Haran

{Moderators, feel free to send this "Elsewhere", since I couldn't open a thread there myself.}

Here is a great spot for those borg-like atheist militants to gang up on poor little 'ol Haran and tell him what they really think. :wave:

So, throw those 'ol opinions my way.

MHF

I was wondering what you'd have to say about my reasoning that the Bible
is false. I'm copying/pasting this from what I wrote in the other thread:

It is not very important if a Bible story is literally true, approximately
true, or not true. What is important is whether the Bible's moral lessons
are good, since the Bible is used as a moral guide by many.

And it is here, on moral values, where the errors in the Bible are by far
the most obvious and most severe. The bible contains more attrocities than
my stomach can handle, including genocides ordered by God.

People can literally justify anything. No matter how grave the crime,
someone will be able to justify it for themselves. Sadly, this is even
true for genocide. More sadly still, we don't even have to go back far in
history for that. But moral values is not about what can be
justified. Some things simply should not be justified. Genocide should
never be justified, one has to take a firm stand on that, because
otherwise moral values mean nothing. If I were to accept any argument that
justified genocide, then I can not look at myself in the mirror and tell
myself that had I lived in Nazi Germany that I would not have supported
these murderous Nazi's.

For these reasons, I must reject the Bible from a moral point of view. If
there exists a good God, then He would have to think that what's written
in the Bible is blasphemy of the gravest kind. There is simply no way that
a good God could have done what the Bible says He did, no way.

I conclude that the Bible must be false. I really don't see any way around
this argument. You may try to argue that even though God ordered genocide
and other cruelties in the OT, that there was a good reason for doing
those things. But like I explained, everything can be justified. Good
moral values means that even when you can find a justification for a
wrongful act, you nevertheless don't commit that act.

MHF

Haran

MHF, I appreciate the more reasoned post you've made as opposed to the other sharks.

It is quite simple, really. I believe that God is that standard of morality. I do not judge God's actions. With respect to supposed biblical attrocities, if you will read closely, God gave people many warnings before anything ever happened to them. In other cases, the people who were destroyed were the aggressors. I do not understand rejecting the Bible based on these accounts because, one, that is not all there is to the Bible, two, I know few sane people who would decide that these accounts were somehow a guide for how we should behave, and three, I do not know God's ultimate reasons for his actions.

I will be quite frank in stating that I do not understand God and I do not understand everything in the Bible. I will say that I have been through periods of deep doubt that I would classify agnosticism. However, I find atheism an irrational position, and agnosticism is almost by definition not an answer.

The knowledge of God has been in this world since time immemorial. You may believe what you like about this knowledge, but I believe it existed and still exists because a God exists. I believe that a God would leave some sort of communication through the ages and would be known/remembered/worshiped by a large portion of the world. I have looked at other world religions and I find little of what appeals to me as truth. In Christianity, I have found a record of a God that appeals to me as truth.

You may disagree, but I challenge you or anyone else who is a non-theist to tell me how your moral standards are any better than mine. I do not believe that you can do it, because your beliefs require that your standards must be relativistic. This means that someone's beliefs as a non-theist are no better than mine.

espritch

Before we can have a Borg style Atheist pile on, we probably need a little more information regarding exactly what strain of religious insanity you suffer from. Are you a Christian? If so, are you Catholic, Fundamentalist, or some kind of Quaker style liberal? If you are a Moslem, do you support suicide bombers and think all infidels are worthy of death or are you one of those (possibly apocryphal) moderate Moslems that doesn't want to kill anyone? Are you Jewish? A Mormom? Does Ganesh float your boat? Or do you prefer the old Gods like Mithra, Odin and Zeus? Have you ever sacrificed a goat, a virgin, or a hampster to your God? Do you talk to your God? Does he/she/it talk back? If so, does he/she/it sound anything like Charelton Heston?

Alethias

You seem to make the assumption that we feel a need to convert you. That is a standard christian mistake because of the evangelistic nature of christianity. I really don't give a shit what you believe, as long as your actions or speech don't impinge on my ability to believe what I want.

Alethias.
P.S. At this point, I don't see anything that is deserving of ~E~. If that changes, I'll send it.

Haran

I don't really care what you do with this thread to be honest. I mentioned that I am a Christian, so I don't know what all the other stuff is about. If you don't get the point of this thread, it is probably because I set a link to it from a thread in the Biblical Criticism forum due to the many atheists who were derailing that thread with their comments. I thought this would be a great place for them to pile on me and leave the other thread open for historical discussions.

Militant atheists not wanting to convert people is an abosulte myth. They most definitely want to convert people, and that is one of Johnny Skeptics main goals if I am not mistaken (and used to be one of the infamous Vorkosigan's stated goals as well). It is also the goal of this entire website, otherwise why bother with such a site? Militant atheists will also gang up and jump on any Christian statement such that no one can possibly respond to every post and then harangue the Christian about how they have no answer because atheism is the end-all be-all most super-intellectual persuit on the earth. Yeah... :huh:

Jedi Mind Trick

:crying:

southernhybrid

I'm not a militant atheist so I hope you don't mind my making a few comments.


The above is certainly not a convincing argument for what you believe, not at all. Your comments make it sound like your beliefs are derived from tradition and a strong emotional attachment. I can understand that, as many lessons can be learned from religion. That however, doesn't mean that religious myths equate with literal truth.

If you had said that mythology, magical thinking and the belief in the supernatural have always been a part of human culture, I would heartily agree with you. Humans are a story telling, pattern seeking, myth making species. Because of these traits, we have used our fantastic imaginations to create beautiful, exciting and sometimes horrifying myths to explain our existence and give purpose to our lives.

If you do a serious study of religious mythology, you will see that many of the myths and symbols found in Xianity have been present in many other religions of the past. For example, the virgin birth and the messiah myth are very common ones found in many cultures. I find all of this fascinating, but not at all convincing that these human stories represent evidence for the existence of supernatural beings.

I am a person that believes that tolerance for those that have no harmful intentions is far more important than any particular religious or secular ideology. I would never make the claim that my personal morality is superior. It's pretty simple and based on the very human traits of empathy, which gave birth to riciprocal altruism. This trait is even found in many other animal species, although with the benefit of our highly complicated brains we have developed it much further. Sadly, evolution is not perfect and we still have many of the negative violent and aggressive tendencies of some of our closest great ape relatives. But I digress.

We are all moral relativists in many areas of our lives, so it's silly to even have a discussion about who has the better morality. One's behavior exemplifies one's morality. It's as simple as that. One's metaphysical position has nothing to do with morality.

One thing I despise about traditional Xianity is the idea that one only has to believe and ask forgiveness to enjoy salvation. In fact it was that very part of Xianity that led me to search for a religion with higher moral standards. While I did find some more attractive religions, I eventually realized that I could also live a happy and satisfying myth free life. I don't ever expect religion to die out and I don't try to bring others over to my side. I am always happy to see them come over, but I prefer that each individual take his or her own journey toward truth without being badgered. As a product of a evangelical Xian home, I wish that more Xians would also stop badgering people to believe like they do. Perhaps it's just the nature of the beast to want to bring others into one's own ingroup. Pity.

Tao of Pooh

Much of this could also apply to just about anyone who's passionate about something. Especially if they find a willing victim... listener.




Oh, how the world so dearly loves a cage.

Haran

No, and I don't mean to say that it does equate to literal "truth", but no one can claim that, not even atheists have a corner on literal "truth".

One must believe in something. Christianity is based upon that faith. Abraham had faith in God and it was accounted to him as righteousness. Faith is the main component, obviously, of the New Testament as well.

So, you are correct, it is subjective. I'm not trying to prove my religion to anyone or convert anyone. I'm just explaining why/how I believe.

I have done quite a lot of serious study of religions. It is a myth that Christianity borrowed from other religions in its initial stages. Some accretions are found later, but they are periphery to the core message.

My historical studies of religions have had little effect on my beliefs other than to convince me that no religion has a corner on historical "truth". Few to none will come to any religion through being convinced of its truth by historical data. That is because religions, at their core, are not about history. History is just an interesting and fun side-tangent.

I do not believe there is such a thing as the "tolerance" claimed in today's society. For all the "tolerance" that one side claims, it is really ignoring that it is being "intolerant" of the other side's beliefs.

Then, when it comes to politics, you cannot say that the Christian right is "wrong", just that you don't like it and will vote against it out of your own preference. Otherwise, you would be claiming superiority and being intolerant of their views.

Altruism is rare and, I would argue, even when it occurs the underlying motivation in still selfishness. Selfishness is the trait of evolution that I believe you are ignoring. It is also the reason that we need a God and his moral standards.

Here is the dilemma for an atheist. If they do not believe in a God, then their views of "God's laws" are that they are relative. If one believes in a God, then suddenly these laws become objective.

As a non-theist, what is that "behavior" based on? It has no basis except society. In other words, you might live in a society where something that is normally considered immoral in our society is considered acceptable in the other society. If this is the case, then no one is really wrong. What ever standards of behavior you don't like, it just doesn't matter, except to you. You can only condemn something based on your dislike of it, not because it is immoral. You have no global standard.

If you have never done anything wrong in your life, then you are a much better person than most of us. (and I think you'd be lying )

Few of us want to admit our failings in life. It is a very difficult thing to do. It is much easier to simply justify our actions to ourselves and others and forget about our wrongs.

During my agnostic period, there was no such "happiness". See, as the wise King Solomon and many others have recognized...Life has no purpose from this perspective. Nothing you do matters because you will die and anything you felt had purpose, anything you accomplished in life, will wither and die along with you. Fyodor Dostoyevsky saw this as well when he wrote of one of his main characters who understood this point and decided to commit suicide because of it, just to get it all overwith. I certainly do not recommend such an action, but it shows the realization of the reality that is agnosticism. Atheism is untenable.

As "a product of an evangelical Christian home", as I have been for 30 something years, I am surprised that you do not understand the underlying motive of evangelization. Perhaps agnosticism has clouded the remembrance of its purpose. The motivation is that Christians, through God's love, want everyone to be saved and to go to Heaven. That seems like a pretty noble cause, to me, though I agree that it could perhaps be done less abrasively than it often is done.

So, there you have it. These are my experiences. I see Atheism as an absurd position, agnosticism as fruitless and depressing, and of religions I have found Christianity to possess the best "truth" I can find, worth having faith in and giving purpose to my life and to countless others.