(February 23, 2012 at 4:56 am)chipan Wrote: You are misquoting me in every direction. I did not say man cannot be good. In fact the bible calls many of the prophets very good people. I never said man cannot be good.

I couldn't care less what you personally believe. I'm not interested in your misguided views of the religion. The Hebrew scriptures demand that all men are sinners and that no man is without sin. And they also demand that no man can possibly be without sin on his own merit.

Sure, you can find contradicting verses in the cannon that deny what the cannon says in other places, but that just proves that the whole cannon is inconsistent and undependable.

For example, these tales themselves have Jesus crying out, "Father forgive them for they know not what they do."

Well, right there you have Jesus proclaiming that ignorance of the law and to simply not understand that what you are doing is wrong, are both valid excuses for receiving forgiveness.

So according to Jesus all non-believers are automatically be forgiven because they know not what they do. How could they possibly know that they are rejecting a God or disobeying him if they don't even believe in him?

So Jesus himself gave everyone a pardon who does not believe in the bible. And since Jesus is supposed to be the "Word in Flesh", then surely you're not going to argue with Jesus?

(February 23, 2012 at 4:56 am)chipan Wrote: And how exactly does the Christian beliefs create unhappiness? In order to believe that you must exclude the millions of Christians who are happy. The bible actually teaches us how to be most happy.

No it doesn't. That could depend on the person. If you're happy being a male-chauvinistic pig then perhaps that will make you happy to be one. But if you not a male-chauvinistic pig, then it would not make you happy to have to become one.

In Genesis 3:16 God makes it perfectly clear that you are to rule over your wife. Thus if you are not doing so then you are blatantly disobeying the Hebrew God and refusing to enforce his curse on women.

So being a male-chauvinistic pig and supporting male-chauvinism does not make me happy. If it makes you happy fine. That would only apply to you, and not to me.

(February 23, 2012 at 4:56 am)chipan Wrote: By following his commandments. He wants us to live for him. To get married and have children and love them. Not to worry about money. To put God first, then others, then yourself. To be honest with one another and not hurt one another.

I have no desire to live for an ignorant male-chauvinistic pig. I also never-married. I never had children. Actually according to the bible I'm a 'sinner' just for that reason alone. God instructed men to multiply and I refused. And that was actually a conscious choice on my part. I simply did not want to bring children into a world based on competition, greed, birth defects, diseased, wars, etc. I don't what to 'create a soul' and put that soul through things that I have no control over.

Moreover, according to Jesus himself only few will make it into heaven. The rest will be condemned to eternal hell fire and damnation. So for me to create new souls in children would to gamble with their souls. And according to Jesus the odds are like the lottery. They are far more likely to end up in eternal damnation and hell.

So I refused to play the game of your hideous gambling God. If he wants to create souls let him create them himself. I'm not going to take responsibility for that. Moreover, he has already cursed women with painful conception and childbirth. Why would I want to put a woman through that to have children who will most likely end up in eternal damnation anyway?

If the Biblical God it true everyone should stop having children immediately and refuse to even take part in this God's sick demented games.

(February 23, 2012 at 4:56 am)chipan Wrote: Does lying, stealing, hurting and such create happiness? No and this is why God says don't do it.

You don't need the sick demented God of the Hebrews to have good moral values. The Buddha taught people not to do those things as well. Does that make him God?

It's nothing short of Christian arrogance to pretend that they hold the patent on good mortals. That is an extremely lame excuse on your part. Almost all the world religions teach good moral values. And you seem to always overlook the indecent moral values that are being taught by the Hebrew God (like supporting male-chauvinism and husbands ruling over their wives)

You can't make up for the nasty shit in the Bible by pointing to the fact that it also include that same "good" morals as all other religions.

Even Wicca states, "Do as you will but harm none". Well stealing from someone would be harming them because you are robbing them of the fruits of their labor, etc. So even Wicca has morals covered, even better than the Hebrew mythology. There is nothing in Wicca that requires you to become a male-chauvinistic pig. There is nothing in Wicca that curses women with painful childbirth. And there is nothing in Wicca that proclaims that the vast majority of souls will be cast into a place of eternal damnation.

So Wicca had Hebrew mythology trumped clearly in terms of having higher moral values.

If a highly moral religion is important to you, trash the Hebrew filth and become a Wiccan.

(February 23, 2012 at 4:56 am)chipan Wrote: And you take this deserving thing completely the wrong way. We do not deserve God's grace, mercy, and forgiveness. But what do we do about it? We do our best to give back to God; not destroy ourselves. We use it in a constructive manner so we can make God proud and give him as much as we can give. This is how you interpret it. You can't include the bad without the good.

Make God proud?

What is God? An egotistical mortal parent?

By the way, I totally renounce violence as a solution to problems. Should an all-wise parent be proud of me for that? Sure they should! Yet the Hebrews would have their God condemn me for renouncing His ways!

I totally renounce cursing women with greatly multiplied sorrow in conception and childbirth. Should an all-wise parent be proud of me for that? Sure they should! Yet the Hebrews would have their God condemn me for renouncing His ways!

I support LOVE, even if it's between people of the same gender. Because love is love and love should always be supported. Should an all-wise parent be proud of me for that? Sure they should! Yet the Hebrews would have their God condemn me for renouncing His hatred of same-gender love!

I refuse to have anyone nailed to pole and crucified on my behalf. If my parents offered to nail by brother to a pole so that they could forgive me I would object and refuse to have anything to do with it. Should an all-wise parent be proud of me for that? Sure they should! Yet the Hebrews would have their God condemn me for renouncing His ways!

Everything that I stand for any all-wise benevolent parent should be quite proud of. Yet, the Hebrews would have their God hating me for supporting higher morals that him.

~~~~~

I could never worship the Hebrew mythology as the 'word of God' to do so would require that I become a horrible despicable person. The only way I could be 'saved' by the dastardly God of the Hebrews would be to become as dastardly as he is and support all his immoral crap.

~~~~

What you need to understand Chipan is that the ancient Hebrew myths have absolutely nothing to do with any all-wise all-benevolent God.

That is the error in your thinking. You view those scriptures as "The Word of God" and you can't get past that mentality. Therefore you will forever be stuck in the rut of trying to justify those myths as being 'benevolent' when in fact, they aren't.

The ancient Hebrew myths have nothing to do with any God.

Until you realize this and can look at the scriptures from that perspective you will remain obsessed with trying to defend those myths.

They are disgusting and cannot be defended.

And that's the truth.

---

(February 23, 2012 at 1:44 pm)Rhythm Wrote:

(February 23, 2012 at 3:51 am)chipan Wrote: If no process exists that life can come from nonlife, then there is no way an athiest can explain where life came from. Period.

We've been here before. We know nothing, everything we know is completely wrong. Now tell us why you're right.

He thinks he's right because to him it makes sense that an all-wise all-benevolent God would solve all his problems using cruel mean tactics like cursing women with painful childbirth and demanding that husbands rule over their wives.

And he thinks it's the epitome of divine benevolence to have someone nailed to a pole just so the God can 'forgive' people.

And worse yet, he can't understand why other people don't see these things as being all-wise and all-benevolent solutions.

I'm not gonna play this back and forth "nuh uh" game. You can believe what you want but don't tell me what I believe. Don't tell me the bible is inconsistent because you can take a sentence out of the bible and say "see, it's not consistant with the message." you can do that with any book in the world but atheists think it means something when you do it with the bible. Read the context, not misquotes from evilbible.com. I bet no one here has even found anything inconsistent in the bible, just went to sites that do it for them. That would explain why you misunderstand it if you don't even read it.

So Jesus gave a word of pardon for those who don't believe? You mind sourcing it?

Living a single life is not a sin. I don't know where you got that. When he said be fruitful and multiply, it was spacifically to those building the tower of babble. We now are fruitful and God does not command us to marry.

And this is not specifically a curse when he husbands will rule over their wives. It is response for men to take care of their wives like they take care of their children. It doesn't mean to treat them with disrespect.

When did I ever say violence was the way to make God proud. Not even following his commandments to the best of our ability makes him proud as you can easily tell from what Jesus said to the Pharisees. We make him proud by doing what is important. By spreading his word, by helping those in need, to love out neighbors, and to follow God's plan for our lives. It teaches not to value what is on earth for it will all go away but the kingdom of God is forever.

You can take all of these sentences out of context all you want but it doesn't prove a thing. When you see something in the bible that sounds bad, keep reading. In Harry potter you can find a sentence that says "kill all of then" but does that mean the message of the book is to kill everyone?

(February 23, 2012 at 7:08 pm)chipan Wrote: I'm not gonna play this back and forth "nuh uh" game.

Sure you are. That's precisely why you log onto these forums.

If you wanted to have positive discussions with like-minded individuals you'd join a Christian forum. There mere fact that you have joined an atheist forum to proselytize your religion proves that you're just looking to argue with people over it.

Obviously your just frustrated because you can't deny the points I make.

The biblical cannon is riddled with endless contradictions and they even have Jesus himself making statements that clearly fly in the face of the many of the sick demented things that Christians often demand that Jesus stood for.

If you're going to demand that Jesus is an egotistical bastard who will hate everyone who doesn't acknowledge that he's God, then you've got your work cut out for you.

There are clearly many quotes attribute to Jesus that suggest just the opposite.

Jesus said that he did not come for the righteous but rather for the spiritually sick. Therefore Jesus himself recognized that not everyone is in need of salvation.

When confronted with blaspheme for claiming to be a son of God Jesus points to the Torah and says, "It it not written in your law, I said, ye are gods"? Thus Jesus was not claiming to be God anymore than anyone else.

Jesus was most likely a Mahayana Buddhist viewing everyone as children of God.

Jesus, himself said that he would not judge those who hear his words but do not believe. In fact, he was supposedly saying that to people live, face-to-face. Well, gee if he didn't even expect people he was speaking to directly in person to believe him, then surely he wouldn't expect anyone 2000 years later to believe hearsay rumors about him.

So no way could Jesus be said to expect anyone to believe in him.

And like I say, Jesus also ask the Father to forgive people for they know not what they do. So there you have it. Clearly evidence that Jesus personally held the view that not knowing what you're doing is a legitimate excuse get be pardoned from judgment and be given the grace of free forgiveness.

If you attempt to hold any other position you'll have to do so by spitting in the face of Jesus and his very own words.

Jesus gave everyone a pardon who "Knows not what they do", because that was clearly his personal view of righteousness.

So even if these rumors and fables are true, Jesus would still pardon all atheists and non-Christians by his own words.

And you're not in a position to revoke the words of Jesus.

So why should anyone care what you think about it?

You don't speak for Jesus.

I never understood why the bible had to be written to be interpreted in so many different ways.

And then you get sent to hell for getting the interpretation wrong.

The only correct interpretation that you can make with this in mind. If there is a God.. he's a complete and utter wanker.

Time to stop drinking wine now

Quote:You don't speak for Jesus.

THERE'S the rub. There are many thousands Christians who argue the precise opposite. The hilariously tragic thing is that there are literally hundreds of different sects each claiming THEY ALONE speak for Jesus, AND that all the others are from partially mistaken to not Christians at all

For reasons passing all understanding,this forum attracts the very worst of the lunar religious right; Wilfully ignorant,lacking the ability or wit to actually study the science they so blithely dismiss. These pathetic individuals cling to a mythology and superstitions over 2 thousand years old and reject ANY evidence which threatens their narrow little minds and petty little lives.

Why do I bother insulting them? Because people of such wilfully profound ignorance and narrowness of mind scare the crap out of me. It's exactly the mindset which would happily kill heretics,gays and any other dissidents if it could.

(February 23, 2012 at 9:29 pm)padraic Wrote: Why do I bother insulting them? Because people of such wilfully profound ignorance and narrowness of mind scare the crap out of me. It's exactly the mindset which would happily kill heretics,gays and any other dissidents if it could.

I agree. These are precisely the same type of people who would support the burning of a woman at the stake who had been accused of witchcraft, if their religious leaders were actively doing that today. They blindly follow their religious leaders and will support absolute nonsense.

In fact, it was precisely that kind of mentality that was used to incite a mob into supporting the crucifixion of Jesus historically (assuming that it actually did happen the way these fables suggest).

Chipan, and so many others like him, are just repeating the same stupidity that religious fundamentalists have brainwashed them to believe. He hasn't stated anything new or original at all. Just the same old unsupportable superstitious rumors.

Rumors that obviously require that modern scientific knowledge necessarily must be wrong in order for their rumors to be true.

So these people are clearly rejecting known truths in favor of supporting ignorant fables. And they won't even permit "sane" interpretations of those ignorant fables.

Try to make Jesus look like a potential nice guy, and they are quick to renounce your interpretations.

They won't support a "nice Jesus". A "nice Jesus" is considered to be Christian blaspheme! Only a hateful unforgiving Jesus will do.

How ironic is that?

Quote:I agree.

Of for fuck sake! Please don't make a habit of that.I might start liking you and I would find that most confusing. hock:

(February 23, 2012 at 10:46 pm)padraic Wrote:

Quote:I agree.

Of for fuck sake! Please don't make a habit of that.I might start liking you and I would find that most confusing. hock:

No, don't do that. If you start liking me you might start slipping up and agreeing with me on rare occasions and that could be disastrous.

After all, I am spiritually agnostic and that could potentially evolve into an outright spiritual belief at some point. So I'm just a spiritual bomb waiting to explode.

Although, that really isn't as dangerous as it sounds. There would be no destructive shrap metal involved. It would just be an explosion of pure spiritual thought.

No need to rewrite physics, chemistry or renounce evolution, etc.

No angry jealous gods involved with fiery furnaces on standby for non-believers.

And if Jesus is involved at all, he'll play the roll of a really nice Mahayana Buddhist who was just trying to get a bunch of thugs to quit stoning people to death.

So it won't be a threatening view of spirituality. It'll be as harmless as a butterfly on a lazy summer day.

Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional.
When Buddha's closest disciple, Ananda, asked him if God exists, the Buddha remained silent. This has been interpreted to say that God is irrelevant. God is a distraction. God does not matter one way or the other. It is just a concept. IMHO, The Christian God evolved into a destructive and maladaptive concept. Jesus is a posterchild for Xtian propaganda. jesus is as fake as mitt romney and osama bin laden.