(September 23, 2015 at 2:25 am)Wyrd of Gawd Wrote: For goodness sake!  If you had been paying attention you would know that that's not the 10th Commandment.  The 10th Commandment is not to boil a young goat in its mother's milk = Exodus 34:25

Well neither of them are really the tenth commandment because Moses never really existed, nor did any ancient Israelites ever visit to Mt Sinai.

In terms of the the narrative, Exodus 34 is not the Ten Commandments, sorry. In Ex 34:1 Yahweh says he will write the commandments on the stone tables himself. Then, while Moses is on My Sinai, he tells him to write down those other commandments he spoke (v.27).

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Also I may as well quote myself paraphrasing Acts 15:

    Cast your minds back to 50AD …

    You’re in Jerusalem and a meeting is about to take place between the early Christian leaders. They are going to discuss whether we really need to follow the Law of Moses any more, or if we can start cutting our Jewish roots and carve out a new pathway for our apocalyptic movement. You see Barnabas and Paul arriving with some newly converted Syrian Christians. You see some Christians belonging to a more traditional Jewish wing of the church go over and begin arguing with the men over the need for circumcision. The apostles and the elders of the church break up the dispute and agree to discuss and settle the matter formally.

    A fiery debate soon ensues, and after some time you see Simon Peter one of the original twelve disciples get up and attempt to draw the debate to a close. Peter stands up and addresses the apostles and elders in a loud strong voice, and makes dramatic, startling, and unexpected argument that shocks the crowd. He says that the Law of Moses is a yoke on the necks of believers that our ancestors have been unable to bear. The apostles and elders are drawn to an eerie silence – not knowing how to respond to such a bold anti-Jewish assertion. Even Peter’s brother and fellow Apostle Andrew is silent. James and Judas the brothers of Jesus are silent, as is John the son of Zebedee, and all the other church elders. In the silence Barnabas and Paul stand up and as the eyes of the church elders turn their way they begin testifying before them about the great numbers of Syrians and other non-Jews they have been converting – gesturing towards some of them that are sitting quietly with the other church laity.

    You think to yourself just 20 years have passed since Jesus was killed by the Romans, the apocalyptic preacher who started the movement. He probably wouldn’t have agreed with such a radical shift, but he was gone now. In his place you see his brothers Judas and James sitting together quietly listening to Barnabas and Paul give their testimony regarding gentile conversions to the Christian gospel of salvation. You have to admit to yourself that even though Jesus probably wouldn’t have done it, it was still consistent with the gospel he preached when he was alive.

    After Paul and Barnabas had finished speaking James stood up ready to make a decision on the matter at hand. He agrees with Peter that the yoke of the Law of Moses is an unbearable burden, one that has shackled their ancestors. He quotes a passage from the holy book of Amos, and another from Jeremiah. James hands down his decision saying that the church in Jerusalem will write to the Gentile churches and instruct them to keep only the following sacred Jewish laws: Not to eat of anything that has been polluted by idols, not to practise sexual immorality, and only to eat meat that hasn’t been strangled and has been drained of blood (kosher). The elders and apostles agree to James’s decision, as you leave you see Luke the Physician taking notes and perhaps preparing to write these letters.

Hello, welcome

Good on you for seeking the truth. The first big question is what reason do you have to think any religion contains any truth? Religion is passed on by indoctrination, teaching religious mythology as fact, mainly to young children. So it becomes embedded in the brain as fact, when actually there is no evidence for any of it. Without this happening, each religion would die out very quickly.

Here are some thinking points:

1) Can you define God in such a way that any particular person could distinguish it from a figment of imagination?

2) If there is a god, then there are an infinite number of possibilities. This includes gods which just created the universe and let it develop, with no further interaction. All of science points to this being the only consistent possibility. There has never been any evidence of a "God" interacting with the universe.

3) To end up with Christianity, since there is no positive evidence, you have to first assume there is a god, then somehow eliminate every possible type of non-interventionist God, then shortlist all the infinity of interventionist gods down to those who happen to have story books lying around identifying them. And even then, you have to disprove all those except the biblical God.

4) The biblical God is a tangled mess of contradiction. It's presented as being all powerful and all knowing, while also displaying a very limited amount of power and knowledge. It's meant to be a superior being infinitely above humans, yet it displays entirely human emotions such as anger, jealousy, sadness, and frustration. It's presented as all loving, yet it creates Hell, the most evil and harmful place there could ever be. It's described as perfect, yet it feels the need to create this universe simply for its own amusement. It creates thousands of galaxies, yet is only concerned with the actions of one species on one tiny rock in the middle of nowhere. Such a being cannot exist. If there is a god, it bears no resemblance to this cartoon character.

I could go on all day! Let us know how you find all our suggestions. I'm not at all concerned with whether there is a "god" or not, as it makes no practical difference. It's the attempts to correlate it with the character in a story book that I find completely absurd, and should be disregarded.

OK, WishfulThinking,

first things first, religion and especially abrahamic religions like Christianity are unfalsifiable by default, and thus trying to disprove them when they haven't been proven in the first place is futile.

We can however test and disprove their claims.

First would be the story of original sin by Adam and Eve, which can be easily disproved through evolution. Animals and species exist and have existed which are not accounted for in the bible. All animals couldn't have been herbivores as the bible suggests and after the fall of they became carnivores, we shouldn't have any herbivores out omnivores today. Besides, we and other species have several dumb biological design flaws, which can only be explained through evolution and not through intelligent design.

Next up is Noah, the story has no proof in reality of a global flood. Plus the story comes from sources much older than their first mention in the bible.

Next is Moses, again there are several discrepancies in the geographical locations mentioned and any historical records of him and his miracles is non existent.

After that is Jesus, again, no proof whatsoever about the biblical Jesus have ever been found. Nobody documented a single one of his miracles during his lifetime as a historical record.


Hell in itself is a borrowed concept. It didn't exist in the old testament and it isn't unique to Christianity either. Every religion has a way of scaring people into believing it. And even if I agree that there are fiery places all over the world, like the earth's core, the sun, etc, after you die, those things mean jackshit. Think about it, without your body and nerves to carry signals and your brain to process them, how do you expect to feel any pain? Do you get burnt when picking up a hot kettle while wearing baking-gloves?

Oh yeah, I forgot! The bible is a load of nonsense. It's filled with stories that demonstrably did not happen, and it is exactly what you'd expect from primitive people trying to explain the world around them while ripping off other mythologies.

This is my favourite video to show people. If you have the time, this bible expert explains why he thinks the Jesus story is just the latest in a long line of similar myths.

http://youtu.be/79Lmmy2jfeo

Quote: I don't think I can find it within me to leave my religion behind without proof that it's false, even if I can't back my faith up.

Same here bro! That pink unicorn has been the bane of my universe for decades!@
It . keeps . haunting . me . and . I . just . cannot . prove . that . it . doesn't . exist! hehe
Relax man, just having some fun! See how silly that logic really is when put a different way!

Let me ask you something simple! If you happen to be born in Saudi Arabia, then your "Islam" would be the one true religion! And you'd be conditioned to feel justified in the death of non believers! Think of Russian roulette with 4199 live bullets and only one is "everlasting heaven".
Every religious person plays these odds! Atheists know the game is "loaded" and have no part of it!

Enjoy your time here!

(September 23, 2015 at 4:01 am)robvalue Wrote: Oh yeah, I forgot! The bible is a load of nonsense. It's filled with stories that demonstrably did not happen, and it is exactly what you'd expect from primitive people trying to explain the world around them while ripping off other mythologies.

This is my favourite video to show people. If you have the time, this bible expert explains why he thinks the Jesus story is just the latest in a long line of similar myths.

http://youtu.be/79Lmmy2jfeo

I like Dr. Carrier a lot! That said, it should be noted that, while I personally think he makes an excellent case and think his work should be carefully absorbed and considered, he nevertheless does represent an "extreme" and minority position among Biblical scholars.

That's not to say he's wrong; I happen to think he's right, or mostly-right. Just that most of his peers/colleagues disagree with him on the mythological Jesus.

On the other hand, I think his analysis of the ancient Judaic concepts of the heavenly powers (angels as demigods) and its polytheistic roots being excised (incompletely) from the scriptures by the later monotheist priests is spot on.

I agree, he represents a minority opinion. But he backs up every point very well I think.

Whether or not he's got things exactly right, he presents a huge number of problems in the story which are enough to blow apart any notion of it being historically accurate. So I hope it will help the opening poster to get over their idea of jesus being "real".

Oh yeah, and prayer doesn't work. It's been scientifically studied and fails every time.

More thoughts:

(September 23, 2015 at 5:14 am)robvalue Wrote: I agree, he represents a minority opinion. But he backs up every point very well I think.

Whether or not he's got things exactly right, he presents a huge number of problems in the story which are enough to blow apart any notion of it being historically accurate. So I hope it will help the opening poster to get over their idea of jesus being "real".

More thoughts:

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I happen to think the majority, even many atheists, have fallen into the "bible is special" trap and give it way more credit than it deserves. I don't particularly care what Christian scholars think as they presuppose not only a historical but a magical Jesus. I find their arguments extremely less convincing, and generally involve appeals to popularity.

Having said that, I think the amount of people who buy into HJ is far less of a percentage than is often made out. I think Min has alluded to fake statistics on this point.

I've not heard any sensible rebuttals to his points, just general insults and more appeals to popularity.

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I concur. That's why I say he is worth carefully considering, because I hear a lot of "well he is a minority", but little in the way of viable proofs. I am not a Biblical scholar, and I was able to see right through the primary objection offered to Carrier's position (which is why I know so damned much about Tacitus, after the research it took for that one).

The reason I pointed to Carrier's minority position is that, if one likes what Carrier says and then tries to use him as a "weapon" against fundie apologists, they're ready to come back with a quick "he's a minority, a nobody". That's a backfire, whether justified or not.

Exactly You're right to point this out, as well.

I'm a nerd; I totally friended Richard Carrier on FB the other day. He accepted.