Q about arguments for God's existence.

[Jenny A]

What I like about christianity is the unfolding of the faith through history and the continuity of the story of salvation passed along by many different authors. Then there's the fulfilled prophecies which predicted Jesus' coming.

Find a really clear prophesy in the Old Testament fulfilled in the New. Good luck. It's like reading horoscopes or worse. And the biggie, the virgin birth is an out and out lie.

In Isaiah, Christians translate the word "almah" as virgin although it really only means young girl of marriageable age. Hebrews has a perfectly good word meaning virgin: "bethulah". And "bethulah" is used elsewhere in Isaiah. You'd think if virginity were important Isaiah would use the word virgin.

Further the prophesy in Isaiah 7 concerns what will happen before the young woman's son reached the age of reason. The prophesy is fulfilled in King Ahaz's time, long, long before Jesus is born.

The best the apologists seem to come up with is the suggestion that the prophesy was really meant to be fulfilled multiple times. Really, that's it?

If we were making up a story about God, how many people would make him become a man, be humiliated, and be executed as a criminal?

The god who sacrifices himself, dies and comes back to life, was an ongoing theme in many religions predating Christianity in and around Egypt and Greece.

Like I've said previously, I have some doubts, like most people, but I've committed myself to following Christ. If I wait until I can remove all doubt from my mind, like an atheist would do, I'll never make the move. And there's too much to gain from my choice to follow God and too much too lose by waiting.

Understood. But without any belief at all you must see that there's nothing to gained by wasting the one life you have attempting to live on in heaven.

[Mudhammam]

Lek, if you were an atheist, you'd never make what move? I don't get it.

You have nothing to lose by abandoning faith except the imaginary constructs you've created or allowed others to create. Letting that go is liberation. It allows you to become your own person and gives you the imminent desire to forge your own path, to form your own ideas given an objective analysis of the real world. Giving up superstition gives you everything (in reality) to gain, a life of free thought.

[The Grand Nudger]

The god who sacrifices himself, dies and comes back to life, was an ongoing theme in many religions predating Christianity in and around Egypt and Greece.

And N. America....and S. America.....and N. Europe.....etc etc etc.
(I'd seem to recall an african sacrifical god as well - and would put money down that the far east has plenty of them - I'm just not familiar. Someone asked me to name a single one once - I just rattled off the listed names of the entire mesoamerican pantheon circa shortly before the collapse of the Aztec. So who would think it up, everybody - and sometimes they even think that -all of their gods- did all of the above.

[GrandizerII]

Lek, if you were an atheist, you'd never make what move? I don't get it.

You have nothing to lose by abandoning faith except the imaginary constructs you've created or allowed others to create. Letting that go is liberation. It allows you to become your own person and gives you the imminent desire to forge your own path, to form your own ideas given an objective analysis of the real world. Giving up superstition gives you everything (in reality) to gain, a life of free thought.

Liberation: Best feeling ever. And still feeling it.

[Tonus]

If we were making up a story about God, how many people would make him become a man, be humiliated, and be executed as a criminal?

The concept of the noble hero is a very popular one. To this day, people tend to highly favor any person who stands out for one reason (riches, athletic prowess, political success, etc) yet remains modest or humble. It was one of the defining characteristics of Superman, who was always a very popular character. Gods are the ultimate super-hero, so it's no surprise that people would write stories about how they allowed themselves to be humbled... right before returning to their sky castle in their position as the most powerful being to ever exist, ready to return in his invincible spirit form to deal out justice to those who wronged him.

How humiliated does he sound now?

[Cyberman]

The concept of the noble hero is a very popular one. To this day, people tend to highly favor any person who stands out for one reason (riches, athletic prowess, political success, etc) yet remains modest or humble. It was one of the defining characteristics of Superman, who was always a very popular character.

Luke Skywalker destroyed the Death Star and was pivotal in the deaths of Vader and the Emperor which brought down the whole Galactic Empire. Not too shabby for a lowly farm boy from the arse end of nowhere.

[GrandizerII]

If we were making up a story about God, how many people would make him become a man, be humiliated, and be executed as a criminal?

I agree it doesn't seem to make sense given the Jewish Messianic context.

However, look at it another way. Jesus was believed to be the Messiah ready to save the Jews from the Roman oppression. Yet, he died without managing to achieve this prediction. So the early Christians had to come up with something to continue to cling to hope. Thus, the resurrection and then the later idea that Jesus was God who came to this world in the flesh to die for our sins and be resurrected after doing so. The salvation, rather than physical, became a spiritual one from sin (rather than from the Romans).

[Dystopia]

Lek, if you were an atheist, you'd never make what move? I don't get it.

You have nothing to lose by abandoning faith except the imaginary constructs you've created or allowed others to create. Letting that go is liberation. It allows you to become your own person and gives you the imminent desire to forge your own path, to form your own ideas given an objective analysis of the real world. Giving up superstition gives you everything (in reality) to gain, a life of free thought.

I say Thor is the real god and not the christian god. Can anyone prove it's a lie?

[Mudhammam]

If we were making up a story about God, how many people would make him become a man, be humiliated, and be executed as a criminal?

I agree it doesn't seem to make sense given the Jewish Messianic context.

However, look at it another way. Jesus was believed to be the Messiah ready to save the Jews from the Roman oppression. Yet, he died without managing to achieve this prediction. So the early Christians had to come up with something to continue to cling to hope. Thus, the resurrection and then the later idea that Jesus was God who came to this world in the flesh to die for our sins and be resurrected after doing so. The salvation, rather than physical, became a spiritual one from sin (rather than from the Romans).

There are a hundred different theories one can come up with that better explain the data we possess from the early Christians, all of which are FAR more plausible than the Zombie Jesus Hypothesis. For one, we have a gazillion other religions to consider, numerous within our lifetimes, and it's patently obvious: people are very gullible. We know the first converts were generally illiterate and poor, and politically powerless. There's a pretty good motive for transferring one's life project from the polis, the city-state--which would have been considered a way of salvation--onto the timid individual. The idea of man-gods was adopted by Christians, perhaps Jesus himself (though more likely Paul) as a way of marketing strictly Jewish concepts to a Gentile crowd, and clearly it worked. Not to mention, if we take the New Testament seriously, resurrections were more common than earthquakes.

[The Grand Nudger]

I say Thor is the real god and not the christian god. Can anyone prove it's a lie?

More importantly, why would I want to? Liquor and battleaxes for all my men!