SecularFuture

7thangel
Oh come on… That would be like saying “today, as was prophesized, the sun still rises.” As I explained in a previous post, biblical prophecy carries no weight. Either the prophecy is soft - easy to manipulate to a personal interpretation, or unfounded on the blind assumption that the supernatural is real.

Why do you believe your bible was inspired by a deity?

Only for those who continue to believe in such concepts. Our existence, and universe, can both be explain naturally, and rationally, without the inclusion of any of the many God concepts.

Exactly.

This is a personal opinion, based on a religious faith, devoid of facts or reason.

7thangel

Sue Sponte said: I don't mean this in an inflammatory way, but does this apply to child molesting priests as well? I presume the answer would be that pedophiles are not acting in God's name, but if some are not "holy", then does this not refute the belief that God is doing the choosing, or perhaps suggest that the choosing is not being done all that well?

First, I am not a catholic, no offense to Albert. The Church I speak of refers to the chosen, and I am referring to hierarchy in the church that will evolve in the resurrection.

As to God’s election, I have made and example about Jacob and Esau. In which an unworthy man, Esau, was predestined to receive promises. But I am implying that God is responsible for every good and evil that exists, which mean that He made Esau predestined to destruction, same as Jacob predestined to glory. And that man’s being is all given of God. And that in the end, the good and evil happens for the benefit of the chosen. Without accepting this fact, there is no way we can justify God about the flood of Noah, of God’s order to Saul to kill “all” men, women, infant, and sucklings of the Amalekites, and of other commands to destroy human lives.

The doctrine of predestination was only revealed during the time of the apostles. It was not taught openly because the doctrine is for those who are matured in thinking. And the advances of science are actually supporting it, where, by science, we see humans as just physically existing of no worth.

God Bless

Sue Sponte

I appreciate your honesty in admitting that seeing the issue in such terms is the only way to justify God's behavior, as you see it. But from my view, I see you saying that God chooses people to inflict harm on others and this is somehow beneficial to the "chosen". What I fail to understand is how pedophilia or murder of innocents can possibly be viewed as "for the benefit" of anyone.

rainbow walking

Hi 7th angel,
You made this interesting comment which I am compelled to question:

And the advances of science are actually supporting it, where, by science, we see humans as just physically existing of no worth.

I was wondering if you could point me to the particular scientifically supported fact that our physical existence is worthless? I realize that some folks may be making this inference from some of the theoretical postulates being profferred by science in fields like cosmology, physics and biology but these are just interpretations, kinda like those you are proferring from the bible.

IMV the best interpretation to be derived from current scientific advancement is that every individual comes into this world devoid of any intrinsic value and only has value assigned to him/her by those already here, until such time as he/she is able to begin creating their own value. To say that we just physically exist without any value is very close to what theism says, except theism declares we have negative value, in other words, we just muck up existence and need a higher being from which to derive our value.

I, for one, refuse to allow theistic interpretations of reality to drag me into that abyss. So what if we have no intrinsic value? That doesn't mean we need anything other than life and liberty to create our own extrinsic value among our fellow countrymen. Most people would prefer to shun this responsibility and assign themselves a higher value than they really merit. And that, my friend, is where a great deal of immorality takes root.

Asha'man

Albert, you amaze me. You are apparently trying to argue that Genesis agrees with modern science, but your argument fails miserably when subjected to unbiased reason.

You are tossing in metaphorical interpretations when they aren’t warranted. The context is clear here, and pretty simple:

On day 3, God created “grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree.” This is very specific, and there is no reason not to take this literally.

For that to happen, the previous pair of verses about separating the waters from the land must also be literal, since all these plants require dry land.

If we have dry land and oceans on day 3, we must have a base for them earlier than that, right? That means that the physical Earth had already been created. Since verse 1 clearly describes the creation of the Earth, and we need a literal Earth to be created around then, how can you possibly decide that is a purely metaphorical usage of the term?

If this is a metaphorical verse, where is the verse that describes the literal creation of Earth? Please don’t suggest that a creation story would leave such an important detail out, not if you want us to take you seriously.

As for Genesis agreeing with science, your argument utterly falls apart on the 4th day. Only after dry land has appeared, and after sunlight requiring plants are around, is the actual sun created. This is completely against current scientific understanding of both how plants work and the formation of the solar system.

Genesis also claims that two lights were made on the 4th day, one to rule the night and one to rule the day. If you think that the night light is the moon, you are again in disagreement with science. The moon isn’t a light, it is a partially illuminated rock. It doesn’t even rule the night, since it isn’t visible at a given hour of the night for half the lunar month. (Arguing that the moon “looked” light a light isn’t going to be accepted, since you are claiming actual scientific knowledge by the author, who therefore should have known better. Also, I’m not going to accept a linguistic shortcut, since words that convey the idea of “illuminated” and “rock” surely existed in ancient Hebrew.)

After creating the sun and the moon, God goes on to make the rest of the stars. Again, this is on day 4, and fails miserably to agree with science. Stars in general predate our sun by perhaps 8 billion years, and yet Genesis places them after the formation of the sun and moon (day 4), after the formation of the earth (day 1), after dry land and oceans (day 3), and even after flowering plants! (day 3)

Not only is the timing off, but the order is hopelessly wrong. This is exactly the point that Jack the Bodiless made much earlier, but you ignored it then. Tell me, are you going to ignore it again?

bgponder

Whew!!

Came into the thread late, and thought at first on hearing "Chosen", etc. from 7th Angel, we were in the presence of CP!

But I see Angel is much too liberal in interpreting the Word, more like my local Southern Baptists.

What a relief.

Generally speaking, 7thangel, where to you derive the authority for your particular spin(s)?

I mean, you say some stuff is to be figuratively interpreted, and then you say that there will be a "hierarchy in the Church that will evolve in the resurrection".

According to at least one school of Christian thought that I am personally familiar with, concepts like the resurrection and the very nature of books like Revelation and Ezekiel are figurative, and their interpretations deemed speculative.

As a matter of fact, what your interpretations do would be regarded in this discipline to be sinful, i.e. "going beyond the word."

If I was convinced that the Christian God was real, why should I trust your telling of that reality?


Sincerely, BarryG

7thangel

Sue Sponte said: I appreciate your honesty in admitting that seeing the issue in such terms is the only way to justify God's behavior, as you see it. But from my view, I see you saying that God chooses people to inflict harm on others and this is somehow beneficial to the "chosen". What I fail to understand is how pedophilia or murder of innocents can possibly be viewed as "for the benefit" of anyone.

Homosexuality is actually helpful in knowing the mystery of body, soul and spirit. It also point to understanding that behavior is very much related to the “physical make” of a person. It proves that man’s will is directly related to his physical make. Thus making us to believe more of determinism. And in determinism, we lose meaning of our existence. Of course, we also see the physical harm in the society.

The murder of innocents, on the other hand, shows us the dependence of human value unto God. Our value depends on the potter’s hand. We are just dust formed of God into human. Thus, the Bible itself says that man’s righteousness is likened unto a filthy rug. But what we should really understand is that the clay cannot complain unto the potter, and say, “Why have you made me thus?” Unless, we do not have good understanding of the clay-potter relationship, God ordering to kill the innocents will be offensive unto us.

bgponder said: Generally speaking, 7thangel, where to you derive the authority for your particular spin(s)?

Common sense, rationality, truth, sound judgment, and of good understanding; whichever of these that would find me justified unto you. If you find any of these things in what I am saying, they are the authorities.

bgponder said: I mean, you say some stuff is to be figuratively interpreted, and then you say that there will be a "ierarchy in the Church that will evolve in the resurrection".

According to at least one school of Christian thought that I am personally familiar with, concepts like the resurrection and the very nature of books like Revelation and Ezekiel are figurative, and their interpretations deemed speculative.

As a matter of fact, what your interpretations do would be regarded in this discipline to be sinful, i.e. "going beyond the word."

If I was convinced that the Christian God was real, why should I trust your telling of that reality?

Like my answer above, if you find either common sense, rationality, truth, sound judgment, or good understanding of what I am saying, put your trust through those things. Atheists and theists judge of themselves of common sense, rationality, truth, sound judgment, and of good understanding.
On the other hand, for people to say that such interpretations are “speculative,” they admit their ignorance of the matter. So why should they be authoritative to such subject?

rainbow walking said: I was wondering if you could point me to the particular scientifically supported fact that our physical existence is worthless? I realize that some folks may be making this inference from some of the theoretical postulates being profferred by science in fields like cosmology, physics and biology but these are just interpretations, kinda like those you are proferring from the bible.

I guess you may call it a theory but I believe that we will arrive to a conclusion that we are bound by the concept of Determinism. Any advancement in science that points us to believe of the concept of determinism will do.

rainbow walking said: IMV the best interpretation to be derived from current scientific advancement is that every individual comes into this world devoid of any intrinsic value and only has value assigned to him/her by those already here, until such time as he/she is able to begin creating their own value. To say that we just physically exist without any value is very close to what theism says, except theism declares we have negative value, in other words, we just muck up existence and need a higher being from which to derive our value.

I, for one, refuse to allow theistic interpretations of reality to drag me into that abyss. So what if we have no intrinsic value? That doesn't mean we need anything other than life and liberty to create our own extrinsic value among our fellow countrymen. Most people would prefer to shun this responsibility and assign themselves a higher value than they really merit. And that, my friend, is where a great deal of immorality takes root.

The concept of determinism voids man of the concept of free will. That whatever being that evolve from man is dependent to the forces of nature. And since all things comes natural, existing according to the dictate of nature, there exist no good and evil in every being. So everything has no value, even man. Given that we are under the concept of determinism, it follows that nobody can change anybody, and that all will happen according to what our physical nature, being governed by the forces of nature, would lead us into. A crazy will always be crazy, lunatic will be lunatic, etc. Though it seems that we change anybody through our words or actions it still because of the forces of nature that lead him/her to respond. And, also, we did the words or actions because we are lead by the same forces of nature too. So everything just exists and things happen. No good, no evil, only natural.

As to assignment of value, that, in principle, is chaotic. For who would assign anyway? of whose purpose and benefit?

God Bless

Jack the Bodiless

Apparently the apologists like to argue that Day 4 refers to the appearance of the Sun, Moon and stars when seen from Earth (i.e. the atmosphere becomes transparent), not their actual creation. Nitrogen and carbon dioxide are transparent, but a CO2 "greenhouse effect" could have made the Earth a hotter and steamier place until photosynthesis scrubs the CO2 from the atmosphere. Hence the appearance of astronomical bodies "after plants".

Not that it really helps though. Now we're left with a "creation myth" that doesn't mention the actual creation of ANY astronomical bodies, and the types of plants are specified: Genesis isn't talking about blue-green algae, and the transformation of the atmosphere would have happened long before the appearance of the large land plants mentioned.

Even if we allow some poetic license and say that the plants of Day 3 WERE photosynthetic plankton, surely we'd have to do the same with the bugs that ate them? Now we have animals that should be appearing "before the Sun and Moon", but don't!

It's a mess. Even allowing such blatant distortions of what the authors clearly intended, the order is STILL wrong.

Sue Sponte

The issue I raised was pedophilia, not homosexuality. Regardless, I simply don't follow what you are saying here. How does molesting children help people understand "the mystery of body, soul and spirit," and more importantly, couldn't an omnipotent God find a way to illustrate these things to humans without raping innocent children?

You aren't addressing the morality of killing an innocent, instead simply stating that it isn't your place to judge such conduct. That seems a complete cop out to me. In other words, you support the Christian depiction of "God" regardless of whether his/her conduct is just or moral itself. I refuse to accept a human depiction of a supreme being that would act with such base HUMAN failings.

Albert Cipriani

Asha says:
Don’t you guys read? Must you force me to quote myself? I hate to do that as it is exceedingly boring for me. Here goes:
I know you think the Genesis myth-makers were stone aged morons, but just how dumb could they be? After all, they could make stone tools, something you and I would be hard-pressed to do. So as dumb as they were, do you think they could be as dumb as you suggest? By “heaven and earth” they meant “our sky and our planet earth” were created as the first act of God, but then just six and nine verses later, they being so dumb, forget that they’d already said God created heaven and earth and so have Him create it again?

Keep in mind that everyone agrees that this myth was memorized and passed down orally for many generations before Moses wrote it down. So for me to be dumb enough to believe you, I’ve got to believe that there were many generations of morons incapable of perceiving or correcting this obvious oversight that is so apparent to you. No thanks, Albert the Traditional Catholic
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