Is the Holy Spirit Misleading You?

[Astonished]

C. S. Lewis excuses the church for burning witches by saying that they truly believed in witches. He tells us that if we believed there were actually women who had sold their souls to Satan and were going around causing mischief, we would still be burning them, so we can’t judge those people by modern sentiments.

He forgets one little thing. The bible says…


That cold mean one of four things.
1. The Holy Spirit didn’t know there’s no such thing as witches when he moved the biblical writer to pen this passage.
2. The Holy Spirit knew but for his own purposes decided to allow his church to believe a lie for millennia.
3. Millennia of Christians misinterpreted this passage which doesn’t actually say there are witches.
4. Man wrote the bible and the Holy Spirit is as fanciful as witches.

Millions of woman were sadistically murdered because of this passage. Misinterpretation? But those witch hunters believed they were being led by god. [1] Do you believe god is leading you? Do you believe you have the correct interpretation of the bible? [2] So did they, so how do you know that thousands of years from now the Holy Spirit might decide to show the future church that you were wrong but they should not judge you for your error since you truly believe something? [3]

You want to believe that the Holy Spirit would never allow you to believe what isn’t so. He did it with witches and I’ve been told he is the same today, yesterday and forever. [4] 

1. Belief that you are being led by God is not the same as being lead by God. 
2. The NT was the last complete revelation from God (which includes saying that it is the last complete revelation from God until the end of time). It has everything in it to have judged the actions of burning witches as entirely contrary to the will of God. 
3. C.S. Lewis was explaining, not excusing. Failure to understand [2] does not create the problem you think it does.
4. The Holy Spirit does not control what people believe and certainly does not stop people from murder.

1. Your lack of introspection is, like the name says, astonishing.
2. Actually from what I've seen on youtube, presentations by well-informed atheists and books (which cite sources) the Quran makes the same claim of being the final revelation (I guess the Book of Mormon also does, but...ew.) But I can't cite chapter and verse off the top of my head so I'd feel hypocritical asking you to do so when you make such a huge claim about the NT but it's generally the practical thing to do when you're attempting to correct someone who knows more than you.
3. Who gives a flying fuck who said what? The content of the message is the only significant part. Doing otherwise is called religion. If people didn't believe Jeebus was who they think he was, nothing in that book would hold any water.
4. The holy spirit DOES apparently control what people do (poor Pharaoh, suffering through many more plagues because Have It Yahweh wanted to be a bigger dick) but is nevertheless solely responsible for ensuring that any message it wishes to convey to mankind comes through clearly and unmistakably and its failure to do this in any way, shape or form leaves few options other than it does not exist, it does not care what we do or think, or it is a very weak god and unworthy of the sort of devotion it gets.