POLL: Is there a God ??
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They're both about doing something difficult for the greater good, in spite of the fact that later on, people might misconstrue the necessity and/or motivation behind it.
And in the case of Egypt, many demonstrations were given to Ramses, that when Moses said God was going to do something, it was GOING to happen.
The blood of those children was the direct result of Ramses' stubbornness.
It's easy to skip right to the killing, w/o recognizing all that came before/precipitated it.
And in the case of Egypt, many demonstrations were given to Ramses, that when Moses said God was going to do something, it was GOING to happen.
The blood of those children was the direct result of Ramses' stubbornness.
It's easy to skip right to the killing, w/o recognizing all that came before/precipitated it.
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Yes, I certainly wish I had done a lot more of it in my lifetime. (I was raised in the church and have attended all my life.) I’m trying to rectify that, but it’s still a struggle I’m trying to conquer. I envy others that have made it the priority it should be, and am ashamed of my past failure.
*As a side, a trip to Israel this time last year was just totally faith encouraging and enriching. So much Bible history! I highly recommend it for those who can.
mapcatfan - I'm in the same boat.
As a Christian, it's easy to fall into the "why do I need to slog through the Old Testament trap. Ironically, my father is the one the one that convinced me it was incumbent upon me to do so.
As a Christian, it's easy to fall into the "why do I need to slog through the Old Testament trap. Ironically, my father is the one the one that convinced me it was incumbent upon me to do so.
The important thing is don’t give up. So, so much better late than never!
You said that you read the bible? But (with all due respect) you don't indicate that you learned the answer to this question?
If you really want to know the answer - Adam and Eve chose to join Satan in rebellion - so just as they were warned (Ge 2:17 "in the day you eat from it you will die") they will now grow old and die, because they rejected God's right to rule (his sovereignty).
This is the real, core issue of atheism by the way.
All subsequent humans inherited death from Adam and Eve. Adam could have saved mankind from this fate. He chose willful disobedience. Roman 5:12 - "Through one man sin entered into the world and death through sin, and so death spread to all men."
Indeed, Pharaoh was warned repeatedly up to that point by 9 plagues, each of which was designed to humiliate and show the powerlessness of Egypt's false Gods. All he had to do was release the Jews from slavery.
And...never mind the fact that the Pharaoh of Egypt earlier had all the firstborn children of the Jews slaughtered.
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No problem - when you said you read the Bible I was just trying to discern what your level of understanding is.
I do not know whether it is generally-accepted, but it is my understanding that some Jewish archeologists and historians have reached the conclusion that Moses never existed and the Jews were never enslaved in Egypt and did not wonder in the desert for years during an exodus. I was told this by some Jewish friends.
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OK, checking in this morning. I'm going to assume that you are a man of your word, and you prayed really, really hard that the invisible man in the sky would make me feel the need for a 2,000 year old middle-eastern Jewish carpenter's apprentice to be my savior.
Nothing!
Will check in again tomorrow to see if it worked. I feel this will be a great experiment on the effectiveness of prayer.
I sure did my man. Prayed for both you and lolman. Feel free to check in everyday (although I am not on this board everyday, so may not get back to you right away). If nothing else, it keeps this thread alive for other ppl to skim through.
Prayer is an interesting phenomenon, to say the least. If nothing else, it can be a form of meditation.
You mention "experiment" ... it appears there have been a number of studies over the years regarding the efficacy of prayer, with mixed and inconclusive results. My understanding is that there has been no conclusive evidence for the efficacy of intercessory (petitions) prayer, but people who pray in adoration, thanksgiving and repent have been shown (in some studies) to have some positive effects on psychological stress and overall health. For anyone that might be curious or interested, simply search for "efficacy of prayer" and you will find many links. It is a fascinating topic. Here is a wikipedia link with some general and summary information about efficacy and research that has been conducted.
Disclosure: I am an atheist and do not pray, but certainly did when I was a believer. As I became a skeptic with ever-increasing doubt, I ceased to believe prayer was effective/beneficial because I thought nobody was listening.
Oh, so we were better off since the bears mauled the children to death. Got it. Thanks for the biblical reasoning there. Puts you guys in a much better light. Makes me wonder why the mauled children wouldn't have had an opportunity for being "saved" before they committed their heinous acts, you guys being so big on God giving man a choice for his deeds, that is. Seems like those kids didn't get much of a choice with the vicious bear mauling to death and whatnot.
Utilizing your logic to current day, how about abortion? Think of all the bad in the world we've gotten rid of. All those little Hitlers being offed before they could unleash themselves on the world.
Your hypotheticals are ridiculous. Whereas what God did was unnecessarily cruel.
Instead of using his infinite power to free some slaves, He instead decided to bring further pain and anguish to Egyptian families to spite the pharaoh.
Instead of choosing to ignore some kids, the infinitely powerful Christian god full of wisdom thought a painful death was appropriate.
The same god who claims to love you and I, mind you.
I guess I don't understand the end game with atheism...seems like you guys care more about trashing/attacking the character of a God that you say doesn't exist, which doesn't make sense to me, as some "gotcha" on Christians.
If you want to debate the reality of God, which is what atheism denies, do that. Like what are you wanting believers to say about God's character that will in any way, shape, or form change your view on the reality of God?
If you deemed the God of the Bible to be more loving and have character that is more suitable to what you think the character of God should be, would that in any way change your view on the reality of God? If the God of the Bible was no longer genocidal in your mind, would that change how you view the reality of God? Would you know believe He is real and exists?
By the way these are all genuine questions, just trying to get a better understanding on what you guys are wanting...
Because there's nothing inherently special about this god compared to other gods of other religions. They're just stories. The Bible is a contradiction machine as well, why would an all-powerful being expect humans to navigate that book with any sort of confidence? If god wanted us to know he existed, he'd do so.
The Bible does no better a job of getting me to believe than the stories told in Greek, Norse, Egyptian mythology.
That's fine if you think that. I am moreso trying to understand why atheists attack the character of someone they say doesn't exist...like in my eyes, one's character does not prove their existence. It's irrelevant. God could be everything you want him to be and more, but that still doesn't prove His existence.
I would think atheists would much rather prefer to debate His existence, b/c if something doesn't exist, who cares what their character is like, as that character can't even exist because the being doesn't exist. So why argue about a made up God's character? The only reason to do so, in my opinion, is to bag on Christians.
There is no reason to bag on something that hasn’t traumatized you in some way. For example I don’t think these guys would be searching for Muslims or Buddhists to argue with, it seems to me they have been traumatized in some fashion by either family, friends, clergy, or some other entity in the name of Christianity/Catholicism. Otherwise I have no clue why in the world they would care so much. All just my opinion of course.
A fall back position for xians describing atheists. “You must have been traumatized to hate god so much!”.
When really we’re simply puzzled by people that believe absurdities to be true.
I'd take on any religion, they're all bogus. Most people here at likely Christian, which is why Christianity is focused on.
So neither one of you were raised in a Christian home or had a bad experience with Christianity? You simply were raised atheist, have never had a negative experience or trauma with it, read the Bible for fun and then started arguing with Christians about it? Gotta hand it to you guys, that’s incredible dedication to relieve boredom.
Baptized and raised Episcopalian. Never bought into the absurd stories. Was repulsed by the death cult imagery and rituals, and the pretend cannibalism. Parents granted the choice for me to stop going to church when I turned 16. The Sunday before my 16th birthday was the last time I was dragged off to church, with the exception of weddings, baptisms and such, to be there for extended family.
No trauma! No drama! Just non-belief and eye-rolling.
You guys continuously misjudge me because you spark the vengeful side of me to mock you because of how arrogant you present yourselves in thinking it is your place to correct my thoughts and actions.
I think religion does a lot of wonderful things. I think if you live a "Christian" life you will live a happier and fuller life, just minus the part about going to church unless you view it as a social or spiritual event and not a scientific one.
I believe, warts and all, right now today (not 100 years ago) that the Catholic church is the greatest force of good in the world today. I think Catholic Charities is one of the very best organizations on earth for doing public good.
I just don't want religion to mix into science. I especially get upset when religion crosses over into politics.
I hope that clears up a few misconceptions in this thread.
Warts? That's what you think the catholic church has? Warts?
Dude, they've been raping children and sheltering pedophiles. Tens of thousands of them? Not a 100 years ago. Did you see the recent story out of Baltimore?
Warts?
There is a distinct popularity to defaming the Catholic Church, for sure. Boy Scouts and virtually any unmasked association dealing with children are going to be full of pedophiles and the Catholic Church had their share and didn't particularly handle it well.
That doesn't change the absolutely wonderful things Catholic Charities does or what a great moral leader the Pope is for the world.
Like everything else the Catholic Church is under constant attack and scrutiny by skilled propagandists that savagely protect their own religion and people. That is the way of the world now and not some other.
So yes, precisely, warts.
Wow!
I guess it’s much worse than I thought. The brainwashing. Now they just shrug off tens of thousands of cases of child rape and suggest it’s all a smear campaign. Besides, other organizations rape kids too, and Catholics do some good stuff, so let’s pretend the child rape wasn’t really that bad. Nothing to see here.
The Catholic church employs about 650K people in the US. I'm not sure what the per capita statistics would be for the Catholic church vs any other organization that routinely interacts with children but I would strongly suspect it's not like they are anomalous I would suspect, just purposefully sensationalized.
And absolutely "yes" 100% I believe the Catholic Church is under purposefully sustained attack and has been for quite some time now.
And absolutely "yes" 100% I believe the Catholic Church is under purposefully sustained attack and has been for quite some time now.
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The mafia is also under constant scrutiny. This is what happens to large, powerful crime rings that originated in Italy.
We just have not been exposed to genius scripture scholars before now. Thanks for these powerful posts. You guys talk about God more than most Christians. If more people could read your comments, I suspect you could really spread the word of hopelessness. Keep up the good work.
Yes, they are ridiculous. This is a thread full of hypotheticals, mischaracterizations, and other tomfoolerry. You said you would never send a bear to kill a child...I presented a hypothetical (Adolph Schicklgruber Hitler) to show the opposite is probably true...unless of course your interest in little Adolph's well being precludes the slaughter of 20+ million people.
Regarding the 42 kids mauled to death by the two bears: that account is in 2 Kings 2:23-25...they were part of a greater mob of children that was mocking and harassing the wrong person, no doubt reflecting their parents abusive attitudes toward a prophet of God. (they earlier tried to kill Elijah, but never mind that) On this occasion their disrespect was not tolerated. If only their parents taught them better.
Perhaps you are simply unaware of the historical fact that many of these people were Baal worshipers, known to burn their own children to death in fire, introduced a civil war in Israel, slaughtered great numbers of God's people, that prior to this Elijah was under death threats and that they tried to assassinate him? Are you aware that this Elisha in question was being hunted down by a Syrian army at their behest? That they tried to usurp the throne of Israel and assassinate the rightful Jewish heir to the throne? The Northern Kingdom of Israel was already invaded and conquered and carried off as slaves, only to have their homes and lands confiscated by these people?
It's always good to bring the backstory into focus. Otherwise, how long was mocking, killing and enslaving God's people and prophets supposed to be tolerated?
TL; DR -
Their is a limit to God's patience. He will not forever excuse disrespect to his representatives. Juvenile delinquents are no exception.
Anyone, regardless of their belief system, who enjoys debates and discussions about the existence of God and the usefulness of religion may find this collage of debating points made by Sam Harris interesting and thought-provoking. He makes a lot of observations that I have come to realize on my own over the years, well before I'd ever heard of youtube or Harris, but I cannot share them anywhere near as cogently and well-reasoned as he does. To my view, he certainly makes you think and ponder these deep questions ... the essence of this thread and the exchanges we've had in it ...
Free some slaves?
Upwards of 3 million people fled Egypt and slavery during the Exodus. A people who had seen their own firstborn slaughtered at the hands of the Egyptian Pharaoh. The Bible indicates a "vast mixed company" of non Jews also chose to join them.
That doesn't say a whole lot for these poor Egyptian families other than that they simply had no intention of giving up their slaves, despite repeated entreaties by Moses and Aaron and those plagues...they could have acted wisely and saved themselves the trouble. They themselves bear no responsibility for their actions?
With all due respect - you don't seem to have thought this out very well?
God could have whisked away the Jews to safety, he could have forced the Pharaoh to comply without adding more bloodshed, etc.
There is zero evidence that Jews were ever enslaved in Egypt during the passover event, so none of this ultimately matters.
Sam Harris - yeah, not so much. I find his arguments rather easy to defeat. The real value a guy like Harris has is helping me to understand which "argument" the next atheist I talk to is going to
Harris is great at conflating "religion" and the stupidity so much of it engenders, with the existence of God. He is great at bait and switch where he (often correctly) exposes some dumb religious belief or practice and uses it as an excuse to deny the existence of God. Or as he says in the video - Jew and Christians disagree that Jesus is the Messiah...therefore they must both be wrong (lol). He does correctly point out "they can't all be right".
His "Asian Tsunami" example he gives is also poorly thought out and exposes his general ignorance of what the Bible actually says regarding things like this (both the Bible's prophecies and the Bible's hope address this) His reasoning is opium for simple minds...at least he is more informed on what the Bible says than Neil DeGrasse Tyson is :flush: .
The great irony of all this is that both of these things can be true: religion stinks for the most part, yet God absolutely exists...in fact the Bible rails against false religion throughout it's pages and even prophesies it's ultimate destruction in the book of Revelation. ("Get out of her, if you do not want to share in her sins")