Nearly everyone has a built in sense of God.
- Thread starter Jeremy
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Primates (us) have evolved to use society as a powerful organizational tool. Society needs leaders, and therefore an acceptance of authority. A sense of, or more correctly a 'need' to have someone 'over' us is built in. It is reinforced by parents, and their need for control of the family. This built in acceptance or assumption of a higher authority, manifests itself ultimately as our concept of God.
I agree but for different reasons. Besides Jeremy your explanation does not explain why most of the gods were corrupt morally and why there would be more than one god. It would seem most natural that mankind would have one god and one master, but most pagan religons had more than one god. Certainly there were societies where they would conquer a tribe and then bring in that tribes god, but this does not seem to be the norm. Also why would society everywhere from the Aztecs to pagan Europe sacrafice even humans to the gods?
If man were to create a belief in an overall master/s of everything it would undoubtedly retain a large aspect of how man himself is.
When early people saw leadership there would have been large cases of corruption, and multiple leaders constantly battling with each other for land, possessions etc.
Anything above this would retain those aspects and would thus be far from any basis of perfection.
Take your god for example... Some people might try to claim perfection and yet why so much destruction, why so much jealousy, anger, etc etc?
god has all these humanlike values that would be consistent with created 'imaginary friends'.
When a child makes an imaginary friend- if the child likes barbie dolls, so does their imaginary friend.
I was reading a psychological book where traumatised kids would have imaginary friends who, not only were traumatised themselves but were also instigators of the same actions when they 'got angry'. The mental state of the child would control the aspects of the 'imaginary friend', most often with disastrous consequences.
"Bob the talking goldfish slit my wrists...."
It was the child who slit his own wrists, but it was manifested into being his imaginary friend by his own mind.
furthermore god takes on this very 'male dominant' attitude throughout the bible- yet another manifestation of how man himself is. In those days and even until recently women wouldn't stand a chance against men, (especially at the times when things were a lot more physical). War, violence, strenuous work- a woman would have been in an extremely bad position. Is it a surprise that god himself is considered a HE? Is it a surprise that god is quite sexist?
(btw i imply no sexism towards women whatsoever).
In the bible though, how many 'famous' women are there? Is there any religion that is actually female dominant?
Having said that many older beliefs have men as the 'guys in charge' so to speak but have the true original creator as a female. This would be consistent with humans.... Do we not all come from a woman originally? So the woman makes the other gods- all men, who then take control of everything. It's very straight forward in the context of humans themselves, (more so in the ancient times).
The same can be said of pretty much every single religion on the planet- including christianity. The sumerians, akkadians, babylonians, jews, christians, david koreshes bunch of nutcups in waco, texas- all a line of change and evolution upon a base culture. You could think you have a completely individual belief but it is in essence just an upgrade of an older one.
That what humans do best. Why would a guy fly a plane into a building killing several thousand people in a few minutes? Think anything ever really changes? Even your very own belief entails a guy who was 'sacrificed' does it not?
This remains constant with the way of humans. From kings/knights sarcificing people and sticking their heads on poles as a warning to modern day death row- it's all about keeping people 'in check'. If you kill a person every now and then, and get them to fear you... (just like your god said when he asked abraham to kill his own son)... you have control over them.
Having control over people means you can get them to provide you with money, gold and silver, (just like god demanded constantly throughout the bible), free food brought to you by your slaves, (as god demands constantly throughout the bible), a nice place to reside, (just like the tent god demanded in the bible), etc etc etc.
I don't think Gods being corrupt have a relevance with the need for authority, so I did not address it. As for multiple Gods, I did hint at it. Parents (or other leaders in the family/tribe structure) have different responsibilities and 'specialties'. The Mother is not the Father, yet both are 'authority' figures. So multiple authorities, or Gods still fulfill the need for authority. Bringing in another tribes God(s) could be seen as once again bowing down to the authority of a God concept.
As for the sacrifices, I don't see how it has much bearing on it.
As a side note:
It is interesting to note that in the U.S. they still sacrifice 'bad' tribe members to appease the government 'God'
Also worth noting is how the god of the OT, or pretty much any other god, is group specific. What i mean by this is the protection god showed specifically to the jews, "his people". He slaughtered their enemies for them, led a path for them- promised them everything and very often mentioned how everyone elses god was nonsense. It is no surprise that a god created by a specific culture would be specifically tailored to that very same culture. They would be the victorious in their written battles- by such easy means aswell- to make their enemies look stupid.
But if you even thought of going against your culture, your god would strike you down where you stand..
Oh and dont sleep with moabite women thus sayeth the lord... they're all ugly.
Man we could only imagine the serious arguments between the worlds first marriages of people with differing religions... *Phew*
But if you even thought of going against your culture, your god would strike you down where you stand..
Oh and dont sleep with moabite women thus sayeth the lord... they're all ugly.
Man we could only imagine the serious arguments between the worlds first marriages of people with differing religions... *Phew*
A common principle in many Wiccan traditions is the equality between the sexes. Both men and women are viewed as having their female and male side. Each person has the task of balancing the two. Within Wicca, the female principle is considered as powerful and sometimes even more important than the male.
Wiccans commune with the Goddess and the God. Many people reject the male domination seen in many Christian denominations -- particularly in Roman Catholicism and in some faith groups within the conservative wing of Protestantism. Here, positions of power and authority are reserved for men. Wiccans view the female and male principle in balance everywhere in the universe.
Wiccan belief
According to this Wicca is quite the opposite of sexist. Try again.
I especially like the wiccan rede- has gods commandments beaten hands down.
Yes but their behavior was truely appalling consisting of incest, murder, and rape. You are reading only the old testament, but God punishes imperfection.
Imaginary friends are sometimes a sign of demons...
Besides why would someone invent a friend so that they have to harm themselves.
We don't consider God male or female.
The intent was different. Bin Laden sacraficed 1000s to Baal all in the name of Allah.
Those sacraficed were often captured prisoners who could have been used as slaves.
You completely missed the point. If god is a creation of man it stands to reason that being/s would have a large portion of human traits within him/her/it/them. god of the bible is overwhelmed with humanlike qualities and downsides- hypocricy, wrath, pain, jealousy, greed etc etc... Absolutely no different to any human.
Furthermore the god of the ot, and the god of the nt are completely separate beings/creations of man. If you study the bible in depth you can clearly see the overwhelming change in gods attitude, style, ideals etc. The reason being is the change in time, the change in human society. The god they create will match the present societys needs, merits, downsides etc etc.
As for god punishing imperfection... the same can be said of nature itself. Those with deformities, frailties, mental issues would be technically 'punished' in that they would not at such time have a good chance of survival. It is quite simple to see why a created god would be so overly stupid when concerning imperfection. As he said "Anyone who has damaged testicles, deformed hands, is blind, dwarfed, deaf, dumb yada yada, can not come near the lord, anyone who is a leper is unclean and can not come near the lord." That's an obvious trait for any creation of man at such a time to possess. It's the smart way of doing things at such a time of minimal medical knowledge.
a long long time after jesus heals the sick, heals the deformed, gives man his eyesight back, etc etc... Medical knowledge has undoubtedly progressed somewhat and now we see a being, supposedly of god, that is not so concerned about the diseased and crippled but instead approaches them and heals them. It stands well with the way society would have been. This is just one sign of how 'god' has done a complete reversal. Originally saying "keep them away from me", and now actually approaching them to help instead of just kicking them out of camp.
Any natural occurences such as earthquakes would lead to people accusing the dead of having been evil..... otherwise why would they die? Can anything be as unjust and cruel to just kill something innocent? Is that what life is like? Oh no, of course not- he died- he must have been evil. It's simplistic caveman like attitude and it's shocking to think you buy into it so easily.
Lol, snakes are demons, scorpions are demons, bees are demons, now imaginary friends are demons. You have some real issues you should get seen to.
If you had a car crash would you say a demon must have been in the engine?
I view it as extremely pathetic you can so simply swipe everything you dont understand and is bad as being demons. It's tragic.
Read up about abused children, mass murderers, etc etc and you might understand why a bit better. It's like saying why does a person who was abused as a child very often go on to be an abuser of children? Wouldn't it stand to reason that he'd never do such a thing seeings as he had to go through it himself? That is far from truth... The brain is a vastly complex thing- you cant just say: "it's god, it's demons." and leave it at that.
A) Who's "we"?
B) In the bible god is male.
C) jesus was supposedly a male.
D) There is a lot of sexism in the attitude of god within the bible.
E) god of the bible is, therefore, predominantly male.
In the name of... on behalf of... it still ends up the same- slaughter of innocents for your belief in god. Be they outsiders, of differing religions, people you just dislike- there's a million and one reasons why someone would be sacrificed to the god/s. Nowadays society is different- and as such you rarely see sacrifices to god, (and it sure wouldn't be labelled as 'sacrifice'- but in the olden days when society was different sacrifice was prevalent. Furthermore, as i said, it serves a purpose of warning to those who might consider going against your culture and belief system.
But just how well serving would slaves be unless you made an example of some of them? Take a guy out- shoot him in the head- then say: "if anyone tries to escape this is what happens to them." It makes people think twice before attempting to flee. It remains that there would be no shortage whatsoever of slaves so killing a few here and there would hardly be regarded as a problem.
He's using the physical realm to manifest the spiritual. If you read Corinthians 11:17-33 "Therefore whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord unworthily will have to answer for the body and blood of the Lord". Another reason is Hebrews 7:26 "It was fitting that we should have such a high priest: holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners, higher than the heavens".
No. I'm saying that some cases of imaginary friends, especially violent ones or ones that have an alter personality, could be demons.
God created man in the image of God. It would be incorrect to say that Jesus was just a man because he is divine. The roles of man and woman are different. Aknowledging this difference is sexism how?
Not just several. The sacrafices to the Aztec God and Baal when over the thousands. Besides human sacrafice, why would they sacrafice livestock. If the king wanted to invent a god wouldn't you think he'd chose one not demanding animal sacrafices?
Completely irrelevant to the point. However while we're on the subject of Hebrews:
"The lord has sworn and will not change his mind; You are a priest forever."
god said that to jesus.. simply put that shows beyond any reasonable doubt that jesus is NOT god but simply a priest of god- much the same as Melchizedek who came before him. In fact, as hebrews says: "there have been many of them." Many people with the same rank as jesus. It goes on to state he gets the priesthood simply because he lives forever whereas the other priests died, (although it also says Melchizedek lives forever). The evidence remains he is just a priest- no way near godliness.
Sorry, that was slightly off topic but it needed to be said
And your evidence in support of this is.......... what exactly?
Again, completely and utterly irrelevant to the point. In the bible god is a male, which stands to reason in a society where men are dominant. If you created a god, and in your culture women were inferior, would your god be a female? Of course not. As for the sexism, it is rife throughout the bible- start reading.
The attributes of god would remain constant with the attributes of the culture. if authority would demand land, livestock and gold so would their god. It is never the high ranking people who have to make the sacrifices but the commoners. The sacrifices are made in a place where the high ranking priesthood and spreaders of belief reside and as such they would get everything. For example in the bible, (exodus), all sacrifices made to god become the property of the priests and his family.
It is simply logical for the spreader of belief to ensure that at the end of the day all sacrifices end up in his hands.
He is the mediator to God. No one knows the Father except through Son. hebrew says: "there have been many of them because they were prevented by death from remaining in office, but he, because he remains forever, has a priesthood that does not pass away. Therefore he is always able to save those who approach God through him, since he lives forever to make intercession for them.
Yeah, im aware of what it says. Again we can clearly see by this statement that jesus is nothing more than a middle man. He is not, and has no right whatsoever to be labelled as god. Everyone will go through him on their way to god himself, but jesus is basically little more than a nightclub bouncer. He does have one distinct advantage in that he "lives forever", but that in itself raises this statement:
"As jesus lives forever that would mean he doesn't die. If he doesn't die then his apparent 'sacrifice' was simply a convenient magic show put on for the benefit of the local idiots." -- Snake, 2003.
I don't think that this is an inherent quality, but rather a learned behavior, or dependence.
As children we are raised always with the constant and immoveable authority of our parents, this builds a psychological dependence on the idea of there always being a higher authority to appeal to.
Reasonably if this is the case, then those with more lenient and open parents, or those who's parents simply couldn't be bothered with them as a child are more likely to be the ones who, both in childhood adolescence, and later in life, will have a "problem" with authority. Now, I'm sure you can think of examples of this simply in people which you know, but I'll also be looking up some studies to support this claim in just a little while (I have all of about 5 minuets to make this post before I need to head over to a class).