All the problems with Christianity

[Godlesspanther]

I was in kindergarten in 1969-70. I remember the scissors. The left-handed scissors had green handles, rounded ends, and said "lefty" on them. The right handed scissors had sharp points.

My parents were contacted by my teacher to ask permission to change my hand preference. Parents said "no." My mother is right handed because she was changed.

[Silver]

If being left handed is so bad, why is there a Johny Cash song entitled The Devil's Right Hand?

[Chad32]

I'm not sure if either of my nieces are left handed or not. Sometimes they like doing things with their left hand, and my parents encourage them to be right handed, but they don't seem to have difficulty using their right hands.

[Godlesspanther]

So, anyway, back on topic...

The main problem with Christianity is that Christians are in charge of it.

[Chad32]

If we're going back on topic, I did make an earlier post about the core of christianity that I had problems with, but no one responded to it.

Among other things, of which there are many, I have a problem with what is basically the core of the christian belief. Different authors give us a story of Jesus' birth, death, and resurrection, and get many details different. From what happened to Joseph and Mary before he was born, to when the last supper was held, when he died, and who was at the tomb. Plus there was supposedly an eclipse, and dead saints rising from their graves, that wasn't mentioned anywhere but in the bible. I've even read that there wasn't even a census that supposedly caused Joseph and Mary to need to move from one town to the other.

Now about Jesus in particular. Supposedly he came to spread the word and save everyone, but Yahweh decided to just send one person down, once in human history, to spend a few years preaching in a backwater part of the world, then dying. Then supposedly being put in a tomb, which was odd because they didn't usually put criminals in tombs anyway. If Jesus was real, and was crucified, he was most likely thrown into a pit with the other criminals and buried there.

So this is supposed to be a sacrifice. If he's part of the trinity, what has God lost from doing that? How is he weaker now than he was before. Jesus was supposedly born, spent thirty years on earth, had an admittedly horrible, torturous week, then went up to heaven to rule the cosmos. That doesn't seem like much of a sacrifice. If I decide to cut off my finger, then have it reattached, what have I really lost in the long run?

Lastly, we get to what we're being "saved" from. If I make a bonfire, gather a crowd together, and tell them to be my slaves or burn to death, I'm not saving them. I'm blackmailing them. This is the biggest problem when you tell people your deity is the originator of all things, and is all powerful. That means he's ultimately responsible for everything. With great power comes great responsibility, and he's the greatest of all.

It's not like he's all knowing or all powerful in the old testament. You have people convincing him to change his mind, or wrestling him to a stalemate, or even beating him with iron chariots. I'm also certain genesis was added after other books, so he wasn't even originally the creator of the universe according to the oldest stories. He was a lesser war god of the canaanite or babylonian pantheon, hence why he was in charge of wars. He was basically the ancient isrealite version of Ares. He spoke to people in person and had an actual personal relationship with them, according to the stories. Not like now, where he's invisible and his very existence is up for debate.

[pineapplebunnybounce]

Amen, brothers. I am also a lefty, and I am fucking TIRED of the pen at the checkout desk being attached on the right side. I'm tired of right-handed desks. I'm tired of right-handed scissors. Even time on clocks is right-handed, for chrissakes.

It's clearly time for bloody, violent revolt.

Not only that, but DRY ERASE BOARDS! As an instructor, I always have to use them in front of my class. Because we write from left to right, I have to keep space between my writing hand and the board by holding my marker as if it's a fork! Otherwise my hand will erase what I write as I go! And writing in 3 ring binders sucks for almost the same reason! Those damn rings are always where my hand needs to be! Right handed people have it so easy! Imagine if the English language read from right to left...We would rule the world!

The chinese language was read right to left for a long time (it's left to right now), you guys didn't take over the world though. Us right handed people were still the majority.

Arabic is read right to left to, yes?

---

Chad32, it's Avoidaiah who wants to know, I think almost all atheists on this forum has problems with xtianity. So probably he'll reply.

[The Reality Salesman01]

The chinese language was read right to left for a long time (it's left to right now), you guys didn't take over the world though. Us right handed people were still the majority.

Arabic is read right to left to, yes?

Oh, I have no idea. But it wouldn't do me any good. I don't know Chinese or Arabic And, unless they send me overseas to train the Afghan Air-Force, I won't be learning any time soon!

---

P.S.
Maybe not the WHOLE world, but perhaps the English speaking part

[MindForgedManacle]

Let's start with the ones on Page 12.

Done; no sweat at all. Next?

-Prophecies about Other Countries

Thus says the Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have grasped,
to subdue nations before him and to loose the belts of kings,
to open doors before him that gates may not be closed:

Babylon's defenses were enormous, at least by ancient standards. Even their walls were more than 70ft thick and 300 feet high. But they had an opening for the Euphrates river to flow through. They diverted it and were able to go through the opening in the wall.

I'm trying to figure out where the prophecy is. All it says is that Yahweh is using Cyrus, which sounds like the ad hoc cop-out someone would add in later to explain why their former war god turned god supreme (at this time, they still believed other gods besides Yahweh existed) could allow them to fall. If Yahweh was their war god, and Babylon defeated Yahweh's favored nation, the inference in those times was that such indicated that the victor nation's gods were greater than the subjugated nation's.
Moving on then from this very easily defeated one.

“And I will make it a possession of the hedgehog, and pools of water, and I will sweep it with the broom of destruction,” declares the Lord of hosts.

This prophecy basically said that Babylon would become swampland. In the 1800s, when archaeologists tried to dig up Babylon, there were some parts they could not dig up because the water table had risen and submerged it.

And you're saying this couldn't have been added later by someone who had already seen that? Further, is there any indication that there was anything special about this? I could 'prophecy' that some small Egyptian town not near the Nile will one day 'be as the great Sahara itself: dry and desolate.' That's very general and easily fulfillable. Clearly I haven't prophecied, yet I have billions of years for that prophecy to become fulfilled. Voila, easy.

36 “Now therefore thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, concerning this city of which you say, ‘It is given into the hand of the king of Babylon by sword, by famine, and by pestilence’: 37 Behold, I will gather them from all the countries to which I drove them in my anger and my wrath and in great indignation. I will bring them back to this place, and I will make them dwell in safety.

By 538 BC, the Jews were released from what used to be Babylon, and many of them went back to Israel.

This couldn't have been easily added after the fact as a post hoc rationalization of why their war god had failed them against Babylon? Seriously? Dude, this is what I mean when I say you need to think more critically about these. These are easily explained by human folly and/or malice.

There fire will consume you,
The sword will cut you down;
It will consume you as the locust does.

This prophecy was directed at Nineveh. Archaeologists have found ash covering the ruins of Nineveh, showing that it was indeed destroyed by fire.

...Destroying a city with fire is unique? Not only could this have been added after the fact, it could easily have been self-fulfilling. If they wanted to forge a prophecy, clearly they could write down that Nineveh would be destroyed by fire, and then they destroy it by fire. Brilliant! Clearly divine prophecy at work here!

-Evidence of Jesus's existence

The fact that Matthew, Mark, and Luke knew Old Testament writings and prophecy does make them less reliable. However, John was not learned in these, and his book depicts many of the same details of Jesus's ministry. Apart from the Bible, there are a number of other sources that talk about Jesus.

Yes it does. If you know the prophecies you are clearly in a much better position to make events try to fit them. Further, the Gospel of Matthew (not actually written by 'Matthew', that's just Church tradition with the Gospels) is particularly bad with prophecy. He practically bends over backward to get the Hebrew Bible prophecies to anally pound their way into his ass of an 'account' of what supposedly happened, to the point here he quotes things like Psalms which in context wasn't indicated to be a prophecy at all.

[Avodaiah]

4 years ago in Virginia Beach, where I live, a man cut his 3 year old son's head off at the breakfast table. He calmly called the police, and told them what he had done. When they arrived at this house,
he explained that God had revealed to him the night before that his son would grow up to be the anti-Christ, and that it was his duty to kill him before he could affect the world. So, the man woke up, made his son his favorite breakfast, and then carried out God's will. I saw him on the news telling his story. He didn't look crazy. He lived in a nice neighborhood, and regularly attended a local Church of Christ. His congregation was shocked.

You are in no position to criticize this man because you are no different. You've both created an identity for the voice in your head that responds when you talk to it. Your conscience that would otherwise be guiding you even if you didn't give it the name "God". Neither you, nor this man have any proof of an additional entity that gives them instructions. No proof of any addition relationship at all. In fact, it's identical to what we would expect if your were operating under a delusion.

If God told you to kill all left handed people, and you were sure it was him telling you to do it, I mean ABSOLUTELY sure, would you do it?

This man was convinced God wanted him to cut his son's head off, and he did it.

God told Abraham to kill his son, and was going to.

So, on to you, God tells you: "Kill all left handed people."

Do you question God, or do you carry out his will?

Let me make one thing perfectly clear: Far be it from me to kill an innocent person. Yes, I do criticize this man, because the God he claims to worship has expressly forbidden the very thing he did.

You shall not murder.

It doesn't get much simpler than this.
And one from Jesus Himself:

but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. 2 Early in the morning he came again to the temple. All the people came to him, and he sat down and taught them. 3 The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placing her in the midst 4 they said to him, “Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. 5 Now in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say?” 6 This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. 7 And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.”

That child had done nothing even remotely anti-Christian, let alone something worthy of death. Therefore he was innocent.
So the answer is no. If I had a revelation telling me to murder the innocent, I would not follow it. I would not even ask myself if God was telling me to do it, because He has already made that point quite clear: He does not call on us to commit murder.
If you want to challenge that point, remember that time and time again people read the Old Testament law and miss literally all of the reasoning behind these laws that would have been common knowledge to the Jews at the time but were lost over the thousands of years leading up to the present. So name one time where Christians in the New Testament are commanded to commit murder.
Forgive me for my harsh reply, but when you say that I am no different from that man, it seems like you have effectively said that the blood of that innocent 3-year-old is on my hands. I'm sure (I hope) that wasn't what you meant though.

Chad32: Sorry for not getting back to you earlier, I've not been posting as often lately.

Different authors give us a story of Jesus' birth, death, and resurrection, and get many details different.

This is true, the Gospels do record different details of Jesus's life and ministry, and you have to read all 4 of them to get a complete picture with all the details. In some cases (at least 1 that I know of), an event happened multiple times, and different Gospels write about different times (for example, Jesus drove the merchants out of the temple twice).

Plus there was supposedly an eclipse, and dead saints rising from their graves, that wasn't mentioned anywhere but in the bible. I've even read that there wasn't even a census that supposedly caused Joseph and Mary to need to move from one town to the other.

Here's a page about some other writings that mention the saints rising. There was also the Census of Quirinius, which happened in the year 6-7.

Now about Jesus in particular. Supposedly he came to spread the word and save everyone...

Not just Jesus, but His followers too. And look how it's worked: There are Christians almost everywhere in the world!

Then supposedly being put in a tomb, which was odd because they didn't usually put criminals in tombs anyway. If Jesus was real, and was crucified, he was most likely thrown into a pit with the other criminals and buried there.

Technically it wasn't Jesus's tomb; it was Joseph's.

So this is supposed to be a sacrifice. If he's part of the trinity, what has God lost from doing that? How is he weaker now than he was before. Jesus was supposedly born, spent thirty years on earth, had an admittedly horrible, torturous week, then went up to heaven to rule the cosmos. That doesn't seem like much of a sacrifice. If I decide to cut off my finger, then have it reattached, what have I really lost in the long run?

Lastly, we get to what we're being "saved" from. If I make a bonfire, gather a crowd together, and tell them to be my slaves or burn to death, I'm not saving them. I'm blackmailing them. This is the biggest problem when you tell people your deity is the originator of all things, and is all powerful. That means he's ultimately responsible for everything. With great power comes great responsibility, and he's the greatest of all.

I think these deserve longer responses, so I'll try and answer them in my next post.

It's not like he's all knowing or all powerful in the old testament. You have people convincing him to change his mind, or wrestling him to a stalemate, or even beating him with iron chariots.

I'm not sure exactly what you're referring to in your first 2 points, but in your 3rd I assume you mean Judges 1:19. It does not say that God could not drive out the iron chariots; it says that God was with them when they took possession of the hill country, but they could not drive out the iron chariots, presumably because God was not on their side. In 2:1-3 this is revealed to be the reason.

He was a lesser war god of the canaanite or babylonian pantheon, hence why he was in charge of wars. He was basically the ancient isrealite version of Ares.

The name given to God, YHWH (Hebrew יהוה) or Yah (Hebrew יה) is related to the word for I Am, Eyeh (Hebrew אהיה). The name YHWH literally means The Existing One, i.e. He created everything, and nothing exists apart from Him. This is very different from the lesser gods of many pagan religions.
P.S. Are you guys calling me Avoidaiah because I don't reply to all of your posts? or is that just a typo? I'm trying to answer a lot of them, but I'm only 1 guy.
I will get to MindForgedManacle and back to Chad next time though.

[Chad32]

4 years ago in Virginia Beach, where I live, a man cut his 3 year old son's head off at the breakfast table. He calmly called the police, and told them what he had done. When they arrived at this house,
he explained that God had revealed to him the night before that his son would grow up to be the anti-Christ, and that it was his duty to kill him before he could affect the world. So, the man woke up, made his son his favorite breakfast, and then carried out God's will. I saw him on the news telling his story. He didn't look crazy. He lived in a nice neighborhood, and regularly attended a local Church of Christ. His congregation was shocked.

You are in no position to criticize this man because you are no different. You've both created an identity for the voice in your head that responds when you talk to it. Your conscience that would otherwise be guiding you even if you didn't give it the name "God". Neither you, nor this man have any proof of an additional entity that gives them instructions. No proof of any addition relationship at all. In fact, it's identical to what we would expect if your were operating under a delusion.

If God told you to kill all left handed people, and you were sure it was him telling you to do it, I mean ABSOLUTELY sure, would you do it?

This man was convinced God wanted him to cut his son's head off, and he did it.

God told Abraham to kill his son, and was going to.

So, on to you, God tells you: "Kill all left handed people."

Do you question God, or do you carry out his will?

Let me make one thing perfectly clear: Far be it from me to kill an innocent person. Yes, I do criticize this man, because the God he claims to worship has expressly forbidden the very thing he did.

You shall not murder.

It doesn't get much simpler than this.
And one from Jesus Himself:

but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. 2 Early in the morning he came again to the temple. All the people came to him, and he sat down and taught them. 3 The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placing her in the midst 4 they said to him, “Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. 5 Now in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say?” 6 This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. 7 And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.”

That child had done nothing even remotely anti-Christian, let alone something worthy of death. Therefore he was innocent.
So the answer is no. If I had a revelation telling me to murder the innocent, I would not follow it. I would not even ask myself if God was telling me to do it, because He has already made that point quite clear: He does not call on us to commit murder.
If you want to challenge that point, remember that time and time again people read the Old Testament law and miss literally all of the reasoning behind these laws that would have been common knowledge to the Jews at the time but were lost over the thousands of years leading up to the present. So name one time where Christians in the New Testament are commanded to commit murder.
Forgive me for my harsh reply, but when you say that I am no different from that man, it seems like you have effectively said that the blood of that innocent 3-year-old is on my hands. I'm sure (I hope) that wasn't what you meant though.

Yes there is a commandment to not kill. Right after God gave the commandments to Moses, he ordered the guy to kill a bunch of people for making a golden calf. Something they were never commanded not to do, because they hadn't received the first two commandments yet. Granted they did do some complaining right after the guy got them out of Egypt, but what is basically the last straw isn't even something they should be held accountable for.

The no killing commandment seems simple, but apparently means thou shalt not kill people unless they're followers of me. Or break my laws. How this relates back to a three year old child, I'm not sure. Maybe he took the commandment to stone disobedient children to death a little too seriously, though not seriously enough to use an actual stone.

As for Jesus, he does say it's better to drown people than to let them pull someone away from Christ. I doubt a three year old was doing that, though. He also says he has come to drive families apart. Also he either is, or works for, the guy in the old testament that commanded the deaths of people that so as broke a rule.

Chad32: Sorry for not getting back to you earlier, I've not been posting as often lately.

I do like it when I at least get one reply to something I said. I don't want to be like "everyone stop what you're doing and pay attention to me!", but I get disappointed if my post is completely ignored. Thanks for replying.

Different authors give us a story of Jesus' birth, death, and resurrection, and get many details different.

This is true, the Gospels do record different details of Jesus's life and ministry, and you have to read all 4 of them to get a complete picture with all the details. In some cases (at least 1 that I know of), an event happened multiple times, and different Gospels write about different times (for example, Jesus drove the merchants out of the temple twice).

Plus there was supposedly an eclipse, and dead saints rising from their graves, that wasn't mentioned anywhere but in the bible. I've even read that there wasn't even a census that supposedly caused Joseph and Mary to need to move from one town to the other.

Here's a page about some other writings that mention the saints rising. There was also the Census of Quirinius, which happened in the year 6-7.

Now about Jesus in particular. Supposedly he came to spread the word and save everyone...

Not just Jesus, but His followers too. And look how it's worked: There are Christians almost everywhere in the world!

Then supposedly being put in a tomb, which was odd because they didn't usually put criminals in tombs anyway. If Jesus was real, and was crucified, he was most likely thrown into a pit with the other criminals and buried there.

Technically it wasn't Jesus's tomb; it was Joseph's.

Ok

So this is supposed to be a sacrifice. If he's part of the trinity, what has God lost from doing that? How is he weaker now than he was before. Jesus was supposedly born, spent thirty years on earth, had an admittedly horrible, torturous week, then went up to heaven to rule the cosmos. That doesn't seem like much of a sacrifice. If I decide to cut off my finger, then have it reattached, what have I really lost in the long run?

Lastly, we get to what we're being "saved" from. If I make a bonfire, gather a crowd together, and tell them to be my slaves or burn to death, I'm not saving them. I'm blackmailing them. This is the biggest problem when you tell people your deity is the originator of all things, and is all powerful. That means he's ultimately responsible for everything. With great power comes great responsibility, and he's the greatest of all.

I think these deserve longer responses, so I'll try and answer them in my next post.

It's not like he's all knowing or all powerful in the old testament. You have people convincing him to change his mind, or wrestling him to a stalemate, or even beating him with iron chariots.

I'm not sure exactly what you're referring to in your first 2 points, but in your 3rd I assume you mean Judges 1:19. It does not say that God could not drive out the iron chariots; it says that God was with them when they took possession of the hill country, but they could not drive out the iron chariots, presumably because God was not on their side. In 2:1-3 this is revealed to be the reason.[/quote]

And why would that be? Kind of a coincidence, don't you think?

He was a lesser war god of the canaanite or babylonian pantheon, hence why he was in charge of wars. He was basically the ancient isrealite version of Ares.

The name given to God, YHWH (Hebrew יהוה) or Yah (Hebrew יה) is related to the word for I Am, Eyeh (Hebrew אהיה). The name YHWH literally means The Existing One, i.e. He created everything, and nothing exists apart from Him. This is very different from the lesser gods of many pagan religions.
P.S. Are you guys calling me Avoidaiah because I don't reply to all of your posts? or is that just a typo? I'm trying to answer a lot of them, but I'm only 1 guy.
I will get to MindForgedManacle and back to Chad next time though.
[/quote]

And yet there was a war god with the same or similar name that was part of a pantheon in the area, and served the same purpose the isrealites needed to take land for themselves. I'm pretty sure I watched a video somewhere explaining this better, but I forgot where it was.