Amaleq13

The general incoherence of the story is no one's problem but those who believe it actually happened. :wave:

temporalillusion

God allowed them to make a choice without equipping them for the choice.

This is like me asking my 5 year old what he wants to be when he grows up, then FORCING him to do it regardless if he changes his mind.. expecting the ability to discern good from evil when it's explicit said that the ability to discern good from evil COMES from the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

That's not what the Bible says, it says that after they ate the fruit their eyes were opened to the fact that they were naked.

Except for those who die without enough time. And time doesn't mean anything if the path to salvation is hidden from everyone.

Jesus said the way that leads to life is narrow and few will find it; this would imply that the world's dominate religion is wrong, else Jesus would have said most will find it.

Plus that statistic includes Catholics, and most evangelical Christians I know consider Catholicism a cult. Do you see Catholicism as a valid branch of Christianity, as valid as your own?

Dark Virtue

IBIH, let me make one thing clear, since you are making this assertion over and over again.

I can only speak for myself on this.

The reason that I concentrate on pointing out the negative aspects of God is for the very simple reason that they're in the Bible, clear as day, yet many, many Christians simply IGNORE them.

Think of a multi-faceted jewel...you're only looking at the positive aspects, but there are negative aspects as well, which are usually just ignored. So while it looks like I only want to point out the negative aspects, it's because I'm trying to make a point.

Just keep that in mind.

Let's talk about this a little more, since you seem to have missed my analogy...

If you see your child about to do something wrong, like say, enter a busy street to follow a ball, would you look over at your wife and say, "Check this out, she's about to learn a really good lesson"? Of course not, you reach out and stop her from being harmed. One would hope anyway.

That's called love and compassion. Allowing that child to get hit by a car in order to remind her that you've told her several times not to go into the street is NOT compassionate. As a human being, that love and compassion pales compared to the infinite love and compassion that God is supposed to have.

How then, did God let his only two children get talked into running out into the street, get hit by a semi and then curse all of their offspring for what they did? All in the name of free will?

Not loving. Not compassionate.

bacht

To be fair, the Problem of Evil has been examined by philosophy as well as religion (Job is an example from the Jewish tradition). Now it tends to be relegated to psychology.

Yep, the literalist approach is a dead-end.

funinspace

Often this notion of God's love is paralleled with the idea of a love of a father (or parent) for a child. So I will comment on your statement from this perspective.

This father sends all those who have heard and do not call on Christ's name, to be abused eternally by a monster that he threw out of his gold palace, by this God's choice. He did not put Himler to death, he sent him to the dungeon and let him set up a play ground for his entertainment. Most all of western world knows of this Christ and God for sure. The large majority of Northwestern Europe doesn't believe in a personal God. So they at least are hell bound by the theology of 70-80% percent of Christianity, let alone the rest of the world.

He demands that you accept the truth and authority of him. Being good is irrelevant; having empathy for humanity is irrelevant. If you do not do this simple thing, and reject his Son, you are condemned. All you have to do is say "Dad, I hate you and do not recognize your authority, nor respect you, nor will I ever listen to you again"; and walk off into the sunset. And you get door #2, hell. This is NOT love. If we took the parable of the lost son, he would have ran off; never came back vice the pretty Bible tale's ending. This father would 20 years later, hunt him down and send him down to the dungeon to be Himler's toy to torture till the end. Yes, within this theology, one can come back from all sorts of heinous crimes, and become "saved". But, the condition is still there: YOU HAVE TO COME BACK, or it's eternal torment. Gandhi, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin among others, all got hell by this theology, if their written words rang true. They all knew of Christ's message and found it vacuous. Again, no normal/mentally healthy human would do this to a child. This is NOT the love of a father. This is not a lesson normal people teach, or inflict upon their children. Normal humans don't torture their children.

Here is another way to look at what you are calling free will, or choice, regarding hell. No sane person would choose to go to an eternal hell that you envision. You think your God is the alpha and the omega; you think him omnipresent (correct me if I get some of your views wrong). Hell would not exist, if your God did not plan for it to be there, for he created everything. With his omnipresence, he know how wide and far his Good News would travel; he knew the capacity of man; he knew that this Good News would not cross cultural divides well at all. He could have simply chosen to create a universe where those that did not believe had a simple and clean real death, with nothingness evermore. That at least would not be an obscenity. He could have also chosen to make sure his message had more clarity; and survived much better in history. This would at least gather more True Believers. Yet he choose not to, but left humanity much like little children groping in the dark...

One could say your God, is like the master of a large day care center. And this master decided to put a large and deep swimming pool in the play area. Of the 100 toddlers that went to this day care center 67 of them crawled or walked into this pool and drowned. When the authorities came and arrested the master, he said "what did I do wrong? I warned each child not to enter the pool; I told them they would be much happier if they stayed by me and listened to my stories. It was their free choice to turn away from what I said".

Quite Orwellian this "Love" is, when the results much more closely matches the most grotesque barbarism humans can envision...

WilliamFearless

There is still a Garden of Eden? Can you show us on Google Earth?

What is a "Bible artifact"? Can you give us some examples?

IBelieveInHymn

Honestly, I do not see any negativity in the bible. You can show me 1,000 verses, and I will have a reasonable answer for it.

Of course I would panic and hope my child doesn't get hit by a car, but by the same token, if someone did hit my child and injure them, I would go after the driver of that car with a great vengeance.

God is a God of love, but also a God of vengeance and wrath. He clearly explains this over and over. Don't be mistaken, God has shown us what he will do to us if we disobey him.

spamandham

Sounds like one hell of a nice guy. He's so cute you just want to pinch his cheeks.

IBelieveInHymn

No, because it existed thousands of years ago.


Joseph coins; http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/133601

Kingdom of David; http://www.bible-history.com/archaeo...dan-stele.html


Brick of Nebuchadnezzar II; http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore...nezzar_ii.aspx

http://www.biblehistory.net/Links.htm

More bible artifacts and amazing discoveries;
This site includes, 1,000 year old Exodus Verses,
Israel's Antiquities Authority announced the discovery of 2nd Temple wall

http://www.squidoo.com/ancientartifacts

Here's a good one for you to read;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...t_to_the_Bible

IBelieveInHymn

He's sounds pretty cool to me. If you do him right, he will do you right. If you slander him, he will slander you.

You are pretty much in a no win situation whether you believe in Him or not.