Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Club for Open-Minded Discussion & Debate

[Charlemagne]

Yes, the story of Adam and Eve asserts the fact that God gave them a free will, and with that free will the recognition that actions have consequences, good or bad. The lesson of free will is asserted yet again when God addresses Cain before he kills Abel. "Then the LORD said to Cain: Why are you angry? Why are you dejected? If you act rightly, you will be accepted; but if not, sin lies in wait at the door: its urge is for you, yet you can rule over it." Genesis 4: 6-7

From this we see again that God warns us about our need to "act rightly," because if we don't the consequence will be on our head, not his.

[LuckyR]

Yes, the story of Adam and Eve asserts the fact that God gave them a free will, and with that free will the recognition that actions have consequences, good or bad. The lesson of free will is asserted yet again when God addresses Cain before he kills Abel. "Then the LORD said to Cain: Why are you angry? Why are you dejected? If you act rightly, you will be accepted; but if not, sin lies in wait at the door: its urge is for you, yet you can rule over it." Genesis 4: 6-7

From this we see again that God warns us about our need to "act rightly," because if we don't the consequence will be on our head, not his.

Absolutely correct, though one could ask when those parables were written did the authors even have the intellectual option of considering Determinism in their story since science hadn't been invented yet.

[Sy Borg]

Actually, I get my information from former theologians who became atheist, and they know far more than you about the scriptures, having studied it in a professional capacity for a long time.

Anyone who has an opinion about God could be called a theologian. It is also said that theologians reveal more of their own nature than they do about God.

Christians MUST own those quotes - and the other atrocities in the Bible - and not try to rationalise around them. That is what your holy book said. So, it is either unreliable as a source of history and morality, or Yahweh was an immature, petulant, narcissistic personality with vastly less wisdom than most human adults.

I would never worship the God you describe. The greatest thing we should do is love God and our neighbours. We should even love and pray for our enemies. We should help the poor and oppressed.

We know how evil mankind can be, wars, murder, rape, theft. We are commanded not to do these things.

These were long-term Christians who were just as dedicated as you are, working to help the disadvantaged. They devoted their entire lives to their religion and gradually realised they gradually noticed the lies manipulations. You discredit them, you discredit yourself.

The deity I described was God in the Old Testament. If you disown Yahweh's cruelty, you are just cherrypicking, according to church hardliners.

[Belindi]

Actually, I get my information from former theologians who became atheist, and they know far more than you about the scriptures, having studied it in a professional capacity for a long time.

Anyone who has an opinion about God could be called a theologian. It is also said that theologians reveal more of their own nature than they do about God.

Christians MUST own those quotes - and the other atrocities in the Bible - and not try to rationalise around them. That is what your holy book said. So, it is either unreliable as a source of history and morality, or Yahweh was an immature, petulant, narcissistic personality with vastly less wisdom than most human adults.

I would never worship the God you describe. The greatest thing we should do is love God and our neighbours. We should even love and pray for our enemies. We should help the poor and oppressed.

We know how evil mankind can be, wars, murder, rape, theft. We are commanded not to do these things.

These were long-term Christians who were just as dedicated as you are, working to help the disadvantaged. They devoted their entire lives to their religion and gradually realised they gradually noticed the lies manipulations. You discredit them, you discredit yourself.

The deity I described was God in the Old Testament. If you disown Yahweh's cruelty, you are just cherrypicking, according to church hardliners.

Jahweh was a stage in the development of Christianity. He was tribal and portable. He also was an idea that codified tribal justice , which was better than family vendetta justice.

[Charlemagne]

Among the ancient religions only the Jews were monotheistic. Because of this they were a persecuted minority everywhere polytheism thrived and were driven to become tribalistic, thus protecting the worship of Yahweh from the impurities of the pagan gods. He was portable only in the sense that the Jews carried their worship of him from Egypt to Israel, and the Ark of the Covenant was to memorialize the worship of Yahweh in the absence of a temple as the Jews crossed the desert looking for a new home. But the Jews had no sense of God as a Trinity. That would be for Jesus to reveal in his person as God the Son who was one with God the Father. God the Holy Spirit is at last revealed when Jesus promises to send a Comforter. John 14:26 Since Yahweh created the universe and the first humans, the early Christians recognized him as their own Trinity more fully revealed.

[EricPH]

The deity I described was God in the Old Testament. If you disown Yahweh's cruelty, you are just cherrypicking, according to church hardliners.

It was always God's intention that we should be kind to each other and love all our neighbours as we love ourselves. Not rocket science. We are too stupid to learn from history, science just gives us the knowledge to produce bigger bombs. Wars, genocides, murder rape, these are all a part of every day life. God must look down on us with sadness. What ever you may think about God in the Old Testament, he has the power to restore life in a greater good life after death.

If you ignore all the passages in the Old and New Testament about God's justice, love, mercy and forgiveness, you are cherrypicking.

[Sy Borg]

Still, Christianity sees itself as monotheist, and adherents can be as dismissive of "primitive" monotheistic religions as atheists can be of all religions.

Yahweh must be seen as the same deity as the NT God, otherwise the OT would have been excised. The Gnostics were excised, so such editing did happen. So much of that which is said to be evil in the OT can often be traced to hostility towards Samaritans and Canaanites.

[EricPH]

Genesis 6 explains why God flooded the Earth. You may see this as evil, I see a God who has to witness the evil ways of mankind throughout our history. But God is a just, merciful and forgiving God, we still have the chance of a greater good life after death; and that gives me hope.

Genesis 6
5 The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time. 6 The Lord regretted that he had made human beings on the earth, and his heart was deeply troubled. 7 So the Lord said, “I will wipe from the face of the earth the human race I have created—and with them the animals, the birds and the creatures that move along the ground—for I regret that I have made them.” 8 But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.

[Belindi]

Genesis 6 explains why God flooded the Earth. You may see this as evil, I see a God who has to witness the evil ways of mankind throughout our history. But God is a just, merciful and forgiving God, we still have the chance of a greater good life after death; and that gives me hope.

Genesis 6
5 The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time. 6 The Lord regretted that he had made human beings on the earth, and his heart was deeply troubled. 7 So the Lord said, “I will wipe from the face of the earth the human race I have created—and with them the animals, the birds and the creatures that move along the ground—for I regret that I have made them.” 8 But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.

There is no way anyone can benefit from the above interpretation.

[Sy Borg]

Many societies have a great flood myth. Logically, any area that floods will always, at some stage, have to endure a worst ever flood.

God did not create a flood. Noah did not travel to Australia to save the kangaroos, wombats and echidnas and load them on a giant boat, where predators and herbivores were kept healthy for months (food stores?). To literally believe this is, as Camus would say, committing philosophical suicide.

[3017Metaphysician]

Many societies have a great flood myth. Logically, any area that floods will always, at some stage, have to endure a worst ever flood.

God did not create a flood. Noah did not travel to Australia to save the kangaroos, wombats and echidnas and load them on a giant boat, where predators and herbivores were kept healthy for months (food stores?). To literally believe this is, as Camus would say, committing philosophical suicide.

The philosophical suicide I see is your insistence, and incessant need, to project atheist fundamentalism. For example, your "cherry-picking" that you refer to is something you oppose because it contrasts with your fundamentalist (dis)belief about Christianity. Please feel free to correct the record.

Sorry, no free pass SB! I'll call you out when I see the pure emotive or arbitrary and capricious elements to your 'arguments'. Please share why you think everyone is a fundamentalist!

[Fanman]

Hi Sy,

Many societies have a great flood myth. Logically, any area that floods will always, at some stage, have to endure a worst ever flood.

God did not create a flood. Noah did not travel to Australia to save the kangaroos, wombats and echidnas and load them on a giant boat, where predators and herbivores were kept healthy for months (food stores?). To literally believe this is, as Camus would say, committing philosophical suicide.

The thing is; anything that stretches the human imagination can be the subject of an appeal to ridiculousness. As an example, if I asked someone to give me an opinion on how the universe came into existence. I’m pretty sure their response, if not in keeping with the BBT, could be ridiculed in some way. Scepticism naturally arises when ideas or claims go beyond the scope of logic. It is difficult to believe that the Biblical flood did occur, but there are things that people don’t have the capacity to fully explain or understand. As for “philosophical suicide”, what do you mean by that?

[Belindi]

Still, Christianity sees itself as monotheist, and adherents can be as dismissive of "primitive" monotheistic religions as atheists can be of all religions.

Yahweh must be seen as the same deity as the NT God, otherwise the OT would have been excised. The Gnostics were excised, so such editing did happen. So much of that which is said to be evil in the OT can often be traced to hostility towards Samaritans and Canaanites.

Nobody but myself is the authority on how I interpret my copy of The Bible.It seems to me the early Jahweh was a tribal deity for very good reason, and that Jahweh had a capability ,as the famous gardener might say , to be developed into a universal code of ethics and different sets of rituals.

Moral evil can always be traced to the divisive nature of narrow tribalism.See it happening in world politics now.

[Sy Borg]

Hi Sy,

Many societies have a great flood myth. Logically, any area that floods will always, at some stage, have to endure a worst ever flood.

God did not create a flood. Noah did not travel to Australia to save the kangaroos, wombats and echidnas and load them on a giant boat, where predators and herbivores were kept healthy for months (food stores?). To literally believe this is, as Camus would say, committing philosophical suicide.

The thing is; anything that stretches the human imagination can be the subject of an appeal to ridiculousness. As an example, if I asked someone to give me an opinion on how the universe came into existence. I’m pretty sure their response, if not in keeping with the BBT, could be ridiculed in some way. Scepticism naturally arises when ideas or claims go beyond the scope of logic. It is difficult to believe that the Biblical flood did occur, but there are things that people don’t have the capacity to fully explain or understand. As for “philosophical suicide”, what do you mean by that?

As an Australian, one tends to be skeptical about any ancient northern hemisphere claims about the entire world. We simply did not exist to you notherners.

So please tell me how Noah's sons saved all the Australian fauna? Or how he managed to gather two of every animal without a) getting killed b) having other animals killed? How did he manage to feed millions of animals the diets they require? How did they keep the animals in place? Who cleaned the dung? How could they all breathe in there? What about pregnancies? Illness? The smell!

But really, should anyone have to waste even a second analysing something so ludicrous? It is not comparable with the BBT, not in any way. That is false equivalence, and unworthy of addressing. That's akin to saying that Santa's legend (which is as believable as Noah's ark) is just as credible as cosmology and physics.

"Philosophical suicide" is a famous Albert Camus term. I expect if you look it up you'll find a more thorough explanation than I can give.

[Fanman]

Sy,

So please tell me how Noah's sons saved all the Australian fauna? Or how he managed to gather two of every animal without a) getting killed b) having other animals killed? How did he manage to feed millions of animals the diets they require? How did they keep the animals in place? Who cleaned the dung? How could they all breathe in there? What about pregnancies? Illness? The smell!

Critical thinking applied to something of such a grand scale would make it seem implausible or even ridiculous. But one thing I have learned is that anything is possible (within my frame of experience). Of course, I cannot conceive of how something like the flood or the animals in the ark could possibly occur. To me (and probably most people) it is beyond the realms of what is can occur in reality. But does that notion in itself create an impossibility, obviously not.

But really, should anyone have to waste even a second analysing something so ludicrous? It is not comparable with the BBT, not in any way. That is false equivalence, and unworthy of addressing. That's akin to saying that Santa's legend (which is as believable as Noah's ark) is just as credible as cosmology and physics.

I said nothing of the sought. Maybe you didn’t understand me?

"Philosophical suicide" is a famous Albert Camus term. I expect if you look it up you'll find a more thorough explanation than I can give.

Why would you tell me to look it up? If you have a good grasp of what the term implies, by all means, explain it when asked to politely.