The god of the old testament has . . . . issues

[Jon Miller]

Originally posted by Lorizael


This little factoid is important, for me. How many of the Christians on this board who argue fervently for their faith would still hold the beliefs they have had they not been born Christian?

While many here have obviously thought about why they are Christian, and what they think about being Christian, how many here have thought about whether or not they should be Christian, and whether or not other faiths might have more value or truth?

I should add that this really shouldn't be targeted at Christians, and that most people born into a particular faith are probably the same.

I have looked at other faiths, and will do so more.

One thing, there are certain things I Beleive. And Christianity (in some interpretations) fits with those Beleifs.

Additionally, I have felt stuff, which leads me to beleive that I am right in being a Christian.

I am not going to go out on a limb and say other ways can't lead to God. I am going to say that Christianity is the best way (that I have seen) to God.

peace,
Jon Miller
(additionally, I beleive in Christ, so I think that people who aren't Christian are saved through Him (just like Abraham was))

[Lorizael]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
I am not going to go out on a limb and say other ways can't lead to God. I am going to say that Christianity is the best way (that I have seen) to God.

I said other faiths might have more value or truth. I didn't say anything about leading you to God.

Arrian and I seem to have had a similar upbringing. My mother is a Catholic who resents the Church for several reasons, and my father is a Jew by blood and tradition but not by faith. There was no dogma in my childhood.

When I decided I wanted to find something meaningful in my life, I looked at many different religions (as well as different philosophies and ideologies) but found nothing that I felt possessed any inherent truth. From Secular Humanism to Buddhism to Christianity, nothing felt right to me. But I wasn't looking for God.

[Arrian]

Let me be clear about one thing, Jon: I too respect your beliefs.

Personally, from what I can see here, your particular brand of Christianity is one I could happily co-exist with.

-Arrian

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
I have looked at other faiths, and will do so more.

Remember Jon, the difference between a Christian and an atheist is small. You don't believe in all these gods except one. An atheist doesn't believe in any (or more precisely, sees no good reason to believe in any). We are just one step ahead of you.

[DaShi]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger


Remember Jon, the difference between a Christian and an atheist is small. You don't believe in all these gods except one. An atheist doesn't believe in any (or more precisely, sees no good reason to believe in any). We are just one step ahead of you.

Exactly, athiests need to feel that they're better than you.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
I am not going to go out on a limb and say other ways can't lead to God. I am going to say that Christianity is the best way (that I have seen) to God.

I dunno. The more time I spend in Asia, the more I think that if Christ himself were alive today and practicing a religion, he'd be a Buddhist.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by CyberShy


Did it really look like I was trying to give an indept insight in the entire polytheistic world and the patheon of the greeks and the babylonians? Or did I just refer to it?

Oh, of course, it was the latter.

Didn't look like it. Looked like you were trying to make some blanket point about sun gods and Jew-hating pagan civilizations:

The gods of egypt, babylon, Rome, etc. (all the sun-god!!!!) all tried to whipe Israel out or to enslave it.

Perhaps the more tolerant polytheistic cultures simply became annoyed with this little group saying: 'All your gods are rubbish! Ours is the best and only one to worship!'

But I'm sure you'll agree with me that there are much simularities between the greek and the roman pantheon. (much gods only have different names) (should I say 'most gods'?)

Uh, that's probably because the Romans imported many of their 'gods' from the Etruscan and Greek civilizations, as they later imported Isis, Cybele, Serapis and Mithras and Mani's teachings. That's the advantage of being a polytheistic religion, you get to recruit all kinds of new things and co-opt any amount of deities.

There are also similarities between Egyptian and other pagan religions and Christianity- the god that dies and is resurrected ? Osiris.

Trinities ? The Egyptians and the Assyro-Babylonians and Greeks and Romans had'em, too.

The Virgin/Mother Goddess ? The Greeks had the virgin huntress (descendant of the earlier blood-thirsty female deities) and the fecund mother goddess is as old as humanity.

The sun-god is the most important God most of the time (Ra, Apollo, etc.)

Not quite. Lightning-wielding Zeus was much more important than Phoebus Apollo.

Marduk, Baal, Tiamat, Astarte, Artemis- you'll find temples and shrines dedicated to weather gods/fertility gods and moon gods- the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, for instance.

Obi Gyn:

"I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth.

Even if limited to adults this is quite a statement.

You're the one who believes that an embryo, zygote or foetus is a human life. Do tell me exactly how they managed to fill the earth with violence from the confines of the womb.


I'm sure I'd be fascinated to find out...

Which raises the question that perhaps they chronicle the same events. As for the archaeological evidence, there has been a real question as to why so many different cultures from the same time period have such similar accounts of a worldwide flood.

No there hasn't been.

The real question is why anyone would choose to ignore a fairly salient point: that humanity requires fresh water in order to live, and believe instead that a muddled retelling of Babylonian-Sumerian myths is a supposed literal chronicle of historical events.

Take away fresh water and humans die.

What links Sumer, Babylon, Assyria, Egypt, and the Harappan civilizations ?

Rivers.

What do rivers do ?

Flood.

I find it rather humourous you blame the Hebrews for the judgement of Amalek when they disobeyed God on numerous occasions even when instructed here.

I find more humorous your inability to read my posts correctly. Saul disobeyed his god's instructions to 'utterly destroy' the Amalekites.

Notice that the Hebrews didn't actually say, 'Hold on god, surely not all the Amalekites were responsible, not the little kiddy-winkies too!'

No; they thought they'd make themselves look good in genocidal Jehovah's eyes by doing this:

15:21 But the people took of the spoil, sheep and oxen, the chief of the things which should have been utterly destroyed, to sacrifice unto the LORD thy God in Gilgal.


15:22 And Samuel said, Hath the LORD as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the LORD? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams.

So I don't in any sense 'blame' the Hebrews for the sentence of genocide.

I blame their god, who, although apparently able to fix its eye on the sparrow, apparently can't find the time in its busy schedule to discriminate between the guilty and the non-guilty, the human and the animal.


It's so hard being a deity, obviously...

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly
I dunno. The more time I spend in Asia, the more I think that if Christ himself were alive today and practicing a religion, he'd be a Buddhist.

This post chimes with an email I got from a friend recently ...

most of the teachings of jesus... tis easier for acamel (actually its hamel a thick rope wrongly translated) to pass through the eye of a needle etc is actually just a re write of a Buddhist txt that was already 600 yrs old along with just about every other lesson he gave.. Issa died at 80 in Katmandu and his tomb is stil there... He preached in the middle east circa 0 bce and his tomb has his foot prints which bare the image of what looks like a nail hole in each... He was crucified but survived using Buddhist meditation techniques..

I'm offering absolutely nothing to back any of this up, I just thought of it when I saw Rufus' post.

[aneeshm]

Update : I've purchased the New International Version ,because it was a choice between that and the KJV . The KJV is rather unreadable without getting a headache , so I went for the one I went for .

Question : Is it good enough ?

[Vesayen]

Originally posted by Arrian
Regarding my openmindedness...

I have pretty much made up my mind w/regard to religion, yes (agnostic, leaning atheist). That is not the same as having never had an open mind, however, and it doesn't mean my mind is currently *completely* closed at this point either. I didn't decide as a kid that I didn't like the idea of God and thus stack the deck against belief. I thought this through. It's pretty clear to me that religion was made up by humans for humans.

Frankly I wish I could believe in a kindly, forgiving God and a heavenly afterlife. Those are, after all, rather nice things (the Good News, as Christians would say, right?). But I've never been able to bring myself to believe it, Jon. There's just too much that doesn't add up.

The nitpicking on one part of the Bible you perceive in this thread, by the way, has something to do with the fact that the OP was about God's violence in the Old Testament (or Torah). So obviously that's the part we got to discussing.

-Arrian

G-D is a kind, forgiving G-D. You really are nitpicking at the instances you pick out, to "prove" otherwise. The instance with Pharoah, is possibly a typo(there is a single documented, potential change in the Torah in the last 2,000 years, the Aseens, the guys who buried the dead sea scrolls also buried a copy of the Torah with their many writings and among them, it includes a line which says "Their gods" in reference to some line on idolators, I forgot what the Torah today says. This is not proof, but evidence it has possibly been changed slightly in 2,000 years.

So it could be a mistake.

It could also be that after the first 6 plagues, decades of oppression and betraying the Jews who helped to save Egypt, G-D had enough. He did whatever he wanted with Pharoah which in this instance included manipulating his emotions for his own uses.

G-D would of been justified even by our *OWN* moral standards to just kill Pharoah at the time, so is it any worse to mess with his emotions to cause a result useful to the Jews?





If you want a heavenly afterlife, your kind of out of luck. No religion or culture exists in a vacuum and Judaism has inherited concepts from others, like Hellenistic reasoning-which was good, or a Christian idea of an afterlife, which is not. Its gotten to the point where some groups of Jews endorce or have endorcedthe idea of a place like hell, or heaven. Its not in the Torah, just NOT there and it is TOO BIG OF A THING to forget to mention heh. Judaism does not focus on an afterlife. There is Olam Haba-which literally translated to "The Next World", we are given no details on it.

Live a good life and be kind to your fellow man because it is worth while to do, because it is the RIGHT thing to do, not for any reward. If you want candy when you die, choose Christianity.

[Vesayen]

Originally posted by Cort Haus
So how exactly does Leviticus fit into this great 'coherent & unifying purpose', John? I notice you didn't have a word to say about it when it was being discussed earlier in the thread.

It fits perfectly to me. The purpose of the Torah is the base level information of everything the Jews need to know about G-D. Ritual laws and observances are definatley part of that and secular laws which are included DEFINATLEY are. The basis of Kashrut(Kosher laws) are in leviticus and are proboably one of the greatest unifying forces, one of the greatest forces of Jewish cohesion we have ever had.

Amoung the laws in Leviticus are also moral laws for the protection of minorities. The laws which make permanent slavery highly unlikley are in Leviticus. The laws which say you have to have cities in your country where criminals can clee and not be executed, are in there. The laws which say you can't just throw lepers off a cliff, are in there.

This is important stuff for the Jews of days gone by to know and still relevant to us today.

[Jon Miller]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger


Remember Jon, the difference between a Christian and an atheist is small. You don't believe in all these gods except one. An atheist doesn't believe in any (or more precisely, sees no good reason to believe in any). We are just one step ahead of you.

You don't understand. I beleive in God. It's not that I have doubts about others gods.. the descriptions are just not of the God I worship.

peace,
JM

[Jon Miller]

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly


I dunno. The more time I spend in Asia, the more I think that if Christ himself were alive today and practicing a religion, he'd be a Buddhist.

Buddhism is interesting, but missing something.

Note, I am not a huge fan of organized religion... (although there is something added when you can worship with others)

Jon Miller

[Vesayen]

Originally posted by DaShi


Exactly, athiests need to feel that they're better than you.

As a sometimes athiest, I resent that, lol.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Not quite. Job is a righteous man, so Satan says that if you strip away all the blessings that God provides, that Job will curse God. So God, knowing Job, takes Satan up on that challenge.

Why does God even talk to Satan, let alone accept his challenges? The whole idea of them having a conversation is incredible.

And don't forget the end of the book, where God restores to Job many times over what Satan had been permitted to take away from him. God wants to test everyone to see where their hearts truly lie.

Why would God have to test people? It is written that he already knows where our hearts lie. Why didn't he already know whether Job would curse him or not? At any rate, why does he care. If Job is going to curse him than it is what it is, so why does God have to dish out massive suffering?

Secondly we are told that our works will be tested through fire, if they survive the test then we shall be rewarded in heaven, if they do not we shall be saved, but only as one escaping through the flames.

Ok, so we are told that God will cause us suffering, you still haven't justified it.

Third, God is not responsible for the suffering, we are. We hurt each other and sin against one another, so why should we blame God for our own actions?

Bull****. God is responsible for everything. He is omnipotent. He created us. He knows everything we will do.