Demigawd

What text?

And

What?

GeoTheo

I am replying to ex-xian

Demigawd

I know. Therefore I reiterate "what text" and "what are you talking about"?

ex-xian

Please, by all means, explain to me how those passages should be interpreted other than to take them literally. I was a fundy xian for 20 years; I've been to Bible college. Believe me, I'm making every attempt to understand the text. I contend that it is you who are going the wrong way. You take a book full of problems such as I have pointed out, and base your life (and afterlife) upon it. It seems to me that you would want to straighten out all the problems with a book before you consider it holy.

I'll pick one to start with. Please explain to me how the following is moral. The jews who were taken into captivity in babylon were asked to sing the song of zion. The song of celebration about jerusalem. Well a psalmist instead wrote a song about how wonderful it would be to see the skulls of the babylonian children smashed upon the rocks. That's in psalms, in the old testament, in the bible, in the cannon of god's holy word.

So, according to you, one of the immutable truths of the bible is that a song about babies being violently killed in part of the book whose main focus is singing praise to god.

Ok, explain that to me and I'll take you comments about the wisdom in the bible 100 times more seriously.

Eudaimonist

And what is this wisdom that you allege that atheists lack?

Also, under what circumstances have you met atheists? Any particular groups?

Cthulhu

Christians have absolutely no insight in the most important issues of life, if we are to believe Homer.

Badfish

Who or what has more insight, the Bible or Homer?

JLennon

I refer back to Earnest Sparks remarks: he thinks I have no read communist manifesto--I have--I have read much of the dreary book Das Kapitol as well. He thinks xianity is a fraud and soviet union did not do marxism right. Marxism is a bigger fraud than even xianity--and the proof is in the pudding. Marxism paints a utopian culture that it cannot deliver. By the way, american government practices much of communist manifesto--separation of family done very well by the military. No allowing mass assembly--american government works very hard to keep Waco people and the like divided and to misinform the public. I will go so far as to say that Marxism has resulted in more deaths than xianity has. Witness Stalin's purging and Soviet Revolution and Chineese revolution. Also--one cannot deny that Marxism was behind WWI and WWII a little--just like Korean War and Viet Nam to a small degree. But don't count those wars and marxism still is responcible for nearly a billion deaths--and that is not counting millions killed in africa and Pan America. All your religious wars in europe and the Inquisition combined did not kill as many as marxism did in just Soviet Union and China alone in just the 20th century. One can make the claim that these murders were imperfect enactment of marxism--same excuse used for xianity. You cannot make marxism work without forcing it on people and killing a huge chunk of the population--witness ever instance where it has been established. No question that marxist form of atheism is significantly less humane than xianity ever has been in its long tormented history. And Marxism has only been around for about a century. And we saw how bloody the French Revolution became with its enlightened leader Napoleon wars to follow.

Cthulhu

Homer. Definitely Homer.

JLennon

Ditto for Homer.