Why are you not a Christian

[Blake]

Originally posted by Geronimo
You're leaving out values.

And what are values? Are they arrived at through a process free of ignorance and delusion?

[Ben Kenobi]

Jon, you may find this interesting, though completely against most of what you believe. It's a book about the history of Christianity, and how the entire Christ mythos comes tumbling down with the new information the Dead Sea Scrolls reveal about that period.

Why would the scrolls have anything in concern with Christian history? They are not books of the new testament but they old. They give an accurate picture of Judaism at the time, at least among the group that was there. They are the oldest extant manuscript evidence of the old testament. This is why they are significant, because we can compare them to the best hebrew we have today and examine evidence for differences between the two texts.

[Ben Kenobi]

It's not that he had to redeem the world through the passion of Christ; he could have redeemed it at any time, just by snapping his fingers or sending a burning-bush-o-gram or whatever.

I'm sure there's an explanation to the "did Christ have to die" question that makes at least some sense. There's a lot of very smart theologians and some of them must have addressed it, I just have never seen one. If you have a link to a good explanation of the answer to that from a Christian point of view I'd be interested in reading it.

Good question.

No, he couldn't. When one has sinned, who does one hurt? They hurt themselves, and they hurt other people around them. They also break the covenant that was made with God.

Now, for God to redeem his people, how could such covenant be restored? They had plenty of animal sacrifices, but they could not serve as the substitution for the offenses against God.

If he just snapped his fingers, what justice would there be in that? There would be consequences for the sins that men had for breaking his covenant. If he did it this way, the convenant would mean nothing.

This is why the atonement is necessary for Christ, and why only Christ could acheive it. He was perfect, he was both God and man. As such, he could serve as both the perfect sacrifice that was required to redress the sins of men prior.

This is why further sacrifices are unnecessary. Christ died for our sins, he chose that path and chose to submit to death on a cross. And because of that man was redeemed of his sins, and could be saved.

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi


Good question. And yet do not men care greatly about the things that they make even though they not match him in stature?

We are his creation, he has made us. He has always been concerned for his creation, of which we are a part.

The real question is why? Why would he choose to do so?

Actually that's the take I have. It's perfectly reasonable that an omnipotent omniscient being might care deeply about it's creations. Scale has no importance to such a being.

As to the question, "why would it care?", Maybe it's impossible for such a being (if it existed) to have any unrealized goals for itself so all satisfaction and fulfillment must be experienced vicariously in a manner only an omniscient being could.

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Blake


And what are values? Are they arrived at through a process free of ignorance and delusion?

the word values gets sloppily bandied about but the kind I refer to are the underived sort. Someone might vote democrat because to them equality is more important than fairness while the reverse might be true about a conservative.

Of course that could be a bad example if the individual voters notions of 'fairness' or 'equality' don't fit my notion of a 'value'. My take is that if a value is merely a means to an end I don't think it's really a value but rather it's a value only if it's something desired as an end in and of itself. I'm convinced that not everybody shares all of the same such "values" and these will steer people in different directions regardless of logic, inference etc. There's no accounting for taste.

[Ben Kenobi]

Not only that but unlike the rest of his creation he made us in his image. You would expect that he would care a great deal more for man because of that.

There is a good psalm that asks the question you ask,

"what is man that you are mindful of him/
the son of man that you care for him?"

And that's why Christ preferred to be called the Son of Man.

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi




Good question.

No, he couldn't. When one has sinned, who does one hurt? They hurt themselves, and they hurt other people around them. They also break the covenant that was made with God.

Now, for God to redeem his people, how could such covenant be restored? They had plenty of animal sacrifices, but they could not serve as the substitution for the offenses against God.

If he just snapped his fingers, what justice would there be in that? There would be consequences for the sins that men had for breaking his covenant. If he did it this way, the convenant would mean nothing.

This is why the atonement is necessary for Christ, and why only Christ could acheive it. He was perfect, he was both God and man. As such, he could serve as both the perfect sacrifice that was required to redress the sins of men prior.

This is why further sacrifices are unnecessary. Christ died for our sins, he chose that path and chose to submit to death on a cross. And because of that man was redeemed of his sins, and could be saved.

An omnipotent omniscient God should have no need for justice. People need justice to regulate behavior amongst each other but a being like God would obviously transcend such a need. A God (even one defined as perfectly good) would no more require justice than it would require food or sex.

A perfectly good God gains nothing for itself or for others by punishing for transgressions against itself or others.

[Blake]

Originally posted by Geronimo
the word values gets sloppily bandied about but the kind I refer to are the underived sort.

Underived? whoa . Where on earth do they come from?!

[Ben Kenobi]

An omnipotent omniscient God should have no need for justice. People need justice to regulate behavior amongst each other but a being like God would obviously transcend such a need. A God (even one defined as perfectly good) would no more require justice than it would require food or sex.

This is a strange position. If God was omnipotent and Good why would he do nothing about evil? Wouldn't he demand justice in his creation?

A perfectly good God gains nothing for itself or for others by punishing for transgressions against itself or others.

No, but if it's character is that of Good, then evil will be harmful to God.

You are right that God cannot be beneficial but a good God will hate evil, and Justice is an important part of the good.

[Zkribbler]

Originally posted by Asher
This is precisely why I think philosophy is a bad influence at universities. It leads to intellectual elitism and lack of original ideas ...

I see you point. --But for me, it had the opposite effect. I was a priggish know-it-all going into college. There, I ran into the quote of Thoreau: "Every man is my superior in some way and from that, I learn."

The idea that American's leading philosopher acknowledged that, at least in someway, everyone else had some superiority to him really bi+tchslapped my own arrogance. It made me much more humble and desirous of listening to other people to discover their perceptions of the world.

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Blake

Underived? whoa . Where on earth do they come from?!

that needs clarification too doesnt it? "underived" in the sense of the use of the "logic, inference and reason" that you were claiming must lead them in different directions. Not everything people value is identified by their logic, inference. and reason and these "underived" values are not universally the same.

[Grandpa Troll]

Originally posted by Geronimo




A perfectly good God gains nothing for itself or for others by punishing for transgressions against itself or others.

This does not coinsicde with teachings of God through his Son Jesus Christ.

From my undederstanding, God made man in his own image, not a robot but a free thinker with a will of his own.

Man sinned in the Garden of Eden, going against what God had commanded Adam NOT to do.

Through trials and ritualistic observances man again showed its sinfulness to not obey God.

Christ was the only fulfillment possible, sacrificing his own Son to pay the price for our sins.

It is a gift.

The only "qualifying" event to earn is obedience and declaration he is your Lord and belief in your heart. Simple, childlike Obedeince.

Only God can truly see into the heart of men, past the human desire to sin, whetehr of not a person actually believes in and truly accepts Christ as personal Lord and Savior.

This is my understanding, forgive me, Im in lots opf pain and thus have taken Vicoddin and if not clearly explained, I ask forgiveness.

Bruce

[Blake]

Originally posted by Geronimo
that needs clarification too doesnt it? "underived" in the sense of the use of the "logic, inference and reason" that you were claiming must lead them in different directions. Not everything people value is identified by their logic, inference. and reason and these "underived" values are not universally the same.

But where do they come from?

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi


This is a strange position. If God was omnipotent and Good why would he do nothing about evil? Wouldn't he demand justice in his creation?

demand justice? absolutely not! If I were omnipotent and had Adolf Hitler (whom I despise for his heinous actions) in my custody I would not punish Hitler I would use my omnipotence to allow Hitler to understand the harm he had done and manipulate the chemistry of his limbic system so that he would regret his actions and repent for them. People will say this violates free will but Hitler is my creation, the hatred that motivated him was a result of faulty reason, faulty intuition and faulty emotional responses that I indirectly created. Whatever motivated him to do what he did was messed up and that's what I'd fix. What use is justice? revenge?

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
No, but if it's character is that of Good, then evil will be harmful to God.

You are right that God cannot be beneficial but a good God will hate evil, and Justice is an important part of the good.

If evil is harmful to God he can use his omnipotence to instantly and pre-emptively "heal" whatever harm it does on the fly. That would be infinitely preferable to punishing the sinner. the punished sinner is still evil after all unless annihilated. If annihilated why create it in the first place?

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Blake


But where do they come from?

That's a scientific question. Would you provide the response that they must arise from variations on logic, inference and reason? I just said there's no accounting for taste. That means I don't think it's possible to explain these values. It's like asking me where someones favorite color comes from.