Heathen Dawn

Very simple: it's a loaded gun held to your head.



God is the creator of the consequence. Going to hell is not merely like leaning off a roof and falling from it - it's like being on a roof and then someone (God) pushes you off it actively if you don't do what he wants.

Mageth

Originally posted by Magus55
Nope, because everything surrounding religion is way too complicated for humans to do it alone.

So, then, all the world's religions are true?

We are stupid primates( or so you think).

Speak for yourself. I consider myself a member of the smart primate species. But I do wonder sometimes, when I hear my fellow primates spouting their religious superstition.

And anyway. Explaining a world ancient man didn't understand, doesn't account for where Christianity came from. If Jesus wasn't real, and in turn, didn't do anything He claimed to, why in the world would you ever go through all that work to make it succeed? The Apostles would have just stuck with Judaism if nothing surrounding Christianity was real.

And the same argument can be applied to all other religions, including Judaism, Islam, Mormonism, Scientology, Hindusim, Buddhism, etc.

Zucco

God never told me anything. A bunch of people have told me confusing, conflicting, often nonsensical accounts of things that supposedly happenned thousands of years ago.

According to the bible, god used to interact with man quite a bit. If his penalty for non-belief is eternal damnation, why can't he tell me that to my face?!?

Magus55

Mohammed never claimed to be God, and never attempted to prove it. Even Mohammed exalted Jesus to a state higher than he was. You're right in that people will die for something they believe strongly enough in, but they won't die for something that they made up. Which is what you claim the apostles did. If Jesus didn't come back from the dead, and perform miracles, the Apostles would have thought of him as a joke and a waste of time, and would have never persued Christianity. They spent their whole life prior following Judaism, and so suddenly one man comes along, makes up a bunch of stories about being God, and not proving it, all the while going against the traditions of the Jews, and the Apostles just decided to abandon Judaism for him? That is completely illogical and would never happen. The Apostles did not make up Christianity, because no one in their right mind would follow it without any backing, especially to the extent that Christianity has acheived. Not to mention, the Apostles ( with the exception of Luke), were primarily uneducated, peasant boys. Yet they made up the Bible, followed their own myth, died gruesome deaths for it, and got it to become the greatest religion in human history? Dang, if i can acheive something as successful as Christianity with no education, why the heck am I going to college?

Heathen Dawn

I didn't claim the apostles made up the Jesus story. But that story was made up by followers of Jesus who refused to face the fact of his death. And the apostles made a religion out of it later.



Non-sequitur. People can believe in a thing without its ever having happened in reality.



Get a clue: they were expecting the Messiah. Just like followers of Shabtai Zevi in the 16th century. They were awaiting the cancellation of Jewish law.

Amaranth

Man built the nuclear bomb apparently without "gods" help. Where is anything surrounding religion too complicated for, say, a good charlatan?

1: You don't have proof Jesus existed. You don't have proof Jesus did what is written. If you did, I would be Christian.

B: You have no proof of why the Apostles, assuming those stories are true, went to Christianity. Did the Lutherans break with the Catholic church, and go through what they went through, because of visions from god or policy disagreement? What about the Babtists? Or the Eastern Orthodox? Or....

Drei: What about other religious fanatics who have gone to absurd lengths because of religion? Branch Dividian, anyone? How about Heavens Gate? People blow themselves up nearly every week for Allah.

Magus55

What makes you think you would believe anyway? People in the Bible that saw Jesus perform miracles still didn't believe who He said he was, what makes you think you'd be any different? Maybe God knows you would still ignore Him, so He doesn't bother? /shrug

Magus55

I know how to make an atomic bomb. The only hard part is getting the materials. Atom bombs are very simplistic. And nuclear weapons haven't made the impact on humanity that christianity has. Considering millions and millions of doctors, theologists, archaeologists etc. still can't fully understand the entire Bible, its so complex, yet one team of scientists figured out how to split uranium atoms. And compared to nature, which God created, atomic bombs are like fire crackers. The Mt. St. Helens explosion had more energy than 10,000 atomic bombs. Not that big of a feat if you ask me. Oh and of course, the purpose of building atomic bombs was such an applaud worthy act. "Hmm, how can we find the most destructive, and painful weapon on Earth, that liquifies the skin of humans, shatters their charred bones with a sonic shockwave, and gives millions of people excruitiatingly painful raidiation burns and cancer; oh I know, lets split uranium atoms!" Hardly a great achievement.

You don't have proof that the journals scientists present their facts in are right either. How do you know scientists aren't trying to get you to believe in what they want? Have you actually gone out, dug up fossils, and done extensive testing, and radiometric dating on them yourself? How do you know Ceasar existed, and the people that wrote about him weren't making up a fictional character? Almost everyone gets info from someone else, yet you accept what scientists or historians say about other things without thinking twice. Nice double standard.

Logic tells us, that the Apostles were originally Jewish, and based on other accounts during that time, usually when a self-proclaimed Messiah dies and doesn't come through on his promise, his followers disband and return to their former religions. Something made the Apostles go against the norm for other self-proclaimed messiahs and their followers, and since they had no other reason to hold on to Jesus' life, the ressurection probably happened. I'm just doing what atheists do. If it looks like the most plausible explanation, it probably is.

What your point? They believe that their religion is right because nothing has told them otherwise. Once David Koresh died, his followers gave up on him. Heavens Gate believed killing themselves was the right thing to do. Its not like they made up a religion, knew for a fact it was false, and killed themselves anyway just for kicks. And The Quran tells Muslims to kill themselves for his cause. The muslims that blow buildings up think they are doing the right thing, because Mohammed said thats what they should do. Its not like Muslims know for a fact that the Quran is a made up story, and blow up buildings in a mythical gods name just for fun.

Darth Dane

Exactly. But why believe the bible and Christianity? Why not believe the Hindus, or the Muslims, or the Buddhists, etc., etc., ad naseum? You can't know any of them empirically; they're all based on "faith." Why believe one over the other?


I don't. But in this instance we are discussing Jesus, who is connected, seemingly more to, the OT than any other belief-structure.

However, there are many things in other religions that can be connected to the same idea.












DD - Love & Laughter

Biff the unclean

There's a great Dudley Moore movie called Bedazzled which retells the Faust tale. In one scene Dudley asks the devil why he rebelled and the devil says that he couldn't take all the praising. Dudley says" oh, that doesn't sound so bad." The devil hops up on a mail box and says "lets try it, shall we. You dance around and tell me how wonderful I am." Dudley does, "You are so good looking, you are great, hey lost a little weight." "Keep going," the devils says " more about how wonderful I am and keep dancing." The scene lasts about two more minutes before Dudley agrees that the devil had no other choice because praising sucks so badly.