Quote:belief in the plan.

Now you sound like those fuckhead republicans talking about their budget plan to screw the poor and reward the rich.

Both plans are equally fucked up....just like their authors.

Quote:Why not create a document that is accessible to all including doubters?

Indeed.To me that is a powerful argument against the claim of sacred texts being revealed truths.

If such texts were divinely inspired universal truths they would be expressed simply and clearly without ambiguity.

Instead there are the arrogant claims of biblical scholars,priests and their institutions that they are crucial interpreters of and intercedents with God(s)

(May 18, 2011 at 6:42 pm)FaithNoMore Wrote: Let's assume what you've been saying is right, then these are the two knowns. God created everything, and evil exists. There are only three ways this is possible. God created it, he allowed it, or he screwed up and is inept to fix it.

I am aware of your assertion - there is no need to restate it.

FaithNoMore Wrote:Actually, it had everything to do with your post.

No, it doesn't. The point of my post was a reductio ad absurdum to the view that if something is a noun, then it counts as a "thing" according to Proverbs 16:4. You have not referred to the text whatsoever.

(May 19, 2011 at 6:15 am)Nimzo Wrote:

(May 18, 2011 at 6:42 pm)FaithNoMore Wrote: Let's assume what you've been saying is right, then these are the two knowns. God created everything, and evil exists. There are only three ways this is possible. God created it, he allowed it, or he screwed up and is inept to fix it.

I am aware of your assertion - there is no need to restate it.

Logic dictates nothing can fall outside of my assertion. Either refute it or qut replying.

FaithNoMore Wrote:

Nimzo Wrote:Actually, it had everything to do with your post.

No, it doesn't. The point of my post was a reductio ad absurdum to the view that if something is a noun, then it counts as a "thing" according to Proverbs 16:4. You have not referred to the text whatsoever.

Here is a quote taken directly from one of your posts.

Nimzo Wrote:How about "televisions" - they're nouns and things! Does the verse mean that God created televisions?

Notice the part in bold where you flat out state God did not create televisions with a rhetorical question. I assert that if God created everything, and something exists, then he is either directly or indirectly responsible for it such as televisions or evil. You may have been attempting to define 'things' but you went beyond that in the second sentence.

(May 19, 2011 at 6:35 am)FaithNoMore Wrote: Logic dictates nothing can fall outside of my assertion. Either refute it or qut replying.

Not according to any Law of Logic that I am aware of.

FaithNoMore Wrote:Here is a quote taken directly from one of your posts.

Nimzo Wrote:How about "televisions" - they're nouns and things! Does the verse mean that God created televisions?

Notice the part in bold where you flat out state God did not create televisions with a rhetorical question.

And my point is that obviously an ancient text (such as the verse which is the subject of this thread - though you wouldn't know it reading your posts) cannot be referring to televisions - notice my underline. The fact that God does not create televisions is irrelevant to the topic at hand.

Quote:I assert that if God created everything, and something exists, then he is either directly or indirectly responsible for it such as televisions or evil.

And until you have justified your assertion by demonstrating that your trichotomy includes every logical possibility, I see no reason to take it seriously. The obvious counterexample would be God Himself, who exists (arguendo), but God is not "responsible" for His own existence.

I think that it is very interesting that Jesus did not write a bbok of His own. He did not need to. The information that He was presenting did not require anyone to be a scholar. He only asked us to accept God's love and be forgiven for things which we had done wrong. How much simpler do you want it. The difficulties come with language and interpretation. God speaks to the hearts and minds of men. Love is no contradiction.

Quote:I think that it is very interesting that Jesus did not write a bbok of His own. He did not need to.

Ficitional characters cannot write books of their own....they exist inside other books.

(May 18, 2011 at 1:41 pm)Nimzo Wrote: "The Lord hath made all things for himself: yea, even the wicked for the day of evil." Proverbs 16:4

Quote:God created evil.

No, text does not say this. If it had wanted to say this, it would say "God created their wickedness", but it says "God created the wicked".

Perhaps, but God created Satan, knowing he would rebel and fall, and lead man into temptation; without temptation, whence evil?

He created adam and eve, knowing they would rebel and condemn all generations to begin life with the stain of original sin;
without that, a good life without god is possible. With it, god is necessary. Servitude to Him is necessary. Perpetual atonement is necessary.

God hardens hearts, puts lying spirits in the mouths of prophets and turns wisdom to foolishness; lacking these, error can be discerned
from truth, the good from the bad. With them, god again is necessary.

I'd sooner bet against the house in Vegas than play god's hopelessly rigged game. If a man departs in sin, let him die. Don't fire up the celestial Coleman.

(May 18, 2011 at 9:06 pm)RDK Wrote: In Romans, Paul suggests that God made two pots. One was to be filled and used for righteous things and the other was to be filled with wickedness and to be ultimately destroyed.

But why even create a "wicked" pot just to destroy it? See, this is what's so stupid about Christian beliefs about God. There was never any need to create evil people and then create Hell to torture them for eternity. Why not just create good people in Heaven to kiss God's ass for eternity?

Quote:Perhaps, but God created Satan

But "satan" was a rather minor figure in the OT.

http://www.realdevil.info/1-1.htm

Quote:The words Satan, Devil, demon, Lucifer, fallen angel etc. simply don't occur in the whole of the book of Genesis. Throughout the Old Testament, the one and only God is presented as all powerful, without equal and in no competition with any other cosmic force. The Old Testament makes it clear that any 'adversary' to God's people was ultimately under the control of God Himself. All Angels are spoken of as being righteous and the servants of God, even "Angels of evil / disaster", who may bring destruction upon sinners, are still God's Angels carrying out His will and judgments. God's people Israel initially held this view; but as has so often happened to God's people, they mixed their true beliefs with those of the world around them. Earlier Judaism spoke of the human tendency to evil [yetser ha-ra] and the tendency to good [yetser ha-tob]. This tendency to evil they understood as being at times personified or symbolized by "the devil": "Satan and the yetser ha-ra are one" (1). But earlier Judaism rejected the idea that angels had rebelled, and they specifically rejected the idea that the serpent in Genesis was satan. At that time, "the Jewish devil was little more than an allegory of the evil inclination among humans"

It took xtian thugs to develop "the devil" into some all-powerful force that they needed to be saved from. As H.L. Mencken put it so eloquently:

Quote:What is the function that a clergyman performs in the world? Answer: he gets his living by assuring idiots that he can save them from an imaginary hell.