Let's be biblically literary

[Vince]

All right, the first thing to do: distinguish the God of the Sunday schools from the God of the philosophers/theologians. 

The first kind is written for simplistic understanding. From the viewpoint of the philosophers, everything people say about that God is allegory at best, outright false at worst. 

I suppose there are various reasons we ended up with both types. Like it or not, most religions have a popular type and an elite type. Even Taoist temples in China have pictures of hell to scare simple people into behaving themselves, although the Tao Te Ching doesn't say anything like that. Christianity, too, when it talks about "God is my friend" etc. is simplistic. 

Taken literally, the God of the Sunday schools is false. This is the God that Dawkins and Hitchens and those types argue against. It is also the kind that theologians and philosophers have never taken seriously. Everyone agrees that we shouldn't believe in that type. Naturally, some Christians do take that stuff literally. Some don't. I don't know what the percentages are and I don't much care. 

This just seems like the no true Scotsman fallacy. You just asserting that the Sunday school Christians are wrong about god because they disagree with your version of god. Why should I believe you have any truth about what god is like?

In what follows I will try to describe very simply the theologian/philosopher view of God. I do not know if it is true or not. But rather than typing "according to theologians" over and over, I'll just lay it out as they would. 

If you don't know if it is true then why is it important to you? Why not lay out what you believe about god and why?

[Belacqua]

You just asserting that the Sunday school Christians are wrong about god because they disagree with your version of god.  

No, I'm saying that the God of the Sunday school Christians is demonstrably untrue. If you want to know why it's demonstrably untrue, you can read Hitchens and Dawkins and nearly everyone on this forum.

Why should I believe you have any truth about what god is like?

You absolutely shouldn't. 

I think I was clear that I am reporting the ideas of others. I am explaining -- NOT WHAT I HOLD TO BE TRUE -- but the difference between the Sunday school God and the philosophers' God. 

If you don't know if it is true then why is it important to you?  

Because I like to learn things. I find the field fascinating. 

I'm really not trying to persuade you of anything, except maybe that the Sunday school version of God is not the only version there is.

[EgoDeath]

@Belaqua right. Just reporting the ideas of others.

God forbid you make any claims of your own, or propose any of your own ideas. Then people might just be able to see through your BS a little too easily.

[Vince]

You just asserting that the Sunday school Christians are wrong about god because they disagree with your version of god.  

No, I'm saying that the God of the Sunday school Christians is demonstrably untrue. If you want to know why it's demonstrably untrue, you can read Hitchens and Dawkins and nearly everyone on this forum.

Why should I believe you have any truth about what god is like?

You absolutely shouldn't. 

I think I was clear that I am reporting the ideas of others. I am explaining -- NOT WHAT I HOLD TO BE TRUE -- but the difference between the Sunday school God and the philosophers' God. 

If you don't know if it is true then why is it important to you?  

Because I like to learn things. I find the field fascinating. 

I'm really not trying to persuade you of anything, except maybe that the Sunday school version of God is not the only version there is.

I think I misunderstood the context.  My apologies.  I understand there are many different ideas of the Christian god and all of them I have encountered have insufficient evidence for belief.

[Mister Agenda]

Does the God Belaqua refers to even provide an afterlife at all, or care about our morality? If it's methodology is unfathomable, so are it's motives. It could want anything so why try to please it at all?

Does the person who made this post want Belaqua to reply at all?

If he does I'd be happy to take a shot at answering.

Thanks, go for it. Unless you say otherwise, I'll assume you're speaking only for this particular concept of God.

Edit: I've read your further explanation (thanks) and appreciate it. Does this view differ from pantheism, and if so, in what way? Is it YOUR view?

[Belacqua]

Does this view differ from pantheism, and if so, in what way?

I'm not very clear on this, but I think that for the Catholic Church, at least, it's different. Pantheism is when the world and God are exactly contiguous and co-terminous. (?) Christians think that God is always the world plus infinitely more. 

But don't use me as a source because I'm not sure!

 Is it YOUR view?

I have this annoying trait of not knowing what my view is. 

All of this seems so difficult, so beyond human confidence, and -- most especially -- so far beyond my own little brain's abilities, that I have yet to know what's really true. I have made good-faith efforts to understand these difficult things as far as I can, yet I have a hell of a lot left to learn.

[LadyForCamus]

"Nothing could be more efficient than choosing to reveal The Truth of salvation for all man who has ever lived and ever will live, during one thirty year span of time; a mere fraction of the almost 200,000 years that humans have existed so far, in one small area of land in the Middle East, to one small group of illiterate farmers, and then expecting that somehow this message will successfully and accurately translate to all of his beloved creation equally, across all continents, all languages, and all pre-existing (and subsequent) world religions on into millennia? You can’t be serious."

But what if the nature of the barrier between us and the recognition of the truth of salvation, is akin to a delusion? This is what atheists often accuse theist of when it comes to the particular truth of reality they possess but religious people don't. That it's a delusions that keep the religious from recognizing it. In fact atheists often speak of their truth of reality, in salvationary terms, like liberation and freedom, a recognition that frees us from bondage.

One thing we understand about the nature of delusion, is that they aren't resolved by the clarity of facts. No matter how clearly you present the case for the holocaust, holocaust deniers will not accept it. And its not as if delusional people, want to know the truth, but fail to recognize it, but they don't want to know it. They want to believe the lie, and will do their best to preserve it. Even if that means killing someone who tries to show them the truth.

The other things about the delusional, is that it's not just a denial of truth out there, but more fundamentally a truth about themselves, a concealing of the underlying unresolved pain that manifests them. A projection of the world and others, formed from a contorted perception of themselves.

So, how do we distinguish between a delusion and reality then? Atheist says theist is deluded. Theist says atheist is deluded. By what method can we distinguish the delusion from the reality? If I say the existence of gravity is just a delusion you have, can it be demonstrated that gravity is real? If you think people who don’t believe god exists are delusional, can it be demonstrated that the god exists?

[EgoDeath]

I have this annoying trait of not knowing what my view is. 

All of this seems so difficult, so beyond human confidence, and -- most especially -- so far beyond my own little brain's abilities, that I have yet to know what's really true. I have made good-faith efforts to understand these difficult things as far as I can, yet I have a hell of a lot left to learn.

I think that's what you really want to be true. I think you want it to be true that the question of god cannot be answered. You're what Dawkins called a permanent agnostic in principle. I think you want it to be so that the question cannot be and never will be answered. Therefore, it's a wash! What the theists know is just as good as what the atheists know.

But it isn't a wash. The playing field isn't even. The conversation about god's existence hasn't even started because the evidence has never been brought to the table.

I can't even say the theists are losing because the game hasn't even started. Maybe when they bring some evidence of god to the table, the conversation can start.

[Belacqua]

I'm always glad to know what Dawkins would say about me.

[EgoDeath]

I'm always glad to know what Dawkins would say about me.

Your point? Do you ever have a point? You're just one big, swirling vat of Dr. Pepper. No one can know what flavor it is for sure. After all, what do any of us know?! Hell, the theists know just as well as you silly atheists!

Your shit is so transparent that I suggest you go see a doctor. Normally it's brown, and somehow, smells much better.