(April 1, 2016 at 4:16 pm)SteveII Wrote:

(April 1, 2016 at 4:07 pm)Brian37 Wrote: Nope, sorry, just more elaborate gibberish. All you are arguing is "You wouldn't understand", "God works in mysterious ways", "God can do what he wants" "God doesn't have to explain himself to you". Those are not evidences, those are your childish excuses to make shit up to cling to the idea of a sky hero because you like the idea. 

Our laws are from western secular law, not fictional beings, I don't need permission from a fictional god anymore than I need permission from Yoda.

Because you don't understand does not mean that is my argument. Again, you need to show that God either did not has sufficient reasons for his actions or that he was obliged to follow some sort of law/code (and where did this law come from) and failed to do so. If there is a God, then there is no logical problem whatsoever to what I am arguing.

"Again, you need to show that Allah either did not has sufficient reasons for his actions or that he was obligated to follow some sort of law/code"...... Still make sense?

"Again, you need to show that Yahweh either did not has sufficient reasons for his actions or that he was obligated to follow some sort of law/code"........ Still make sense?


"Again, you need to show that Bhrama either did not has sufficient reasons for his actions or that he was obligated to follow some sort law/code"........ Still make sense?

"Again, you need to show that Yoda either did not has sufficient reasons for his actions or that he was obligated to follow some sort of law/code"......... Still make sense?

Before you even get to your claims, much less he examples above, before you get to the first word of ANY holy claiming ANY god claim, you have PROVE the existence of that claimed god FIRST. You assume your god is real but you don't have jack shit for evidence. 

And even then you cannot call something "all powerful" then put a limit on it. You are trying to shift the burden of proof. That is what believers of all religions do, not just you. Get in line take a number.

(April 1, 2016 at 1:39 pm)SteveII Wrote: So...Christian denominations err in using the Bible to develop systematic theology. It is those ideas that should be scoffed at? Again, a lot of time, a lot of people, and a lot of content. Perhaps you are missing something.

Yes, I think they err in buying into the bible as an unerring source of info about God when the experience which many cite as sealing the deal for them makes no mention of the bible. That move is completely unwarranted. Faith seems to come from the experience but they immediately sell that out for belief in explicit words.

(April 1, 2016 at 11:37 am)SteveII Wrote:

(March 31, 2016 at 11:13 am)KevinM1 Wrote: Are the people who murder and attempt to murder their children because they claim God told them to do so morally correct in doing so?

God commanded the recognized intermediary leader of a theocracy (Moses, Joshua, or a judge--depending on what story you want to use), to carry out a battle strategy in a brutal time and in a brutal land. 

Your scenario is nonsense.

Yeah, complete nonsense:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deanna_Laney_murders
http://boston.cbslocal.com/tag/dora-tejada/
http://pix11.com/2015/05/21/mom-faces-mu...lds-death/
http://murderpedia.org/female.S/s/schlosser-dena.htm

Need I go on? Because I most certainly can. These woman all believed god spoke to them and commanded them to kill their children. Are these moral acts because god commanded them? It's a very simple question.

(April 2, 2016 at 11:31 am)KevinM1 Wrote:

(April 1, 2016 at 11:37 am)SteveII Wrote: God commanded the recognized intermediary leader of a theocracy (Moses, Joshua, or a judge--depending on what story you want to use), to carry out a battle strategy in a brutal time and in a brutal land. 

Your scenario is nonsense.

Yeah, complete nonsense:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deanna_Laney_murders
http://boston.cbslocal.com/tag/dora-tejada/
http://pix11.com/2015/05/21/mom-faces-mu...lds-death/
http://murderpedia.org/female.S/s/schlosser-dena.htm

Need I go on?  Because I most certainly can.  These woman all believed god spoke to them and commanded them to kill their children.  Are these moral acts because god commanded them?  It's a very simple question.

Oh, Kevin, don't you know that when contemporary people hear God command them to do terrible things it's because they are psychotic or otherwise afflicted, while the characters in the Bible are sane as hell and just following orders (*cough*Eichmann*cough*)? The Biblical characters' characters and motives must be above reproach to maintain the façade that their national narrative is the word of their god, while the characters and motives of modern-day believers who commit horrible acts ostensibly on behalf of that same god must be questioned and rejected for pretty much the same reason.

(April 2, 2016 at 11:51 am)Crossless1 Wrote:

(April 2, 2016 at 11:31 am)KevinM1 Wrote: Yeah, complete nonsense:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deanna_Laney_murders
http://boston.cbslocal.com/tag/dora-tejada/
http://pix11.com/2015/05/21/mom-faces-mu...lds-death/
http://murderpedia.org/female.S/s/schlosser-dena.htm

Need I go on?  Because I most certainly can.  These woman all believed god spoke to them and commanded them to kill their children.  Are these moral acts because god commanded them?  It's a very simple question.

Oh, Kevin, don't you know that when contemporary people hear God command them to do terrible things it's because they are psychotic or otherwise afflicted, while the characters in the Bible are sane as hell and just following orders (*cough*Eichmann*cough*)? The Biblical characters' characters and motives must be above reproach to maintain the façade that their national narrative is the word of their god, while the characters and motives of modern-day believers who commit horrible acts ostensibly on behalf of that same god must be questioned and rejected for pretty much the same reason.

Exactly my point.  There's no real difference between the people god supposedly commanded to do heinous things in the bible and the people who do heinous things today because they think god is talking to them just like he did to those people in the stories.  The only difference is that society has progressed to the point where hearing voices in one's head is a sign of psychosis, a result reached in spite of religion.  

Moreover, the bible starts out saying that everything god does is good, and we're just supposed to agree because... we are.  Fuck.  That.  The stories present terrible things, and we're just supposed to go along with it because, nah, man it's cool, god's doing it.  It's idiotic in the extreme, and frightening to boot.  A horde of idiots who are more than willing to 'just follow orders' because they believe a deference to authority - an authority they believe to be above reproach, which is also terrifying - lets them off the hook.

It's reprehensible and insulting, doubly so because they gleefully defend their lemmingness.

(April 2, 2016 at 12:58 pm)KevinM1 Wrote:

(April 2, 2016 at 11:51 am)Crossless1 Wrote: Oh, Kevin, don't you know that when contemporary people hear God command them to do terrible things it's because they are psychotic or otherwise afflicted, while the characters in the Bible are sane as hell and just following orders (*cough*Eichmann*cough*)? The Biblical characters' characters and motives must be above reproach to maintain the façade that their national narrative is the word of their god, while the characters and motives of modern-day believers who commit horrible acts ostensibly on behalf of that same god must be questioned and rejected for pretty much the same reason.

Exactly my point.  There's no real difference between the people god supposedly commanded to do heinous things in the bible and the people who do heinous things today because they think god is talking to them just like he did to those people in the stories.  The only difference is that society has progressed to the point where hearing voices in one's head is a sign of psychosis, a result reached in spite of religion.  

Moreover, the bible starts out saying that everything god does is good, and we're just supposed to agree because... we are.  Fuck.  That.  The stories present terrible things, and we're just supposed to go along with it because, nah, man it's cool, god's doing it.  It's idiotic in the extreme, and frightening to boot.  A horde of idiots who are more than willing to 'just follow orders' because they believe a deference to authority - an authority they believe to be above reproach, which is also terrifying - lets them off the hook.

It's reprehensible and insulting, doubly so because they gleefully defend their lemmingness.

The cherry on top is believers' unwillingness to entertain the notion that much of their beloved OT narrative is likely royal propaganda written and disseminated long after the alleged 'facts'. Contrast the Exodus narrative or the narrative of Joshua with what is currently known by way of archaeology. Look at how Israel and its kings are treated in the narratives that originated in Judah. Then there's the "discovery" of Deuteronomy during the reign of Josiah. It goes on and on.

(April 1, 2016 at 4:33 pm)Whateverist the White Wrote:

(April 1, 2016 at 1:39 pm)SteveII Wrote: So...Christian denominations err in using the Bible to develop systematic theology. It is those ideas that should be scoffed at? Again, a lot of time, a lot of people, and a lot of content. Perhaps you are missing something.

Yes, I think they err in buying into the bible as an unerring source of info about God when the experience which many cite as sealing the deal for them makes no mention of the bible.  That move is completely unwarranted.  Faith seems to come from the experience but they immediately sell that out for belief in explicit words.

If a person responds to the message that God loves them and wants a relationship (perhaps from a friend or sermon), they are going to need to find out how that works. Christians have used the OT and NT since the first century to answer those question. Regardless of how much people here believe in alternative theories of how the OT and NT came to be, they are just theories. Christians believe them to be largely true. This is nether illogical nor unreasonable. 

Perhaps when you encounter a part of the Bible that you don't understand or think is difficult to rationalize, you do not come here to get an explanation. Go to a well established commentary or website that explains the context. Otherwise you are just heaping bias on the whole question and you really are not learning anything. 

Like I keep saying over and over. No objection that comes up here is new and has not been answered be at least 100 books and a thousand articles stretching back millennium. Sometimes you get the impression reading here that people have these "ah-ha" points and then feel good about themselves as the affirmations from other atheists come pouring in.

(April 2, 2016 at 11:31 am)KevinM1 Wrote:

(April 1, 2016 at 11:37 am)SteveII Wrote: God commanded the recognized intermediary leader of a theocracy (Moses, Joshua, or a judge--depending on what story you want to use), to carry out a battle strategy in a brutal time and in a brutal land. 

Your scenario is nonsense.

Yeah, complete nonsense:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deanna_Laney_murders
http://boston.cbslocal.com/tag/dora-tejada/
http://pix11.com/2015/05/21/mom-faces-mu...lds-death/
http://murderpedia.org/female.S/s/schlosser-dena.htm

Need I go on?  Because I most certainly can.  These woman all believed god spoke to them and commanded them to kill their children.  Are these moral acts because god commanded them?  It's a very simple question.

If you think this is some sort of meaningful comparison, then I am wasting my time.

(April 4, 2016 at 2:22 pm)SteveII Wrote:

(April 2, 2016 at 11:31 am)KevinM1 Wrote: Yeah, complete nonsense:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deanna_Laney_murders
http://boston.cbslocal.com/tag/dora-tejada/
http://pix11.com/2015/05/21/mom-faces-mu...lds-death/
http://murderpedia.org/female.S/s/schlosser-dena.htm

Need I go on?  Because I most certainly can.  These woman all believed god spoke to them and commanded them to kill their children.  Are these moral acts because god commanded them?  It's a very simple question.

If you think this is some sort of meaningful comparison, then I am wasting my time.

How are they not meaningful?

Don't run from the question.  Answer it.

I mean, I can guess at your objection - it was a different era, the people involved in these murders were ordinary churchgoers rather than leaders, etc. But none of those caveats address the issue at hand: your claim (and WLC's claim) that if an order comes from god, it's good. Period. Well, these people claim to have been ordered by god to kill their children, either directly or by proxy. Were they moral acts? It's not a trick question, nor should it be difficult for you to answer.