BadBadBad

God needs to add a good deal of personal revelation and supernatural manifestation of himself to jump start the Bible? Did you actually say that? I thought that's what the Bible was supposed to be all about? What happened to the first two attempts at exactly that? Why do we need God to jump start our faith?

If miracles were a common occurrence, yes we might take them for granted, but we'd all believe in Christianity without doubt. In just the same way I don't believe in Chrisitianity in reality. Why didn't God just make it obvious?


Your list of things that could lead you to be an atheist?

No I don't seriously think I could add anything to your list that would absolutely prove the non-existence of God. How about another hypothetical though?

What if you were actually exposed to the religion you believe in? What if god appeared before you. Once you and He got to know each other on an actual personal basis, God has a little test of your faith. He wants you to murder your child as a demonstration of your faith. Just for the sweet savour of it. Then once he's convinced you're one righteous dude, he tells you the Muslims are one bad lot, and something must be done about it. "How about you taking some flight training?"

How would you feel about your religion then? Would you do it? How would you be sure it was God and not Satan or Allah? You might say it couldn't be God. God wouldn't ask me something my conscience won't allow. That would take a moral judgement wouldn't it? What would be the basis of that judgement if not God? Would you dare judge God? Would you dare deny God? You might say the Bible says that could never happen. If it did actually happen though, then the Bible would be wrong. If actually confronted by God and he told you point blank that the Bible was wrong, would you believe it? Seriously off topic, but just curious. I love hypotheticals.



Have you seen the ongoing debate here at IIDB between Till and Gastrich? Gastrich opens with this argument. He makes a very well thought out point by point accusation along these lines. Unfortunately, as I read through the debate, Gastrich becomes the prime suspect not Till.


I hope the Bible's philosophy of having your wife be the headless slave minion of your holiness works out with your partner. However, I submit to your superior faith based interpretation of the Bible over my heathenistic satan based interpretation.

Rational BAC

Revelations? I should have figured. Wasn't Revelations kicked out of the canon at least once? I don't think you can kick out Revelations often enough.

Revelations is just sick loony tunes stuff. Wasn't it written down supposedly by John in his dotage?-------Either he was senile or had been chewing on some funny mushrooms.

Cross Examiner

brettc, some thoughts:

Well, wrote it. Yeah.

God reveals Himself to you. You write it down. It gets compiled into the Bible. It went that way for Moses. Jeremiah. David. Paul. Etc. If there was no initial revelation to these men there would be no Bible and no Christianity. These acts of revelation is what I meant by "jump-start the Book." Is there another way to get the word out to humanity apart from God directly speaking to humans at first?

Or some other religion--which might not be the effect God would want if Christianity is true. Then again, does God want the devotion of men who had no choice other than believe in Him? Seems to defeat the idea of free will to me.

If it was obvious, there'd not be much of a choice in the matter.

You're referring to Abraham and Isaac? Murder or sacrifice of devotion? Did God let Abraham do it? Did God ever intend Isaac to die that way? What might be the reason for such a test? What positive lesson might Abraham, Isaac or anyone else learn from such an account?

God hates muslims? Are you riddling about Ishmael? Flight training? Sure, why not.

The same way you know anyone, spend time communicating with them.

It's ok. Moral judgements are necessary in day-to-day life.

Nope. I wouldn't.

Um. Sure. What are we talking about again?

Sure. I'd believe it. Then I'd ask Him who shot JFK and what He wants me to do next, if anything. Fortunately I know the voice of God from the voice of Satan. The devil is in the details

Yeah, even the name Gastrich sounds evil and untrustworthy . I've read the Geisler-Till debate at iidb. Farrel was interesting but couldn't hang with Geisler IMO. If you post a link to Gastrich-Till I'll check it.

Whoah. I think you need to read my post, which you are responding to in the quote above, again: "Hope that philosophy works out for you partner " -- which was in response to your objection that I not translate the Bible for you since you learned to read when you were 5 etc... Note that I did not say: "Hope that philosophy works out for your partner." When I read the latter then your response about wives and slaves and holiness and heathenistic satanic interpretation and stuff kinda makes sense now. Note, again, that I was not talking about your wife. That'd be pretty low. Give me the benefit of the doubt next time?

Ya know, partner, like what folks affectionately call each other sometimes. You're from Texas right?

Regards,
BGiC

Opera Nut

Any God that wants me to believe he or she or it exists better DAMNED WELL TELL ME WHAT THE F*CK HE WANTS!!!


IN PERSON AND IN TECHNICOLOR AND STEREO!!

NO AMBIGUITY!!
:banghead:

Asha'man

I hate this free-will defense, I've always thought it was one of the stupidest arguments ever invented by theists.

It isn't free-will if it isn't an informed decision. I can't honestly choose between options A and B if I don't know that B actually exists. If choosing B is a requirement to avoid Hell, and there is an utter lack of convincing evidence that B exists, then God is clearly malevolent.

Second, if knowledge actually destroys free-will, then God seems to have ignored the free-will of most of the characters in the bible. For example, Moses had no free-will, since God talked to him. In fact, all of Exodus was pointless, since the stated purpose of God's intervention was to demonstrate his power, so he was stomping on the free-will of two entire nations (Israel and Egypt). Obviously, God really could care less about free-will.

PopeInTheWoods

Atheists don't claim to be their own gods. That's Mormons, Scientologists, and (if you stretch the definition) some Eastern philosophies. It is neither funny nor surprising that you would project this belief onto atheists, since you appear incapable of grasping the concept that people can lack belief in any small-g "gods".

As for claiming there's no capital-G "God" being arrogant, I guess you consider about half of the world's population (all non-Abrahamics) arrogant. Or is it the two-thirds that don't believe in the xian triune "God"? Or the 80+% that aren't "born again"? Or the over six billion that don't believe exactly as you do?

The theistic (especially xian) projection of arrogance onto atheists always make me laugh. Which of the following statements is more arrogant?

- "I'm one of many finite beings who occupy an infinitesimal portion of the Universe."

- "I have an immortal soul and a personal relationship with the Creator of the Universe."

Andy

BadBadBad

BGC, I think we have several interesting conversations going, at this point all of them off topic. Which would you like to pursue in another thread? I'll try to hold back on the riducule if you'll hold back on knowing the absolute truth. Oh, and I appreciate you for answering all my questions. I ask a lot, and almost everyone else ignores most of them.

On revelations from God:

I believe God could have made it obvious. I believe, assuming Bible is the inspired word of God, that it was so obscure and unbelievable that it appears that the intent was to make it virtually impossible for most to believe (christianity is a minority).

I'd love to talk to you more on this. Free will is my favorite topic and this business of the unbelievable nature of christianity and the Bible is now integrating into that.


Another interesting topic on it's own. Whether or not God let Abraham do it, he asked him. My hypothetical is exposing you to that directly. He's testing you in the same way. How would you answer the test not in action but your decision. Would you grab your kid by the arm and drag him to the designated place of sacrifice without question? Would you question God? Would you judge God? Would you deny God? If he followed that up with a request to get flight training and fly a 747 into Mecca, same questions. Even if you did deny God, what lessons would you learn about God?

Another good discussion. Does God define absolute morality?



Really? How can you be sure. How about sharing some of those details?


You'll have to trace back to the original debate site for this argument on the correct interpretation of the bible argument, but here is the link on IIDB: debate



I missed one letter in your statement and it totally changed the meaning. I added an R to "you." My apologies. I was the one to make a low blow.

Cross Examiner

Touché.


Is there an utter lack of evidence? How so? I can point you in the direction of some good evidence if you care to follow it like your very life depended on it. Don't believe your life depends upon it? Because there's an utter lack of evidence? Hm. Circular.

Knowledge doesn't destroy free will. Though coercion can. Moses could have written off the Burning Bush as bad pizza. Pharaoh could've written off the plagues of God as trickery, since he was God. After the sixth, he begins to doubt himself and believe that God indeed was and was with Moses. Uh oh. Time to have a change of heart? Nope. Too late. God hardened him irrevocably so He could deliver the Jews as dramatically as possible, on the world's biggest stage. So big, we still talk about it and make movies about it. He could've let Pharaoah scamper off with his tail between his legs, but He didn't. Cruel? Nope. Pharaoh could've done the right thing before it was SO VERY APPARENT. But he didn't. We give felons three strikes in California. Not unlimited mercy for evildoers who consistently choose evil. Pharoah had free will but it came to an end. Each has free will but it will also come to it's natural end. Your choice. How do you know God is not speaking to you right now? Asking you to believe on Christ for the remission of your sins? Bad pizza? Silly stories? Have you looked at all the evidence? No? What are you waiting for?

When you look for me with all your heart, you will find me. Jeremiah 29:13 (NIV)

Regards,
BGiC

Demigawd

Please do so.

Cross Examiner

brettc,

How about confident in the absolute truth ? It is my pleasure speaking/writing with you brettc.

I disagree with that analysis. We could focus on the credibility of the Bible. But even that is a monstrous subject. I would kick to you and ask what in particular you find most unbelievable. Personally, I would choose to focus on the resurrection of Christ since it is the linch-pin of all history. But you choose.

I agree on the importance of free will. But I'm already involved in two other threads on this very thing. I'd hate to pick up a third though you may wish to enter the fray here and/or here.


I'd be interested in developing this one also.

And there's an ongoing thread that intend to one day rejoin here.

Respectfully, we'd have to put the horse before the cart. Before knowing the difference between God and Satan you need to know God. If you preclude the Bible as the Word of God then you'll you'll have a tough time getting to know Him since, as mentioned prior, you're unlikely to get your own personal audience with God to set you straight. We can develop all this too if you want.

Thanks for the link.

Not a problem bro. So, to sum, I'm up for the Abraham thing, the getting to know God thing, or the Resurrection or other Bible hang-up thing. I'm not running a duplicate of any of the aforementioned. You choose which one you think you'd like to discuss most, first and let me know.

Regards,
BGiC