Validity of the Bible

[jay_a2j]

Say God doesn't exist. What's so wrong in the idea?

I would say nothing at all. Just look around you if you want to see what it's like.

*looks around...Nope thats not what its like. You see, the Spirit of God is still dwelling on the Earth.... holding back evil (all out evil). If you want to see what its like without God around, wait till the tribulation. With the Spirit of God gone, Evil will have a field day!

God, your god may be perfect, but man is not, im not saying god isint bright im saying the people that took his word (going off of the basis that god exists) is flawed and this is where i try to control my anger and rage so i will make sense

people bend "gods" word all the time, my friend MY FRIEND! was beaten with a baseball bat by her mother, for being "full of sin" she was drowned in a tub full of ice water BECAUSE the mother took "the word of god" and bent it to mean that she has to punish her daughter for being "full of sin" gave her daughter a choice between being beaten with a bat or burning her hands on the stove for being "full of sin" because of the belief in your god.... she had internal bleeding, collapsed in school, sent to the hospital, when she woke up she told them to let her bleed, my friend Jay has been hurt and mentally fucked up because of her mother, who like you believes in god... and likely like most back then, bent the "word of god" to make it mean something else..... you are essentially saying that "God" would not allow it to be bent... well prove me wrong of that fact....

Morph there are nuts in all walks of life. Your friend's mother obviously interpreted Gods word totally wrong. That or someone else interpreted it wrong for her. But that is different from Gods word being written down by man. If God is, (and I believe he is) omnipotent and omnipresent. He knows what Moses is going to do with the words he gives him to write down BEFORE he gives him the words! And if that is so, then God would be aware that Moses would write them down wrong, or that in the future people would translate them wrong. So why would he bother giving His word to a man who would "get it wrong"? He wouldn't. The authors of the Bible were given devine inspiration to write down Gods words. And so it is.

[Backglass]

*looks around...Nope thats not what its like. You see, the Spirit of God is still dwelling on the Earth.... holding back evil (all out evil). If you want to see what its like without God around, wait till the tribulation. With the Spirit of God gone, Evil will have a field day!

Nice way to explain it all away jay. You have a deluded way of reasoning away even the most far fetched stretches of the imagination. Everything is great now because your god is "holding back evil"? Bad things still happen so he must not have a very good hold on it, hmmm! And why is it that he only wants to "hold back evil" instead of eliminate it? Is he not capable of abolishing evil? Does he not have the power to just wave his hand/claw/flipper and eliminate it forever? If so, WHY isnt he? If not, WHY not? Didnt he invent evil in the first place? Please explain.

So...when this trifecta comes (any day now!) your god is just going to abandon this wonderful planet that he worked so hard on? Just sh*t can it and leave it to the evildoers? Why doesnt he just FIX the mess he made? Wasnt jesus purpose to save people? Thats why he came...right? Why not save EVERYONE?! Why not just wave a magical hand and say "Poof! Evil is gone! Everyone is saved! Now lets all get drunk & play pingpong!"

Go ahead...explain it all away. (No fair using the "he works in mysterious ways" copout.)

I look forward to it.

If God is, (and I believe he is) omnipotent and omnipresent.

Then he should be able to do the above. Why doesnt he?

The authors of the Bible were given devine inspiration to write down Gods words. And so it is.

jay. Do you believe the bible you put under your pillow at night is exactly the same as it was, word for word, 2000+ years ago.

Yes/No please.

[jay_a2j]

Nice way to explain it all away jay. You have a deluded way of reasoning away even the most far fetched stretches of the imagination. Everything is great now because your god is "holding back evil"? Bad things still happen so he must not have a very good hold on it, hmmm! And why is it that he only wants to "hold back evil" instead of eliminate it? Is he not capable of abolishing evil? Does he not have the power to just wave his hand/claw/flipper and eliminate it forever? If so, WHY isnt he? If not, WHY not? Didnt he invent evil in the first place? Please explain.

So...when this trifecta comes (any day now!) your god is just going to abandon this wonderful planet that he worked so hard on? Just sh*t can it and leave it to the evildoers? Why doesnt he just FIX the mess he made? Wasnt jesus purpose to save people? Thats why he came...right? Why not save EVERYONE?! Why not just wave a magical hand and say "Poof! Evil is gone! Everyone is saved! Now lets all get drunk & play pingpong!"

Go ahead...explain it all away. (No fair using the "he works in mysterious ways" copout.)

I look forward to it.

God is allowing evil so people can choose. To do evil or turn from evil and turn to Him. Could God abolish evil? Of course. God has created beings that worship Him (angels). They had no free will, they just did so because they were created too. God wanted to see if man would choose Him over evil (which came about when Lucifer decided he wanted to be God). So when God created man he gave us free will.

God is not going to abandon the planet. The 7 year tribulation God will judge the nations of the earth. By a never-seen before destruction ("no stone will be left on top of another") The world will be in termoil as never seen before. People will want to die but death will not find them. But in the end Jesus will decend and destroy the remaining armies of the earth and reign on earth for 1000 years. "And behold I saw a new Heaven and new Earth"

quote]

If God is, (and I believe he is) omnipotent and omnipresent.

Then he should be able to do the above. Why doesnt he?[/quote]


Already answered.

The authors of the Bible were given devine inspiration to write down Gods words. And so it is.

jay. Do you believe the bible you put under your pillow at night is exactly the same as it was, word for word, 2000+ years ago.

Yes/No please.

I believe the KJV to be the most word for word accurate of all the translations. Other translations have added/taken away from the original scripture. (And the Bible gives warning about this at the end of the book of Revelation) Is it exact word for word to the original Greek/Hebrew? Most likely the English translation can not be word for word since languages have their own unique words. But I believe the KJV to be accurate enough to get the message.

[vtmarik]

God is allowing evil so people can choose. To do evil or turn from evil and turn to Him. Could God abolish evil? Of course. God has created beings that worship Him (angels). They had no free will, they just did so because they were created too. God wanted to see if man would choose Him over evil (which came about when Lucifer decided he wanted to be God). So when God created man he gave us free will.

There's a slight problem with that statement:
If the angels had no free will, how did Lucifer decide anything?

God is not going to abandon the planet. The 7 year tribulation God will judge the nations of the earth. By a never-seen before destruction ("no stone will be left on top of another") The world will be in termoil as never seen before. People will want to die but death will not find them. But in the end Jesus will decend and destroy the remaining armies of the earth and reign on earth for 1000 years. "And behold I saw a new Heaven and new Earth"

Makes sense, since without the second coming and the book of Revelation he would never be able to fulfill the prophecies about the Messiah being a military king whose domain will rule from sea to sea. [Zechariah 9:10-13]

I believe the KJV to be the most word for word accurate of all the translations. Other translations have added/taken away from the original scripture. (And the Bible gives warning about this at the end of the book of Revelation) Is it exact word for word to the original Greek/Hebrew? Most likely the English translation can not be word for word since languages have their own unique words. But I believe the KJV to be accurate enough to get the message.

Yes, but if it is inaccurate, what then? And how do we know how accurate it is? How many original copies of the Bible still exist? One cannot theorize without data.

[heavycola]

God is allowing evil so people can choose. To do evil or turn from evil and turn to Him.

This was my point. I had to go to chapel every day at school and church every sunday, for 10 years. And this is what we were told. Choose god or go to hell.

But how can anyone choose what to believe? That's not how it works. Belief is not a matter of choice. I could choose not to believe that heroin is addictive and have myself a wild few days. Or I could choose to believe that a giant rabbit is leaving chocolate eggs in my bedroom every easter and live a happier, magic filled life.

You are saying, jay, that instead of proving himself to us, god instead allows evil to flourish and expects us to CHOOSE to believe in him on that basis? Religious faith is a huge cop out. "There's no proof. None at all. But you better believe or you are screwed."
WTF sort of deal is that?
It is a perfect control mechanism, and that's all it is.

[jay_a2j]

If the angels had no free will, how did Lucifer decide anything?

This is not known. But someone told me that God put the temptation in Lucerfer's mind.... and Lucifer acted on it (the first sin... rebelling against God). At some point God must have allowed Lucifer to have free will and 1/3 of the angels who sided with Lucifer.

Yes, but if it is inaccurate, what then? And how do we know how accurate it is? How many original copies of the Bible still exist? One cannot theorize without data.

I don't believe it is inaccurate (there may be small variations like the word "love". There is a word "Agapae" which is love, but it takes on a slightly different meaning than the word "love"). Just as there are words in other languages that cannot be exactly translated to English because English does not have a word that means the same thing. I do not know how many copies of the original scriptures remain.



Heavycola, if you had children, would you want them to love you because they wanted to love you or because they had no choice but to love you? God does not want you to believe in Him based on the existence of evil. God can be "known". "Seek and you shall find" and "Seek first the Kingdom of God". If we seek God he does not hide from us.

[MeDeFe]

so... "someone" told you, and god essentially MAKES Lucifer sin. "Hey, I'm bored, let's give this guy some free will and tempt him a little so he'll sin and we can have a nice rebellion and throw some guys out of here and create hell"

I know you didn't say that, but it's the message you convey. You do notice that you're always falling back on the "god works in mysterious ways"-concept, don't you?. Literally meaning "I have no fucking idea why god did it but I can't accept the possibility that it never happened."

[Backglass]

Heavycola, if you had children, would you want them to love you because they wanted to love you or because they had no choice but to love you?

Do you also tell your children that if they dont change their wicked ways and start worshiping you that you will cast them into a fiery eternal death? Or that one of your other, better children will come someday, imbued with special powers and that they should worship HIM too?

It is a perfect control mechanism, and that's all it is.

Yup, and it's working! Jay is a prime example.

[heavycola]

But someone told me that God put the temptation in Lucerfer's mind....

Well I'm certainly persuaded by that. And if that's the case, then god must REALLY love fucking with our heads.


Jay, if my kids don't love me then that's up to them. Would i still love them? I hope so. Would i condemn them to an eternity of unimaginable pain? Er, no. Am i more loving and merciful than god? Apparently.

[mr. incrediball]

There's evil for didactic reasons.

Without evil there is no good, and without good there is no evil.

It's all about balance, unfortunately Christianity rejects the concept of a balance between good and evil, because leaving one immediately leads to the other. There is no fulcrum, no center point for the two sides to balance on and so you get the "It's God or Satan, good vs. evil, my way or the highway" mentality. Without balance, there can be no peace. The Bible denies balance by claiming that there are only two ways to go, Toward God or Away from God. One cannot walk between the two and follow the third path which acknowledges both sides of nature.

What do you hear whenever a family survives a tornado? "God saved us."

You never hear "God sent the tornado" because Christianity forces you to focus on the positive, using deflection to shift doubt from God to Satan; "God works in mysterious ways" or "God has a plan."

I prayed for guidance and for an answer like the Bible says to do. The answer I was given? The Bible's all psychodrama designed to teach you about Free Will. Jesus didn't come down here to die for our sins, because sin is guilt. Jesus was God's way of showing us "Here is a creature with no free will, he knows his inevitable fate and he does not make the choice to take another road. Do not do this. I gave you free will so you would make your own choice."

And what did they do? They cooked up this sin nonsense and started preaching that Jesus came down to redeem mankind from original sin (which, also, consequently does not exist). Mankind always manages to screw things up (because the mob mentality never works).

The Tree of Knowledge is the metaphor for consciousness, for self-awareness. It was a test, a test of this free will thingy that God had never worked with before. That is why they were taken out of Eden. It wasn't a punishment, it was a reward. "I told them not to do that, they did it anyway, Free Will works, I can put them in the real world now!"

But man felt guilty, because man didn't understand. Hence sin, the guilt man feels for exercising free will because he doesn't fully understand it. So, man dies, his soul is filled with guilt, he goes down to hell and begs for purgation. He thinks he has offended God, so he demands to be punished for his "transgressions."

God didn't create evil, man did. Satan is Freud's superego, the societal pressure that we all feel to conform and to not exercise our base desires. It is the inevitable side effect of civilization that we should feel this guilt whenever we do something "uncivilized." God created man, and gave man free will. Man rejects free will and feels guilty for his perceived transgressions against the lord, hence we have sin and Hell. Those that reject this unnecessary guilt, are free. They are without sin, simply because they reject the concept.

God gave us free will, and yet we have people like Jay who surrender it to a misinterpreted book and some authoritative figures who claim to know what various passages mean. f*ck that, I'm proud of what God gave me and I'll be damned if I let some sanctimonious preacher tell me that I should surrender it to "God's will" which, in reality, is that very preacher's will.

*anime sweatdrops, grins*

Um... here endeth the lesson.

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that has got to be the most insightful thing anyone has posted on the internet... except the balance thing, good can live without evil, vice versa, and they can live together, but the rest... you may be on to something...

[mr. incrediball]

jay, i've been thinkin'... what kind of christian are you?

(roman catholic, church of england, protestant, unitarian, russian orthodox, ukrainian orthodox, various other orthodox churches, etc etc)

[mr. incrediball]

Do you think God would give his word to man and allow them to "bend" it? As imperfect as man is, God is perfect. He would not allow man to screw up his Word. The Word is perfect, without flaw. As far as understanding Gods word, man has studied it for some 2000 years and still cannot grasp all that is in it. God if far supierior to man. Just as Moses requested to see God's face, God could not allow it because the glory of God would have killed him. To say Gods word is flawed, is to say God isn't that bright, that He would give his word to man who would turn around and mess it up.

how can you be too perfect? isn't being do perfect that one look can kill a flaw? ha! get out of that one, jay!

[Backglass]

if that's the case, then god must REALLY love fucking with our heads.

See: Ant Farm analogy.

[vtmarik]

This is not known. But someone told me that God put the temptation in Lucerfer's mind.... and Lucifer acted on it (the first sin... rebelling against God). At some point God must have allowed Lucifer to have free will and 1/3 of the angels who sided with Lucifer.

So there is no Chapter:Verse that says how Lucifer obtained free will and we are left to theorize? Why would God give free will to only 1/3 of the angels, that's a very strange number (33%)? I think that is one glaring oversight that one of the authors would've surely noticed had the text been divinely inspired.

that has got to be the most insightful thing anyone has posted on the internet... except the balance thing, good can live without evil, vice versa, and they can live together, but the rest... you may be on to something...

Well, as far as the balance thing goes I kinda adapted that from the ancient concept of Yin and Yang, the balanced dichotomy of reality. It had to be adjusted slightly for a Christian context but the principle is basically the same:
If there is no darkness, how can you distinguish what is light? If there is no evil, how can you distinguish what is good?

Like MeDeFe said, didactic reasons.

[Mirak]

If God is, (and I believe he is) omnipotent and omnipresent. He knows what Moses is going to do with the words he gives him to write down BEFORE he gives him the words! And if that is so, then God would be aware that Moses would write them down wrong, or that in the future people would translate them wrong.

God wanted to see if man would choose Him over evil

Jay do you notice any contradictions here

Happy Saturnalia

[MeDeFe]

The "didactic reasons" was really more of a joke... they are the explanation we came up with in one of my seminars for quite a lot of stuff in the books of Moses. (Are they called that in english, too)

[jay_a2j]

If God is, (and I believe he is) omnipotent and omnipresent. He knows what Moses is going to do with the words he gives him to write down BEFORE he gives him the words! And if that is so, then God would be aware that Moses would write them down wrong, or that in the future people would translate them wrong.

God wanted to see if man would choose Him over evil

Jay do you notice any contradictions here

Happy Saturnalia

No, do you? God knows that not all men will choose Him.... but some have and will.

[jay_a2j]

This is not known. But someone told me that God put the temptation in Lucerfer's mind.... and Lucifer acted on it (the first sin... rebelling against God). At some point God must have allowed Lucifer to have free will and 1/3 of the angels who sided with Lucifer.

So there is no Chapter:Verse that says how Lucifer obtained free will and we are left to theorize? Why would God give free will to only 1/3 of the angels, that's a very strange number (33%)? I think that is one glaring oversight that one of the authors would've surely noticed had the text been divinely inspired.

All the angels had free will at that time to choose to go with Lucifer or stay with God. The 1/3 are the ones who went with Lucifer.

[vtmarik]

All the angels had free will at that time to choose to go with Lucifer or stay with God. The 1/3 are the ones who went with Lucifer.

But you said God created the Angels with no free will.

Which is it Jay?

[areon]

Well obviously lucifer gave it to them and some staid loyal which shows the purity of God...or some such message.

[Mirak]

If God is, (and I believe he is) omnipotent and omnipresent. He knows what Moses is going to do with the words he gives him to write down BEFORE he gives him the words! And if that is so, then God would be aware that Moses would write them down wrong, or that in the future people would translate them wrong.

God wanted to see if man would choose Him over evil

Jay do you notice any contradictions here

Happy Saturnalia

No, do you? God knows that not all men will choose Him.... but some have and will.

Yes...one minute you have an all knowing all powerful god who "knows what Moses is going to do with the words he gives him to write down BEFORE he gives him the words!"

Next minute we have a god biting his nails in anticipation of whowill choose him and who won't....

According to your first statement god should and does know what everyone of us will do, say, choose, even before we are born..

The second statement contradicts that...surly you can acknowledge that

[Ectomancer]

Jay, the Bible does not say that God is perfect. By saying so you trap yourself, not the Bible. In fact, the Bible states specifically that God can make mistakes. After the Flood, he regreted his violence upon all living things and formed a covenant stating that he would never do it again.
Do not twist the Word to suit the desires of Man. God does not need to be made palatable to the masses by misrepresentation. Accept his faults along with his wisdom to see them. You do God a disservice by trying to make him that which he is not.

[jay_a2j]

Jay, the Bible does not say that God is perfect. By saying so you trap yourself, not the Bible. In fact, the Bible states specifically that God can make mistakes. After the Flood, he regreted his violence upon all living things and formed a covenant stating that he would never do it again.
Do not twist the Word to suit the desires of Man. God does not need to be made palatable to the masses by misrepresentation. Accept his faults along with his wisdom to see them. You do God a disservice by trying to make him that which he is not.

What Bible are you reading from? The Bible does not say God makes mistakes. God made a covenant with all living creatures that He would not destroy all living creatures via flood ever again. I just read it to make sure... and it says nothing about "regret". If you are going to accuse God of having faults please document chapter and verse cause this is news to me.

[reverend_kyle]

Jay_a2j takes internet conversation so seriously he got out his bible and looked up shit..

confirmeD!

[vtmarik]

All the angels had free will at that time to choose to go with Lucifer or stay with God. The 1/3 are the ones who went with Lucifer.

But you said God created the Angels with no free will.

Which is it Jay?

Oh no, don't you dodge this question Jay. You're the one who said that the angels were created with no free will, then Lucifer decides to rebel and 33% of the angels in heaven decide to go with him.

You can't have it both ways Jay, did they have free will or didn't they?