish thought, you'll soon see they were very self-conscious about anthropomorphizing God from the beginning, and took pains to stress the inherent mystery of God, but saw it as a necessary mode of expressing what needed to be said.

Well, they did a really crap-ass job. The Bible-God is the most anthropomorphized god I can think of. Also, as I recall, there were many rebellions (the Iconoclasts anyone?) against the current vision of God and the symbols that accompany him. Guess we know who won.

I'm busy with a study on Jesus' miracles at the moment, and one thing that has surfaced is that people misunderstand their place. Miracles haven't ceased. Some of the things that happen at missions will make your hair stand on end. But why only at missions obscure places where nobody can see them? History will show you time and time again: miracles are not sufficient for faith. They pointed the way, and once people were on the way they ceased.

Once again, funny how miracles are always somewhere else.

God put a law on sin, and then delivered us from it. A lifeguard among drowning people is not necessarily himself drowning.

OK, again. There is a marked difference between God going among something and God endorsing it!

Deuteronomy 21:10-14 NLT: Suppose you go to war against your enemies and the LORD your God hands them over to you and you take captives. And suppose you see among the captives a beautiful woman, and you are attracted to her and want to marry her. If this happens, you may take her to your home, where she must shave her head, cut her fingernails, and change all her clothes. Then she must remain in your home for a full month, mourning for her father and mother. After that you may marry her. But if you marry her and then decide you do not like her, you must let her go free. You may not sell her or treat her as a slave, for you have humiliated her.​

Now, tell me. Is God so concerned about the men of his selected tribe not getting laid with “beautiful” women that he feels it necessary to allow them to marry (and let’s face it, probably rape) their female captives? This is, in fact, the OPPOSITE of “putting a law on sin” – unless that law is “Go ahead and indulge yourselves. God says it’s OK."

But I suppose they needed to populate the community, right? Keep the Lord’s people around for another generation to spread his great message of love?

The question is, what kind of love makes a difference? You like to even things out, tell me: is love always right by definition, or does one have to learn how to love truly?

Well, you ask one question… then follow it up by asking another that negates the first. Love has many faces (though I have yet to hear of any convincing ones that involve perpetrating rape), and certainly has different applications in different arenas of life. Therefore, the question “Is love always right be definition?” seems rather pointless.

Here’s one for you: if we are to include perpetrating rape and endorsing slavery as signs (albeit strange ones) of love, how might that affect our “definition” of love? Will that improve or degrade our idea of love?

To quote a Leonard Cohen lyric…

“I’ve seen the nations rise and fall. I’ve heard their stories, heard them all. But love’s the only engine of survival.”

You quite readily admit that we all die, with no one to adminster judgement (know the objective difference between life and death, in other words). If it was common knowledge that we all would live forever, and I said that, you would be on me like a Rottweiler for "condemning us all to death" as if we deserved it. Isn't it interesting that I agree with you entirely, but still think God can resurrect us from death/save us from hell?

I never said God could not resurrect us or save us. In fact, I never said what I believe one way or the other, although you certainly enjoy sticking me with the atheist position whenever possible.

I’m afraid I don’t follow your hypothetical. If it was common knowledge that we live forever (which, of course, it isn’t), and if you claimed there was no one to administer judgment, I would be on you like a Rottweiler? What exactly does that mean? Sorry, you lost me on that one.

But you won't admit that the God had reform in mind with the laws He provided for Israel. You can't, because you "don't care what societal norms were". If any of those reformers had your attitude about society, I doubt they would have made a dent in its functioning. We in South Africa have a different history than America, so I'll try to give an example you can associate with (you might not believe culture makes a difference, but I'm convinced of it. Let me know what you think of South Africa and I'll tell you why...)

Ah, South Africa! FW De Klerk recently spoke at our local university (and not without some controversy actually). I produced a story on it for the university radio station. Nice to know I’m debating internationally here.

I appreciate the Frederick Douglas quote, but I’m afraid it does little to bolster your point. Douglas, in his own words, was reacting against what he called the evil side of Christianity. What I meant by “fuck the culture” is not that culture does not matter (i.e., how reformers interact with the culture) per se, but that great reformers are the ones willing to question the status quo, not the ones who blindly adhere to it. They will say what is unpopular, no matter the expense. People paid with their lives to bring about freedom for slaves in this country. If they had sat back and said, “Well, we should probably obey our masters for now, and just wait for them to slowly change their minds over hundreds of years,” then nothing would have happened. It took action. And it took reformers with a great deal more courage than it appears God was willing to muster.

Are you saying that, if God had NOT endorsed slavery, war, and rape, the Israelites would not have been able to handle it? It would have been too much of a culture shock? They would have rebelled against their God? Was society just not ready for such things? THAT’S when I say “fuck the culture.”

People who wait around for “the right time” will not achieve social change. Bottom line: It’s never the right time.

Culture and context has an effect on how words are used and what they mean. Don't you understand this or don't you want to understand this?

I understand it entirely. So, tell me. What did “kill all the women who have been with a man and take the virgin girls for yourselves” mean in cultural context, and tell me why this advice was necessary to advance God’s will. And conclude by telling me why believing God ever wanted this is a positive thing.

If a slave has taken refuge with you, do not hand him over to his master. 16 Let him live among you wherever he likes and in whatever town he chooses. Do not oppress him.

Wonderful. Now contrast that with this quote:

When a man strikes his male or female slave with a rod so hard that the slave dies under his hand, he shall be punished. If, however, the slave survives for a day or two, he is not to be punished, since the slave is his own property. (Exodus 21:20-21 NAB)​

Or this:

Slaves, obey your earthly masters with deep respect and fear. Serve them sincerely as you would serve Christ. (Ephesians 6:5 NLT)​

Now, here’s the problem. If you’re saying God had to deal with a pro-slavery culture in this way in order to foster an attitude that would later blossom into a loving, compassionate society, then I’m wondering how these past few passages advance that attitude (rather than reinforce it).

If Martin Luther King Jr. had said, “Blacks, obey your white masters with deep respect and fear. Serve them sincerely as you would serve Christ,” would he have accomplished anything? Perhaps if he had just subtly hinted that an attitude change was needed?

Yeah, I’m sure that would have done the trick.

On the one hand, you have God establishing draconian laws and quickly (often violently) punishing people for not following them, in an attempt, you say, to make them realize their wrongdoing, however, when it comes to issues such as slavery, God took his time “fostering an attitude.” You can look at that and say, “Oh, that was God’s divine plan.” All I’m saying is that was awfully convenient for those who owned slaves.

Um... actually it's keeping together slave families. If he already had a wife, she could go free with him (read the previous verses). It was only if his wife was a slave herself, given to him later, that she would have to work of her six years before she, too, could go free. Otherwise the women would marry themselves into an "early retirement".

Really?! Well, shit. Where do I sign up?

I don't understand your remark about the piercing of his ears. How do you suppose they did it? With a Surgeon general approved, sterilized acme(TM) standard earpiercer? After all, the servant had to "plainly say", in front of a judge, that this was his wish. Other cultures branded their slaves with hot irons.

It’s called sarcasm over here in the States. I was mentioning how the mere idea of a man who is owned by another man and does not wish to leave his wife, and therefore must face a judge, and be tagged so that he can serve his current master forever isn’t exactly a situation where I envision the slave “loving” his master. (I’m willing to bet the masters wrote that bit.) I’m sure you can argue the whole thing away with how much nicer they were to their slaves than other people, but that isn’t exactly a stellar improvement (not unlike saying, "Well, we're more gentle when we rape our women").

Had you been in that slave’s position, would it all seem justified to you? Probably so. Especially if you were a fan of Ephesians 6:5.

It had become a moral issue, which it was not in ancient times.

And why wasn’t it a moral issue? Because God decided not to make it one?

The difference, my friend, is between God's will and our will. Prophecy tells us about God's will, that's why it will be done one way or another - it's a truth that transcends time or choice - but free will is our own will, which can submit to God's will or not. I think of it as a light that God casts, and some things are outside the light of His will and other are inside His will, but still free. That light distinguishes between light and darkness, and at the same illuminates certain events that are God's explicit will.

OK, so tell me again how creating the human race, giving them a vague, contradictory book as a guide, allowing them the free will to choose (although not telling them exactly what choices specifically lead to Hell), and then sentencing them when they die, based only on God’s will (which we can neither distinguish very well at all, nor influence in any way) is not tyrannical?

The Old Testament shows you exactly what would have happened if she were judged right there, so you wouldn't have to wonder.

Really? OK, let me extend the hypothetical. The woman stole some money from her workplace. She spent it, but she’s sorry. Now, you just said the Old Testament would tell me what would have happened if she were judged, correct?

So, tell me what the judgment would be: Pillar of salt? Instant death? Bear mauling? Or would her little theft have been one of the pardonable sins, like sending your daughters out to be raped instead of facing a crowd yourself, or beating your slave (but not enough to kill him)? Or did it matter if she had “faith” in God? What if she only had a moderate amount of faith? Would that have had any bearing on the situation?

I don’t see any consistent punishment here.

Then Jesus came to show us that, in fact, the law was much more strict than we ever imagined (in Matt. 5:20), and God was actually being lenient all along

Hmmm. More strict than bear mauling for kids? Yikes. Can anyone spell T-Y-R-A-N-T?

So I should be thankful that God is being so lenient with his floods and wars and what not. Why? What have I done that should anger God that much? Certainly, seeing as that he is God, I cannot be a threat to him in any way (nor can anyone else). He created me. He created us all. My life is of no consequence and God’s will is paramount. He can do with me whatever he chooses. And if he knowingly chooses to inflict torture at every turn, for any minor deviation from his law, why should I (or anyone else) thank him? Because he inspired a book that will act as a kind of makeshift guide to avoiding the very damnation he invented?

That’s kind of like coming close to murdering someone, then drawing back, knife in hand, and saying, “Now, aren’t you thankful I didn’t just kill you?” Of course, the victim’s answer would most likely be “Yes.” But would that make the killer any less of a psychopath?

Face it. Christianity is a religion based in fear - not love. To quote the book itself, “Perfect love casteth out all fear.” I suppose occasionally God says, “Fuck it! Fear gets things done.”

Whenever I hear someone say “God is love,” I always think of the Jack Handey joke:

“Whenever someone asks me to define love, I usually think for a minute, then spin around and pin the guy’s arm behind his back. NOW who’s asking the questions?”

Perfect illustration of the Bible-God if I ever heard one.

Josh

It’s just a ride. – Bill Hicks :m:

 

[heart]

I haven't read this thread in its entirety as it is quite long, but must say that I have found it very interesting thus far.

You both have made some great points- of course Jenyar knows where I stand. I have had this debate with him a few months ago, not near as in depth though.

I agree with your views Josh...and have yet to understand why Christians think it is perfectly fine for their God to kill innocent lives -babies in the flood, 1 Sam 15:3 killed children & babies here too, and as you had pointed out the she bears that killed the children all because they made fun of the bald man. Outside of these scriptures (okay and a few more), one passage that really gets me is found in 2 Samuel 6:1-7

I realize no one was to touch the ark, including Uzzah... but, the ox stumbled...and no doubt- out of a reaction Uzzah tried to stop it from falling. Uzzah wasn't trying to destroy it- he was trying to protect it from smashing into the ground. God repays this follower by killing him. 7 "The LORD's anger burned against Uzzah because of his irreverent act; therefore God struck him down and he died there beside the ark of God."

I would think a true and loving god would be above such acts

Carry on

 

[Jenyar]

I haven't been ignoring you... between a cold and a stacked inbox I just haven't had time. But I have been mulling over your questions, and I decided not to counter with another lenghty article. I don't think the root of the problem is with minor misunderstandings or misreadings - or even cultural differences. It's that you seem to believe in a God extracted from the Bible and not the God of the Bible. I didn't notice this until I realized that I don't base my faith on the Bible per se. I base it on a faith that is "radiated" by the Bible as surely as it radiates in my life - it's a reasonable, coherent, if often contradictory radiation, but one I can be at least as sure of as you are of your own morality. It's not exactly that you (don't) believe in a "straw-man" God, but that you are willing to ignore the rest of the Bible (and the whole of Christianity) to make your point.

For Israel, God was only their God. The rest of humanity was excluded from salvation. But since Jesus came we don't think that anymore. It's nice to speculate how the present compares to the past, but you don't really learn anything unless you gain from it. And you're not gaining - you're losing information. Selectively.

For instance, have you ever noticed the little book on slavery in the New Testament? Here's a quote from Philemon:

Therefore, although in Christ I could be bold and order you to do what you ought to do, yet I appeal to you on the basis of love. I then, as Paul--an old man and now also a prisoner of Christ Jesus-- I appeal to you for my son Onesimus, [a refugee slave imprisoned with Paul] who became my son while I was in chains...
15Perhaps the reason he was separated from you for a little while was that you might have him back for good--no longer as a slave, but better than a slave, as a dear brother. He is very dear to me but even dearer to you, both as a man and as a brother in the Lord.
So if you consider me a partner, welcome him as you would welcome me. If he has done you any wrong or owes you anything, charge it to me. I, Paul, am writing this with my own hand. I will pay it back--not to mention that you owe me your very self.​

You might dismiss this as inconsequential, but to my ears it sounds like Jesus speaking. From Exodus and Deut. we learn that God also judged Israel by the way the treated their slaves or eliminated their enemies. What would have been more unsettling would be if God had made no mention of any of those things. The Bible-as-you-like-it: no wars, no slavery, no sex, incest, rape or contradiction. But to think now that God actually condones those things are beyond absurd. You have to read between the lines so hard that you can only see spaces. Today we have the "different" New Testament (i.e. the new covenant) saying that God does not condone lying, stealing, homosexuality or greed - in fact these things, among others, are condemned in the strongest terms...

So what will it be? Does God condemn too much of the present and too little of the past? Or should He have tolerated their sins less than He does ours? You can almost smell the hypocrisy beneath such a mentality. The fact is, Israel had their covenant with its laws, and will be judged by it, but we have ours - now will you deal with it just as strictly as they had to, or will you discard it, too?

Don't get me wrong. I have no problem with your agnostic standpoint; even your atheistic arguments don't bother me. But be aware that calling God a liar while at the same time claiming no ability to know Him, is a cowardly attempt to justify thinking you won't be held accountable for what you do know.

Face it. Christianity is a religion based in fear - not love. To quote the book itself, ?Perfect love casteth out all fear.? I suppose occasionally God says, ?Fuck it! Fear gets things done.?

If God really was who you think He is portrayed to be in the Bible, then Israel had every reason to fear God and follow Him blindly without question. After all, Moses' laws stated perfectly what they needed to do. But why did they take such liberties with Him then? If God was such a succesful tyrant, wouldn't the assured presence and approval of such a powerful ally be enough to inspire blind obedience in even the weakest Israelite, not to mention the great king Saul who was anointed by the prophet Samuel himself?

You're not making a distinction between fear of the known and fear of the unknown. The kind of fear you imagine God to instill has to be "of the unknown", because simply, you don't know Him. Fear doesn't inspire faith, you're living proof of that... and it's not enough to inspire obedience either. Neither are miracles, neither are any laws. In fact, fear doesn't inspire much other than fear. But belief in God does suggest a healthy amount of fear. If you have faith, you fear the One who will judge your life but also saves it. It's a different type of fear, and not nearly as oppressive or debilitating as you seem to think. Abraham certainly used "love for God" and "fear of God" interchangably, as if they were the same thing.

I agree with your views Josh...and have yet to understand why Christians think it is perfectly fine for their God to kill innocent lives -babies in the flood, 1 Sam 15:3 killed children & babies here too, and as you had pointed out the she bears that killed the children all because they made fun of the bald man. Outside of these scriptures (okay and a few more), one passage that really gets me is found in 2 Samuel 6:1-7

I realize no one was to touch the ark, including Uzzah... but, the ox stumbled...and no doubt- out of a reaction Uzzah tried to stop it from falling. Uzzah wasn't trying to destroy it- he was trying to protect it from smashing into the ground. God repays this follower by killing him. 7 "The LORD's anger burned against Uzzah because of his irreverent act; therefore God struck him down and he died there beside the ark of God."

I would think a true and loving god would be above such acts

Hi there heart. I remember our discussion very well, and I don't think we'll gain any more insights by repeating it again. But I want to respond in the light of my discussion with JustARide.

I think you wanted simple answers, but it shouldn't surprise you that there aren't. God gives life, and it's His to take away again. If you don't understand that principle, you are underestimating the difficulty of your questions. If you suggest that God takes life unfairly, that's something different.

I will just remind you of some points to keep in mind:
David also didn't agree with the death of Uzzah - he called the place "outbreak against Uzzah", so don't think the objection is original. But you'll know that breaking a law even with good intentions is punishable. And the ark wasn't just a religious relic, it represented God's own presence. If the ark was treated as prescribed, Uzzah wouldn't have been near the ark, and their would have been no oxes that could stumble... (incidentally, just letting the ark fall, although unthinkable, carried no punishment. It was precious because of God's presence, not because it was made of porcelain).

Numbers 4
5 When the camp is to move, Aaron and his sons are to go in and take down the shielding curtain and cover the ark of the Testimony with it. 6 Then they are to cover this with hides of sea cows, spread a cloth of solid blue over that and put the poles in place. [i.e., covered three times, which David didn't do]
15 "After Aaron and his sons have finished covering the holy furnishings and all the holy articles, and when the camp is ready to move, the Kohathites are to come to do the carrying. But they must not touch the holy things or they will die. The Kohathites are to carry those things that are in the Tent of Meeting.
19 So that they may live and not die when they come near the most holy things, do this for them: Aaron [the High Priest] and his sons are to go into the sanctuary and assign to each man his work and what he is to carry.

But instead they lifted it onto an ox-wagon and had Uzzah and Ahio guide it. Uzzah was a son of Abinadab, David's older brother. They literally forgot who they were dealing with, and David admitted it himself:

1 Chronicles 15
13 It was because you, the Levites, did not bring it up the first time that the LORD our God broke out in anger against us. We did not inquire of him about how to do it in the prescribed way."

The same is true with those people who mocked Elisha, when they basically told him to f* off to heaven the same way Elijah did, and just after he miraculously cured their drinking water.

You can extract many meanings of each account, but the plain message seems to be:
1. God will take your life as you take others (Amalekites)
2. To curse God is to curse yourself (Elisha)
3. You aren't obeying God if you don't take care to obey Him (Uzzah)

PS. You might be interested in this account by Tesla. I haven't heard it before:

"The records, though scanty, are of a nature to fill us with conviction that a few initiated, at least, had a deeper knowledge of amber phenomena. To mention one, Moses was undoubtedly a practical and skillful electrician far in advance of his time. The Bible describes precisely, and minutely, arrangements constituting a machine in which electricity was generated by friction of air against silk curtains, and stored in a box constructed like a condenser. It is very plausible to assume that the sons of Aaron were killed by a high-tension discharge, and that the vestal fires of the Romans were electrical."​

- Wikipedia

 

[heart]

I think you wanted simple answers, but it shouldn't surprise you that there aren't. God gives life, and it's His to take away again. If you don't understand that principle, you are underestimating the difficulty of your questions. If you suggest that God takes life unfairly, that's something different

Hi Jenyar,

I would agree that a god could have the power to give and take away life. Yes, from stories I've read in the Bible god is barbaric, egotistical, and most definitely unfair.

The Bible illustrates, to me, a god who has got a definite power problem. It's like because he's god- he can treat others like poop. And don't get on his bad side because he will make sure to punish your children and their children's children etc (rambling here and rehashing..sorry )

David also didn't agree with the death of Uzzah - he called the place "outbreak against Uzzah", so don't think the objection is original.

Yes, I'm very well aware of this.

But you'll know that breaking a law even with good intentions is punishable. And the ark wasn't just a religious relic, it represented God's own presence. If the ark was treated as prescribed, Uzzah wouldn't have been near the ark, and their would have been no oxes that could stumble... (incidentally, just letting the ark fall, although unthinkable, carried no punishment. It was precious because of God's presence, not because it was made of porcelain).

Okay, I'm going to ignore that fact that god made his presence so powerful that it would kill a human...I won't even ask why he couldn't have "toned" it down . In the story basically god said don't do it that way- do it this way or you'll die. I'm just wondering why death was the penalty.
Then again, if his presence is that deadly, who needs it? I wouldn't think it would be appealing..it would be something I wouldn't want to go near. Evidently, Uzzah didn't see it that way- poor guy.

I can't help but think that instead of god's presence being something that is wanted, warm, loving, and cherished it is quite the opposite. Just what kind of message was god sending out by killing someone because they touched it...why all the fuss about how to cover and carry it? Perhaps to make god feel important and powerful knowing he can strike down the person who touches it?

But instead they lifted it onto an ox-wagon and had Uzzah and Ahio guide it. Uzzah was a son of Abinadab, David's older brother. They literally forgot who they were dealing with, and David admitted it himself:

Yes, someone who will strike you down because you disobeyed an order... No room for error-
If god is the god who changeth not...if he is the same yesterday, today, and forever... If he isn't a respecter of persons- why was he more forgiving in the NT vs the OT? He let the disciples get away with so much more...

The same is true with those people who mocked Elisha, when they basically told him to f* off to heaven the same way Elijah did, and just after he miraculously cured their drinking water.

Oh cry me a river LOL Jenyar, this was a man who was made fun of because he had no hair..and perhaps it was basically telling him to f* off by saying "go up bald man"... but, let us stop there for one second please.

This is a man who represents your god. What kind of example is he setting? Better yet, what kind of example is god setting by sending the bears out to kill the children? This certainly is the exact opposite of what Jesus would do, yes? Kids will be kids...and I don't think because someone might tell a prophet of god to f* off, that it gives the right to have god kill them, do you?

You can extract many meanings of each account, but the plain message seems to be:
1. God will take your life as you take others (Amalekites)
2. To curse God is to curse yourself (Elisha)
3. You aren't obeying God if you don't take care to obey Him (Uzzah)

Did god take David's life when he was king- and arranged to have a man go to the front line of the war knowing that he would die? The motive being David wanted this man's wife for his own.
Nope he didn't. Instead god sent Nathan to tactfully show David his error.

Are you saying Elisha is god, or because he was a godly man, he had the right to point his prayers and have god kill the children?

Moses disobeyed god by not leaving god alone (Exodus 32:10) when asked to. Instead Moses talked to god about not destroying his people. God didn't punish Moses, instead he granted Moses request. You might think god rewarded instead of punishing Moses because his intentions were good, but so was Uzzah's.

PS. You might be interested in this account by Tesla. I haven't heard it before:

"The records, though scanty, are of a nature to fill us with conviction that a few initiated, at least, had a deeper knowledge of amber phenomena. To mention one, Moses was undoubtedly a practical and skillful electrician far in advance of his time. The Bible describes precisely, and minutely, arrangements constituting a machine in which electricity was generated by friction of air against silk curtains, and stored in a box constructed like a condenser. It is very plausible to assume that the sons of Aaron were killed by a high-tension discharge, and that the vestal fires of the Romans were electrical."

Yes, very interesting indeed and I thank you for posting that. Jenyar, this would make more sense to me than a god striking someone down because of disobedience. It's easy to get exaggerated stories from an incident.

 

[JustARide]

I haven't been ignoring you... between a cold and a stacked inbox I just haven't had time. But I have been mulling over your questions, and I decided not to counter with another lenghty article.

Thanks for breaking the cycle, bro. I will try to respond in kind (but will most likely fail).

Also - Hi Heart! Welcome to the fray. Nice to know I'm not alone.

I don't think the root of the problem is with minor misunderstandings or misreadings - or even cultural differences. It's that you seem to believe in a God extracted from the Bible and not the God of the Bible. … It's not exactly that you (don't) believe in a "straw-man" God, but that you are willing to ignore the rest of the Bible (and the whole of Christianity) to make your point.

I believe the problem is quite the opposite. You do not want to connect the Bible to the world as we know it; rather, you aim to divorce the Bible (and God) from any kind of paradigm in which the text can be analyzed, deconstructed, or held to any of semblance of a standard, whether scientific or moral. On the contrary, you want to see the Bible accepted on its own terms and by its own self-made claims, as if the narrative was somehow detached from our common reality, a cosmic storyline played out in some parallel universe where slavery and rape were somehow temporarily acceptable to God.

For Israel, God was only their God. The rest of humanity was excluded from salvation. But since Jesus came we don't think that anymore. It's nice to speculate how the present compares to the past, but you don't really learn anything unless you gain from it. And you're not gaining - you're losing information. Selectively.

“But since Jesus came…” Another sentence that attempts to divide history – as if men and women before Jesus were somehow not flesh and blood, as if they deserved (or were perhaps punished with) a drastically different God who ruled by drastically different standards, as if the meaning of divinely-administered “justice” depended solely upon the era of one’s birth.

Yes, I prefer to lose the “information” that has led to countless wars, oppression, racism, sexism, and disrespect for human rights. What would I gain by accepting a once-upon-a-time warlike God? Faith in an invisible Machiavellian deity who once perpetuated the very crimes he forbids us to commit. Yippee.

You say I’m not respecting the whole Bible, that I’m singling out instances that conflict with my fallible human standards, but I ask you this: what more proof does the Bible provide that these were not the acts of a tyrannical god than simple circular logic? What can the Bible say except “The acts were warranted because we say they were”? Should I bestow validity on documents based only on the claims contained within those documents? If the answer is no, then why, I ask, is the Bible an exception?

Whatever answer you provide will inevitably boil down to this: because the Bible says so.

From Exodus and Deut. we learn that God also judged Israel by the way the treated their slaves or eliminated their enemies. What would have been more unsettling would be if God had made no mention of any of those things. The Bible-as-you-like-it: no wars, no slavery, no sex, incest, rape or contradiction. But to think now that God actually condones those things are beyond absurd. You have to read between the lines so hard that you can only see spaces. Today we have the "different" New Testament (i.e. the new covenant) saying that God does not condone lying, stealing, homosexuality or greed - in fact these things, among others, are condemned in the strongest terms...

Again, you can yank any quote from the Bible to support/condemn any position on slavery – a common practice for thousands of years now. In fact, I never said the Bible should not have included war, slavery, sex, etc. These were, and continue to be, deeply-engrained aspects of the human condition. But your contention that God did not endorse these things can be nothing if not a case-study in denial. I have quoted unambiguous passages, claimed by the Bible to be the “Word of God” - direct from the horse’s mouth as it were - and you have simply responded by quoting other passages that contradict mine. That proves nothing – except that the Bible contradicts itself. No news there.

When a man strikes his male or female slave with a rod so hard that the slave dies under his hand, he shall be punished. If, however, the slave survives for a day or two, he is not to be punished, since the slave is his own property. (Exodus 21:20-21 NAB)

Since I'm reading "between the lines," please tell me what the above passage was meant to convey if not instructions on how to correctly beat your slave.

So what will it be? Does God condemn too much of the present and too little of the past? Or should He have tolerated their sins less than He does ours? You can almost smell the hypocrisy beneath such a mentality. The fact is, Israel had their covenant with its laws, and will be judged by it, but we have ours - now will you deal with it just as strictly as they had to, or will you discard it, too?

So you’re saying, by my holding God to a consistent standard on human rights (my radical anti-rape position, for instance), I am somehow pulling God in two directions? That nothing God could have done would please me? Quite the opposite. The Bible-God does a remarkably good job of contradicting himself; he doesn’t need my help. If God had set forth a consistent set of rules, then maybe I could follow it. How you find the consistency in the Bible is beyond me.

Don't get me wrong. I have no problem with your agnostic standpoint; even your atheistic arguments don't bother me. But be aware that calling God a liar while at the same time claiming no ability to know Him, is a cowardly attempt to justify thinking you won't be held accountable for what you do know.

OK, so…

Let’s say I know rape is wrong. Now, by holding to that standard (what I think I know), and therefore disbelieving in a God who, at one time, easily tolerated rape, I will be condemned. How exactly am I trying to escape responsibility for what I know? I’m trying to be to true.

In actuality, you are accusing me of trying to escape accountability for what you know. A very common Christian attitude. You want me to fear what you fear.

But belief in God does suggest a healthy amount of fear. If you have faith, you fear the One who will judge your life but also saves it. It's a different type of fear, and not nearly as oppressive or debilitating as you seem to think. Abraham certainly used "love for God" and "fear of God" interchangably, as if they were the same thing.

Where there is fear there cannot be true love. The love people show for God in the OT is more akin to the “love” victims develop for their kidnappers. They love because they believe their court sentence in the afterlife depends upon that love. That’s a forced brand of love, a conditional love, a love chanted by many who fear for their lives around the world. “Long live Saddam!” “Praise our beloved leader, Kim Jong Il!” Love produced from fear = artificial.

I believe a truer love does exist because I’ve seen it in action – a giving-without-reward love; some might call it agape, others might simply call it unconditional or true. A God who must convince people to be good by baiting them with eternal Heaven and frightening them with eternal Hell is dealing in a lower form of love, a cynical love that plays to our selfish nature more than it does our truly heroic side – the side that does good simply for goodness’ sake.

Who possesses the greater love? One who loves, believing he is “building up treasures in Heaven,” or one who loves simply because he loves?

As Albert Einstein said, “If people are good only because they fear punishment, and hope for reward, then we are a sorry lot indeed.”

All the best. I hope that fear/love thing works out for you.

Josh

It’s just a ride. – Bill Hicks

 

[Jenyar]

can't help but think that instead of god's presence being something that is wanted, warm, loving, and cherished it is quite the opposite. Just what kind of message was god sending out by killing someone because they touched it...why all the fuss about how to cover and carry it? Perhaps to make god feel important and powerful knowing he can strike down the person who touches it?

You want God to be something warm and fuzzy - something people can fall back on when all else fails. The regulations about covering the ark and assigning carriers were necessary to protect the people who God chose to be His own. Why should people be able to handle God without gloves, so to speak? What happens when you mix fire with fire? Nothing. But when you mix fire with wood? We are of a different material than God. The covers on the ark are the same covers that split the temple into three parts, and for the same reason that Moses had to cover his face after He spoke with God. You want the truth? You can't handle the truth...

Yes, someone who will strike you down because you disobeyed an order... No room for error - If god is the god who changeth not...if he is the same yesterday, today, and forever... If he isn't a respecter of persons- why was he more forgiving in the NT vs the OT? He let the disciples get away with so much more...

God didn't change. Our position changed - because He changed it. Humanity was essentially lost from the beginning, remember? It's been a long road back to grace. There is always plenty of room for error until a law is broken. The laws had their place in history - they represented an artificial morality. And it will always seem artificial from your new "enlightened" existence - because it was insufficient.

Jer.31
28 Just as I watched over them to uproot and tear down, and to overthrow, destroy and bring disaster, so I will watch over them to build and to plant," declares the LORD . 29 "In those days people will no longer say,

'The fathers have eaten sour grapes,
and the children's teeth are set on edge.'

30 Instead, everyone will die for his own sin; whoever eats sour grapes-his own teeth will be set on edge.

31 "The time is coming," declares the LORD,
"when I will make a new covenant
with the house of Israel
and with the house of Judah.
32 It will not be like the covenant
I made with their forefathers
when I took them by the hand
to lead them out of Egypt,
because they broke my covenant,
though I was a husband to them,"
declares the LORD.

33 "This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel
after that time," declares the LORD .
"I will put my law in their minds
and write it on their hearts.
I will be their God,
and they will be my people.​

I believe the problem is quite the opposite. You do not want to connect the Bible to the world as we know it; rather, you aim to divorce the Bible (and God) from any kind of paradigm in which the text can be analyzed, deconstructed, or held to any of semblance of a standard, whether scientific or moral. On the contrary, you want to see the Bible accepted on its own terms and by its own self-made claims, as if the narrative was somehow detached from our common reality, a cosmic storyline played out in some parallel universe where slavery and rape were somehow temporarily acceptable to God.

On the contrary, I have no wish to divorce the Bible from reality. That's what I've been trying to show you. The reality of the Bible was just as real as the one we live in today, but they lived under a different paradigm than ours - that's what you won't admit. Slavery and rape was not "temporarily acceptable", that was part of the sinful world we had come to live in, and part of the world God promised to change. His promise was to slaves as much as owners (even though slavery as it existed under Mosaic law has no modern parallel). Rape was never justified, I don't know where you see that. But it existed just as murder, lying and stealing existed.

?But since Jesus came?? Another sentence that attempts to divide history ? as if men and women before Jesus were somehow not flesh and blood, as if they deserved (or were perhaps punished with) a drastically different God who ruled by drastically different standards, as if the meaning of divinely-administered ?justice? depended solely upon the era of one?s birth.

2 Corinthians 3:6
He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant?not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. 7Now if the ministry that brought death, which was engraved in letters on stone, came with glory, so that the Israelites could not look steadily at the face of Moses because of its glory, fading though it was, 8will not the ministry of the Spirit be even more glorious?

You are arguing a spirituality that corresponds with our current way of life. Ancient civilizations made almost now distinction between spiritual and scientific experience. Heart could accept Tesla's explanation more easily than the biblical author's, but does that change what happened? Does that change that he died because he didn't respect God's will? Heart reinforced my point when he showed what happened wasn't an every day occurrence. David didn't die, Moses didn't die, Elisha wasn't punished... Noah didn't die... don't you see any difference between these people and the Amalekites, "poor Uzzah" and Elisha's mockers? You argue that the difference is contradictory, I argue that it's telling. To you, there can be no other reason the bears attacked anybody other than chance. Neither can you explain how they could to pass by Elisha and manage to maul 42 people. Neither can I, scientifically.

In science, when you start exploring a field you don't understand, and you find apparent contradictions, you learn from them. You don't reject the method; why do it with our knowledge about God? Surely not because it's "not scientific", because we're not examining the science behind God, are we? Knowing what the scientific explanations might be may give you a sense of comfort, but once again, are you really justified to dismiss God because He doesn't seem comforting enough?

Take your example from Exodus 21:

When a man strikes his male or female slave with a rod so hard that the slave dies under his hand, he shall be punished. If, however, the slave survives for a day or two, he is not to be punished, since the slave is his own property.

Show me where any other system of laws at the time would punish an owner for how he treated his slaves. If "being property" was meant inhumanely, why is there even a clause about it? Where are the laws about how to treat their animals? I'd say it was exposed as a reality - as laws are meant to do - so that it could be handled with responsibility, and not run its own course silently.

So you?re saying, by my holding God to a consistent standard on human rights (my radical anti-rape position, for instance), I am somehow pulling God in two directions? That nothing God could have done would please me? Quite the opposite. The Bible-God does a remarkably good job of contradicting himself; he doesn?t need my help. If God had set forth a consistent set of rules, then maybe I could follow it. How you find the consistency in the Bible is beyond me.

Here is your consistent set of rules: Love the Lord your God, who freed you out of slavery (of the world and death), and love your fellow man as yourself.

All other sets of rules, as you have noticed, are either too constrictive or too lax, depending on where you stand. You could read Romans again if you're interested in the philosophy behind it.

Let?s say I know rape is wrong. Now, by holding to that standard (what I think I know), and therefore disbelieving in a God who, at one time, easily tolerated rape, I will be condemned. How exactly am I trying to escape responsibility for what I know? I?m trying to be to true.

You're just realizing that an internal compass is far more trustwothy than an external one. But you are projecting your uncertainty about its authority on God, instead of on those whose moral compasses were less aligned than your own. People do the raping - people are the sinners - and no law God could provide will override a person's own will. God appealed to the Israelites to treat their slaves as neighbours, to tolerate no evil, and to keep themselves holy; He guided but never manipulated. But instead of finding fault with those uncivilized Israelites, you want to find fault with God, who was no more responsible for sin then than He is today. God is concerned with our eternal life in His presence, and sin sabotages that.

Be thankful that you live in a society that has realized the horrors slavery leads to, but learn from the Israelites who did not know it. Be thankful if are not threatened by Amalekites or worse, and that God will not tolerate them in His presence. But when bears start coming out of the woods, will you still wonder whether it's just anture taking its course, or whether you need God's protection after all?

I believe a truer love does exist because I?ve seen it in action ? a giving-without-reward love; some might call it agape, others might simply call it unconditional or true. A God who must convince people to be good by baiting them with eternal Heaven and frightening them with eternal Hell is dealing in a lower form of love, a cynical love that plays to our selfish nature more than it does our truly heroic side ? the side that does good simply for goodness? sake.

You mean the 1 Cor. 13 kind of love? The love Jesus showed us by dying for our sins? What reward does God get for saving all of humanity or even one person? What reward do you give Him? I always wonder, if that is what the poor reflection in the mirror looks like, in this imperfect world, what will it look like when we see it perfectly?

Eternal life will never be a promise that can be underplayed, but does it really present such a tangible reward that people can pretend to be "inspired to love" because of it? On the contrary, it seems heaven only inspires people to die for it, and the promise of death seems only to inspire people to stick to atheism. Don't you see the vicious circle? Similar to faith, love tolerates no kinds of inspiration - it's a choice you make. That it's the choice God made cannot demean that in any way.

 

[Medicine*Woman]

You want God to be something warm and fuzzy - something people can fall back on when all else fails. The regulations about covering the ark and assigning carriers were necessary to protect the people who God chose to be His own. Why should people be able to handle God without gloves, so to speak? What happens when you mix fire with fire? Nothing. But when you mix fire with wood? We are of a different material than God. The covers on the ark are the same covers that split the temple into three parts, and for the same reason that Moses had to cover his face after He spoke with God. You want the truth? You can't handle the truth...
*************
M*W: Jenyar, wherever you were when you weren't here, why don't you go back there? You weren't missed at all. Who are you to say what God is? Who are you to know what God wants? You fantasize. Get lost.
*************
God didn't change. Our position changed - because He changed it. Humanity was essentially lost from the beginning, remember? It's been a long road back to grace. There is always plenty of room for error until a law is broken. The laws had their place in history - they represented an artificial morality. And it will always seem artificial from your new "enlightened" existence - because it was insufficient.

Jer.31
28 Just as I watched over them to uproot and tear down, and to overthrow, destroy and bring disaster, so I will watch over them to build and to plant," declares the LORD . 29 "In those days people will no longer say,
*************
M*W: You're an embarassment to God. You're an embarassment to Christianity. Is this how you want to make your point?
*************
'The fathers have eaten sour grapes,
and the children's teeth are set on edge.'

30 Instead, everyone will die for his own sin; whoever eats sour grapes-his own teeth will be set on edge.

31 "The time is coming," declares the LORD,
"when I will make a new covenant
with the house of Israel
and with the house of Judah.
32 It will not be like the covenant
I made with their forefathers
when I took them by the hand
to lead them out of Egypt,
because they broke my covenant,
though I was a husband to them,"
declares the LORD.

33 "This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel
after that time," declares the LORD .
"I will put my law in their minds
and write it on their hearts.
I will be their God,
and they will be my people.​

On the contrary, I have no wish to divorce the Bible from reality. That's what I've been trying to show you. The reality of the Bible was just as real as the one we live in today, but they lived under a different paradigm than ours - that's what you won't admit. Slavery and rape was not "temporarily acceptable", that was part of the sinful world we had come to live in, and part of the world God promised to change. His promise was to slaves as much as owners (even though slavery as it existed under Mosaic law has no modern parallel). Rape was never justified, I don't know where you see that. But it existed just as murder, lying and stealing existed.

2 Corinthians 3:6
He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant?not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. 7Now if the ministry that brought death, which was engraved in letters on stone, came with glory, so that the Israelites could not look steadily at the face of Moses because of its glory, fading though it was, 8will not the ministry of the Spirit be even more glorious?

You are arguing a spirituality that corresponds with our current way of life. Ancient civilizations made almost now distinction between spiritual and scientific experience. Heart could accept Tesla's explanation more easily than the biblical author's, but does that change what happened? Does that change that he died because he didn't respect God's will? Heart reinforced my point when he showed what happened wasn't an every day occurrence. David didn't die, Moses didn't die, Elisha wasn't punished... Noah didn't die... don't you see any difference between these people and the Amalekites, "poor Uzzah" and Elisha's mockers? You argue that the difference is contradictory, I argue that it's telling. To you, there can be no other reason the bears attacked anybody other than chance. Neither can you explain how they could to pass by Elisha and manage to maul 42 people. Neither can I, scientifically.

In science, when you start exploring a field you don't understand, and you find apparent contradictions, you learn from them. You don't reject the method; why do it with our knowledge about God? Surely not because it's "not scientific", because we're not examining the science behind God, are we? Knowing what the scientific explanations might be may give you a sense of comfort, but once again, are you really justified to dismiss God because He doesn't seem comforting enough?

Take your example from Exodus 21:

When a man strikes his male or female slave with a rod so hard that the slave dies under his hand, he shall be punished. If, however, the slave survives for a day or two, he is not to be punished, since the slave is his own property.

Show me where any other system of laws at the time would punish an owner for how he treated his slaves. If "being property" was meant inhumanely, why is there even a clause about it? Where are the laws about how to treat their animals? I'd say it was exposed as a reality - as laws are meant to do - so that it could be handled with responsibility, and not run its own course silently.


Here is your consistent set of rules: Love the Lord your God, who freed you out of slavery (of the world and death), and love your fellow man as yourself.

All other sets of rules, as you have noticed, are either too constrictive or too lax, depending on where you stand. You could read Romans again if you're interested in the philosophy behind it.


You're just realizing that an internal compass is far more trustwothy than an external one. But you are projecting your uncertainty about its authority on God, instead of on those whose moral compasses were less aligned than your own. People do the raping - people are the sinners - and no law God could provide will override a person's own will. God appealed to the Israelites to treat their slaves as neighbours, to tolerate no evil, and to keep themselves holy; He guided but never manipulated. But instead of finding fault with those uncivilized Israelites, you want to find fault with God, who was no more responsible for sin then than He is today. God is concerned with our eternal life in His presence, and sin sabotages that.

Be thankful that you live in a society that has realized the horrors slavery leads to, but learn from the Israelites who did not know it. Be thankful if are not threatened by Amalekites or worse, and that God will not tolerate them in His presence. But when bears start coming out of the woods, will you still wonder whether it's just anture taking its course, or whether you need God's protection after all?


You mean the 1 Cor. 13 kind of love? The love Jesus showed us by dying for our sins? What reward does God get for saving all of humanity or even one person? What reward do you give Him? I always wonder, if that is what the poor reflection in the mirror looks like, in this imperfect world, what will it look like when we see it perfectly?

Eternal life will never be a promise that can be underplayed, but does it really present such a tangible reward that people can pretend to be "inspired to love" because of it? On the contrary, it seems heaven only inspires people to die for it, and the promise of death seems only to inspire people to stick to atheism. Don't you see the vicious circle? Similar to faith, love tolerates no kinds of inspiration - it's a choice you make. That it's the choice God made cannot demean that in any way
*************
M*W: What are you trying to prove? You are lost. Don't try to pretend that you are saved. You're a puppet. It's been proven that Afrika has been corrupted by missionaries. You're a lame brain.

 

[Jenyar]

You're an embarassment to God. You're an embarassment to Christianity. Is this how you want to make your point?

Such love.

But really, whatever threat do I pose to you that you get anything out of trying to humiliate me?

 

[Medicine*Woman]

Such love.

But really, whatever threat do I pose to you that you get anything out of trying to humiliate me?
*************
M*W: You're no threat to me. It's just that you are so humiliatable.

 

[Jenyar]

Because I'm Christian?