Are all atheists this ill-informed about religion?

[John V]

Damn! It's so obvious that the Jewish god was just something they created to justify genocide.

Christians, I don't care what you say. You cannot unwrite what is written. You can revise the Bible to leave these problematic passages out, but we already have our copies.

Here's another one:

Mark 6
4 But Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his own country, among his own relatives, and in his own house.” 5 Now He could do no mighty work there, except that He laid His hands on a few sick people and healed them. 6 And He marveled because of their unbelief. Then He went about the villages in a circuit, teaching.

Think about it...why couldn't he perform many miracles there, but he could elsewhere?

[Redbeard The Pink]

If our every thought and action is pre-determined by god, then we aren't persons with rights. We're just characters in a very complex novel.

Bingo. You now understand the key logical shortcoming of Gaud's omniscience.

We don't call novelists evil for letting their characters suffer.

That's because their characters are not real people, genius.

[abaris]

Ironically it points to another misconception of the god crowd. No In God we Trust, only exitus in dubio est. The end is always uncertain.

The God part on the currency is an Eisenhower invention.

[Rhondazvous]

Can a god who tells fathers how to properly sell their daughters into sexual slaver V) be morally excellent? Will you surf the internet for a dictionary that defines moral excellence in a way that allows you to answer that question in the affirmative?  Perhaps the Bible dictionary?

Maybe my error is that I'm interpreting the Bible literally. Can we glean some profound spiritual lesson from this passage if we interpret it metaphorically?

Property shouldn't be allowed to post so eloquently.

Oh yes, I forget my place some times. Guess somebody spared the rod and I went astray.

[Mister Agenda]

As for responsibility, that depends entirely on the specifiic "Christian worldview" in question. Most sects assert that Gaud is completely and perfectly omniscient, which precludes the possibility of free will because the only one with any agency in that scenario is Gaud. If Gaud already knows everything that will happen, then history is written and all choices are already irrevocably made. By creating us with full advance knowledge of our actions, Gaud sets us on a path that we are powerless to change or control, making him responsible for everything we do and everything that happens to us.

This argument is self-defeating. If our every thought and action is pre-determined by god, then we aren't persons with rights. We're just characters in a very complex novel. We don't call novelists evil for letting their characters suffer.

Characters in a novel can't actually suffer.

[John V]

Bingo. You now understand the key logical shortcoming of Gaud's omniscience.

No, I understand one of several problems with the omniscience precludes free will position.

That's because their characters are not real people, genius.

Neither are we, if we don't have a single thought or action of our own.

[John V]

Characters in a novel can't actually suffer.

Exactly, and we're just characters in a novel under the omniscience precludes free will position.

[John V]

Consider: 

I think, therefore I am
God predetermined all my thoughts
Therefore, I don't think
Therefore, I am not

[drfuzzy]

In telling him not to eat, god gave him a priori knowledge that eating was wrong. The tree provided experiential knowledge of good and evil. There's more than one type of knowledge. A virgin might have full intellectual knowledge of sex, but he doesn't really know what sex is until he partakes.

Note that Paul said that Eve was deceived, but Adam wasn't - i.e. Adam willingly sinned. He knew that what he was doing was wrong, but did it anyway.

How was Adam supposed to know disobedience was wrong if he didn't understand right and wrong? Telling a child not to do something before you've taught them to obey you and expecting obedience is a sign of moronic deficiency on the part of the parent.

Now . . . sure, I know that we're discussing the deficiencies of a creation myth . . . all of the plot holes in the fairy tale.  (Take your pick from either myth, Genesis chapter 1 or chapter 2.)  And it's usually fun to point out plot holes and pot holes and . . .       But now it has been proven that Adam and Eve never existed.  No garden of Eden.   No single original male & female progenitor of the entire human race.  No original sin, no fall.  

So isn't it kind of silly for those of us who don't see evidence for the existence of any deities or any creator to be arguing over the actions of a non-existent deity in a non-existent garden talking about non-existent rules creating a non-existent concept: "sin" against god?

[The Grand Nudger]

Exactly, and we're just characters in a novel under the omniscience precludes free will position.

That's not a position, it's a logical consequence of omniscience.  If the future -can be- known, we only think that we're making choices.  We're actually just progressing towards the inevitability required for the future to be known. I've always wondered why the religious don't just drop that one little tidbit. Maybe god doesn't know the future, perhaps it simply cannot be known..gods omniscience is limited to what -can be- known, there's nothing illogical about god...right? There, dilemma solved, free will maintained. ..... What's the problem with that?