Does Religion Have a Place in the Future of Humankind?

Nah, more like a change of devils. Wink

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mesquite wrote:

Eorl wrote:
I think the standard argument is that the old testament was completely true, but he had a change of "heart" when he sent his son down to check things out.

I guess it's like when head office sends a guy over to sack someone for using too many paper clips, but it turns out everybody was just working hard and using lots of paper clips so he just arranges more paper clips instead !

When the god that used to get his jollies causing droughts, plagues, and pestilence, destroying the planet, turning women into pillars of salt etc. switches from espousing "an eye for an eye" to "turn the other cheek", I'd have to call that more than just a change of heart. It's more like a change of gods.

Maybe we missed that episode of Extreme Entity Makeover

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The only thing that changed was the way we repent.

How is it that the people who spend their lives studying the bible find that he is a loving God? I'd be willing to put money on it that they have a little better understanding than most of you guys (eorl, c.i., mesquite, frank)

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You don't think maybe they study the bible because they think he is a loving god and also a god that they love.....rather than the other way around?

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Oh sure, he's a loving god this millenia, but go back a few thousand years and the guy seems a little pre-occupied with mass death and destruction.

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You people are so afraid of the unknown...that it truly makes no sense to argue with you.

In any case, Thunder...if the "god" to whom you refer happens to be that clown described in the Bible...then there are no arguments that make that god to be anything less than the ill-tempered, comically tyrannical, silly, vengeful, revenge driven, murderous, barbaric, petty cartoon character that it is.

Love and worship it if you will.

I'd sooner love and worship Saddam Hussein or Idi Amin. There's more to love and worship in those two than that god.

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thunder_runner32
Whether there is or is not a supreme being is not the question or if you will the problem. What is-is the myriad of religions and how they both depict and chose to worship God. With each insisting theirs is the only way. Tolerance ends and conflict begins on the doorstep of religion.

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thunder_runner32
Perhaps you missed this post (clickety click) that I addressed to you. If you purposely ignored it, I do understand.

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Quote, "In any case, Thunder...if the "god" to whom you refer happens to be that clown described in the Bible...then there are no arguments that make that god to be anything less than the ill-tempered, comically tyrannical, silly, vengeful, revenge driven, murderous, barbaric, petty cartoon character that it is."

The only thing he's missing is a cape and a mask. LOL A combination of Superman and the Joker.

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C.I.
Why blame God for man's stupidity. After all it was man who conjured up the God of the Bible

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au, True! My mistook. Wink

BUT, I think Frank's description of this comical persona man created needed some embellishments. LOL

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Quote:

Perhaps you missed this post (clickety click) that I addressed to you. If you purposely ignored it, I do understand.

I am not so familiar with these passages, but I think that they are like that, because women had a very different role back then, as they do today.

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god to be anything less than the ill-tempered, comically tyrannical, silly, vengeful, revenge driven, murderous, barbaric, petty cartoon character that it is.

I don't know of one passage where he had no reason to destroy as he saw fit. Perhaps you are unfamiliar with the term "Punishment"?

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You people are so afraid of the unknown

I am not afraid of the unknown, I am afraid of ignorance of the truth. If someone could prove to me without a reason of a doubt that the bible is completely false, I would change my beliefs. I adapt and cling to the truth, not what is petty and pleasing to me...otherwise I would be an atheist Wink

...JK

I take the bible as a history book, and as the living word.

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thunder_runner32 wrote:

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god to be anything less than the ill-tempered, comically tyrannical, silly, vengeful, revenge driven, murderous, barbaric, petty cartoon character that it is.

I don't know of one passage where he had no reason to destroy as he saw fit.

What the hell is that supposed to mean?

I know of no reason that Saddam did not destroy as he saw fit. Or Hitler, Stalin, Caligula...or any of the other monsters of the world.

So what the hell is that supposed to mean?

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Perhaps you are unfamiliar with the term "Punishment"?

Oh no...I know the term "punishment." As I said, I've studied biographies of people like Saddam, Hitler, Stalin, Caligula and the rest. They, like your god, were into "punishment" quite a bit.

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You people are so afraid of the unknown

I am not afraid of the unknown...

Every indication is that you are terrified of the unknown, Thunder. Absolutely terrified of the unknown.

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...I am afraid of ignorance of the truth.

Well then stop avoiding it.

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If someone could prove to me without a reason of a doubt that the bible is completely false, I would change my beliefs.

For crissake, Thunder...the Bible is NOT completely false. And why would it have to be for you to see that lots of it is better guessed to be fiction than revelation?

Do you think before you post...or do you just write words and click "submit?"

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I adapt and cling to the truth, not what is petty and pleasing to me...otherwise I would be an atheist ...JK

You do not adapt at all...and you cling to what more than likely is fiction and pretend it is truth.

And if you had any sense of logic...if you finally escaped the terror driving you and realized that the best guess that can be made about the Bible is that is primarily fictional mythology...you would realize that rejecting it would not necessarily make you an atheist...but an agnostic.

But I suspect that a compulsive person like yourself WOULD probably drop one set of beliefs (there is a God) for another set of beliefs (there are no gods) because you truly cannot handle the truth.

(The truth, nearly as I can tell, is that humans simply cannot tell what the circumstances of existence are...and we do not know if there is a God or if there are no gods...and the evidence is so ambiguous, any guesses made are really nothing more than coin tosses.)

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I take the bible as a history book, and as the living word.

It probably is a history book...but not an especially good or accurate one. And as for "the living word"...
well...I don't really know what you mean with that. If you would care to translate, I'll respond.

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thunder_runner32 wrote:

I am not afraid of the unknown, I am afraid of ignorance of the truth.

I actually believe you Thunder. I think maybe that is why you are here debating your worldview with us. I think you do listen and consider the arguments you hear, but you have invested a lot of energy in your faith and won't be easily turned way I imagine. From your point of view either we have been conned by a bunch of wicked lies, or you have...and you are pretty confident (but not certain) it's us Smile

(Eorl assumes brace position)

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Eorl wrote:

thunder_runner32 wrote:

I am not afraid of the unknown, I am afraid of ignorance of the truth.

I actually believe you Thunder. I think maybe that is why you are here debating your worldview with us. I think you do listen and consider the arguments you hear, but you have invested a lot of energy in your faith and won't be easily turned way I imagine. From your point of view either we have been conned by a bunch of wicked lies, or you have...and you are pretty confident (but not certain) it's us

(Eorl assumes brace position)

Thank you *tear comes to eye* I think that the fact that I still submit myself to others with a different line of thinking is self-evident that I do test my faith, and I still try to keep an open-mind.

Frank, by punishment...let me clarify...God has set a standard for men to live by, he has clearly shown that those who don't live by that standard (or don't repent) get punished.

By living word, I mean that it can be applied to life's situations at any point in time. Although it was written very long ago, its lessons can relate to today.

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Yeah, but that punishment is supposed to come after our life here on earth. Why aren't the good people of god given the same reward here on earth? Seems illogical to not reward the good people, but penalize the "bad" people before they die. What about all those people that perished as the result of that recent tsunami? God's works? I guess they were all "bad" people.

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thunder_runner32 wrote:

By living word, I mean that it can be applied to life's situations at any point in time. Although it was written very long ago, its lessons can relate to today.

Numbers 31:17-19

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Num 31:17 - Now therefore kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman that hath known man by lying with him.

Num 31:18 - But all the women children, that have not known a man by lying with him, keep alive for yourselves.

Source for the full context.

That was Moses instructing what to do with captives from a battle.

We are involved in a war today. Are you saying that Moses' words above should be of value to guide our actions today?

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Remember the game where you sit in a circle, one person whispers a message to the next? By the time the message got to the last person it was nothing like the start, How can a person have so faith in a literal accptance of the bible, when it's been passed through so many men and so many languages. i believe in God, but no man, or book can stand up to my direct line.

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fab, Your analogy also works, but it's been my observation that you can have six witnesses to a crime, and they will all interpret the crime differently to the police. Often times, they become a witness during the trial to identify the criminal, and the defendent ends up not being the right person through subsequent events and/or DNA.

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thunder_runner32 wrote:

Frank, by punishment...let me clarify...God has set a standard for men to live by, he has clearly shown that those who don't live by that standard (or don't repent) get punished.

I suppose that if you were more careful in your wording...you would have used the words "..it is my guess that..." somewhere in that sentence.

I do not see how you can possibly suppose your god has "clearly shown that those who don't live by that standard (or don't repent) get punished"j...when your god hasn't even "clearly shown" that it exists.

In any case...I didn't ask what you meant by punishment.

I understand that many people "believe" this god they pretend to love rather than to dread...will punish people who don't live up to its expectations by torturing them relentlessly and excruciatingly FOR ALL OF ETERNITY.

What a piece of shyt this god is!

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By living word, I mean that it can be applied to life's situations at any point in time. Although it was written very long ago, its lessons can relate to today.

Excellent.

Here are four passages from your "living word.". Would you care to tell us how they can be applied to today's life situations...how we can relate them to today?

"Slaves, male and female, you may indeed possess...such slaves
you may own as chattels, and leave to your sons as their
hereditary property, making them perpetual slaves." Leviticus 25:44ff

"If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them shall be
put to death for their abominable deed; they have forfeited their
lives." Leviticus 20:13

"If a man has a stubborn and unruly son who will not listen to
his father or mother, and will not obey them even though they
chastise him, his father and mother shall have him apprehended
and brought out to the elders at the gate of his home city, where
...his fellow citizens shall stone him to death." Deuteronomy 22:18ff

"When you march up to attack a city, first offer terms of peace.
If it agrees to your terms of peace and opens its gates to you,
all the people to be found in it shall serve you in forced labor.
But if it refuses to make peace with you and instead offers you
battle, lay siege to it, and when the Lord, your God, delivers it
into your hand, put every male in it to the sword, but the women
and children and livestock and all else in it that is worth
plunder you may take as your booty and you may use this plunder
of your enemies which the Lord, your God, has given you." Deuteronomy 20:10

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Does Religion Have a Place in the Future of Humankind?

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