Regarding the Existence or Absence of God
- Thread starter rs7
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.....Faith is just Faith...Just as Love...we cant really see it, we can just feel it in our hearts...My friend the Horse of a Darker Color
;With what do you disagree? If you say (as I read it) that "proof" remains a subjective issue, then I see no disagreement at all.
I know with absolute certainty that I have no way of believing or disbelieving the topics of "Revelations" (for example) with absolute certainty.
So my mind is open to hearing some explanations, and some I have dismissed. Of course the way I was raised and the things I was taught to believe for as long as I can remember will always influence me. I cannot say that if I were born in Saudi Arabia I would not be a believer in Islam. Nor if I were born in France I would not be a Catholic. Or a Jew in Israel. Or a Buddhist in China, etc., etc.
I do however have some serious problems with some of your explanations. Mainly with regards to the Bible as history. But these are issues that cannot be proven; only believed or not.
I took an interesting course in college that was titled just that: The Bible as History. It was taught as "neutral". A secular class. The "historical" explanations (theories) for the Exodus (for example) varied greatly. And strong cases could be made for different theories. None of them could be proved. Of course the New Testament is about much more recent history, but again, there is no substantiative proof of which I am aware. But many compelling arguments (such as your own). And few that I can reject our of hand. Who am I to argue with hundred of millions? I leave that sort of thing to GG and UBL and Lenin and a large handful of others.
Peace,
rs7There are strong arguments for Christ's identity based on historical documents outside the bible confirming his life and times.
Oh yeah? Name ONE. (Don't give me that BS entry in Josephus - historians are absolutely unanimous that it was forgery.)
Strange, dark, is it not, that we have such a wealth of recorded history of the time period in which the alleged Jesus dwelled, yet absolutely nobody sought to make mention of this great miracle worker.
There is strong circumstantial and psychological evidence regarding how hard it would be, if not impossible, to pull off a fake resurrection where a dozen coconspirators willingly faced martyr deaths as a result.
Perhaps an history of the early Christian church - a factual history - would help you to understand how your religion was able to spread without it being based on fact. (The short answer - political power.) BTW, what exactly IS, I wonder, this strong evidence dark has? I think there is none. (dark, you bullshitting again? naughty boy!)
There is strong evidence in regards to behavior, specifically the way the apostles were bumbling and tripping over their own feet most of the time Christ was with them but then became bold as lions after he rose. You don't get a surge of power and confidence when your leader failed and is in the ground. You get that when you realize He was the real deal and that the grand plan was even bigger than you could have imagined.
Circular reasoning if I've ever seen it. I'd expect better from someone like you dark, i really would. Then again, just like all other christians, you are forced to clutch at ever thinner straws in providing a rational defence for your faith.
Then of course there was the total destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70, which Christ prophesied about, which the book of revelation prophesied about, and which was directly prophesied about by OT prophets centuries before that- a linear progression hundreds of years if not a thousand years long that was filled precisely. All that was spoken of came to pass and was, again, documented by outside sources. Carbon date the documents if you want.
Go ahead carbon date them. Are you aware that bible scholars - you know, people who actually KNOW something about it - date the gospels as having been written about 50-150 years AFTER the alleged jesus's death? (Are you aware that NONE of the New Testament characters were actually eye-witnesses of jesus?)
That's not the only prophecy that's been proven to be hogwash. The book of Daniel, one of the Christians favorites when proving the reliability of the bible, is also an outright fraud.
I can tell you here and now though that John was as clear thinking as you and I, that the 'dragon' you spoke of was an analogy no different than the 'axis of evil' type analogies used today, that the Christians back then would have understood the analogies and symbolic language just as easily and straightforwardly as you or I understand symbolic language in political speeches today,
I'll tell you what the Christians of 'back then' would have easily understood. They were completely aware that the miracles attributed to jesus ALREADY EXISTED (for hundreds of years before jesus, although not everyone would've known exactly how long before) before jesus came along. The jesus story is practically a carbon copy of the story of Mithras, Dionysus, Osiris etc.
So the early church fathers made up a story that Satan had come along earlier and spread these stories about jesus, in order to confuse the people. What complete bullshit. But the people bought it.
The correct interpretation of revelation has NOTHING to do with most of the end of the world stuff we hear about regularly and is, in fact, straightforward and not hard to understand. There is a lot of bad theology out there that offers up target practice like those little ducks with bullseyes painted on the side; but again, shooting down bad theology is not the same as shooting down Christianity itself.
Didn't you just admit that you were no authority on the bible? How the hell can you judge what qualifies as 'good' or 'bad' theology? Wait, I know - 'good' theology is the theology you agree with right? So, I guess when vast numbers of christian theologians agree that the bible is full of 'editorial constructs' (their words), they are just practising 'bad' theology, right?
There are no be all end all arguments, of course, because intellectual assent is ultimately an act of will. For some people, an angel could show up in a dream or at the foot of their bed and they would still convince themselves it is a hallucination. This is not a dig or a hidden insult, it's an attempt to point out that words usually won't cut the mustard because even the greatest argument in the world can be rejected on technicalities, and because emotions can be stronger than reason on both sides of the aisle.
If it can be shot down on technicalities, it wasn't the "greatest" argument was it. Point is, christianity, far from being the "greatest argument", is not even a very good one.
May I again strongly suggest the value of being sure you know what you are criticizing before writing it off, and again point out that knocking down a straw man is not the same as knocking down the real deal.
I would strongly suggest to you of being sure you know what you are defending before laying down your life for it.
You are steadfast in your belief because you say you have met God. I say you are delusional, and that what you consider meeting god is just a figment of your imagination.
I know, I've been there. I was indoctrinated into christianity and was fully into my 'beautiful' (if only i knew!) religion. Because I so loved god, i too had experiences that i would swear up and down were actual experiences of god. Luckily for me, i lived in the 20th century, where information on the awesome power of the brain was available to anyone who would care to look. Dude, there are scientific, rational explanations for what you claim to have experienced, I doubt that you'd care to listen though.
BTW, what does God actually tell you when you met him? Did he affirm the veracity of the bible? If not, how did you know it was the god of christianity you met? How did you know it wasn't Allah or Zeus or Jupiter?
Just out of curiosity, how did you know it was actually a god that you met? How did you know it wasn't Satan playing tricks on you?
So I must mildly disagree Rs7 and assert that there IS 'proof' out there, but value judgment of that proof will remain a subjective issue. As you point out debate does have a sense of futility to it when both sides made up their minds a long time ago.
Of course there IS proof - overwhelming proof that christianity is load of hogwash.
Oh yeah? Name ONE. (Don't give me that BS entry in Josephus - historians are absolutely unanimous that it was forgery.)
Strange, dark, is it not, that we have such a wealth of recorded history of the time period in which the alleged Jesus dwelled, yet absolutely nobody sought to make mention of this great miracle worker.
There is strong circumstantial and psychological evidence regarding how hard it would be, if not impossible, to pull off a fake resurrection where a dozen coconspirators willingly faced martyr deaths as a result.
Perhaps an history of the early Christian church - a factual history - would help you to understand how your religion was able to spread without it being based on fact. (The short answer - political power.) BTW, what exactly IS, I wonder, this strong evidence dark has? I think there is none. (dark, you bullshitting again? naughty boy!)
There is strong evidence in regards to behavior, specifically the way the apostles were bumbling and tripping over their own feet most of the time Christ was with them but then became bold as lions after he rose. You don't get a surge of power and confidence when your leader failed and is in the ground. You get that when you realize He was the real deal and that the grand plan was even bigger than you could have imagined.
Circular reasoning if I've ever seen it. I'd expect better from someone like you dark, i really would. Then again, just like all other christians, you are forced to clutch at ever thinner straws in providing a rational defence for your faith.
Then of course there was the total destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70, which Christ prophesied about, which the book of revelation prophesied about, and which was directly prophesied about by OT prophets centuries before that- a linear progression hundreds of years if not a thousand years long that was filled precisely. All that was spoken of came to pass and was, again, documented by outside sources. Carbon date the documents if you want.
Go ahead carbon date them. Are you aware that bible scholars - you know, people who actually KNOW something about it - date the gospels as having been written about 50-150 years AFTER the alleged jesus's death? (Are you aware that NONE of the New Testament characters were actually eye-witnesses of jesus?)
That's not the only prophecy that's been proven to be hogwash. The book of Daniel, one of the Christians favorites when proving the reliability of the bible, is also an outright fraud.
I can tell you here and now though that John was as clear thinking as you and I, that the 'dragon' you spoke of was an analogy no different than the 'axis of evil' type analogies used today, that the Christians back then would have understood the analogies and symbolic language just as easily and straightforwardly as you or I understand symbolic language in political speeches today,
I'll tell you what the Christians of 'back then' would have easily understood. They were completely aware that the miracles attributed to jesus ALREADY EXISTED (for hundreds of years before jesus, although not everyone would've known exactly how long before) before jesus came along. The jesus story is practically a carbon copy of the story of Mithras, Dionysus, Osiris etc.
So the early church fathers made up a story that Satan had come along earlier and spread these stories about jesus, in order to confuse the people. What complete bullshit. But the people bought it.
The correct interpretation of revelation has NOTHING to do with most of the end of the world stuff we hear about regularly and is, in fact, straightforward and not hard to understand. There is a lot of bad theology out there that offers up target practice like those little ducks with bullseyes painted on the side; but again, shooting down bad theology is not the same as shooting down Christianity itself.
Didn't you just admit that you were no authority on the bible? How the hell can you judge what qualifies as 'good' or 'bad' theology? Wait, I know - 'good' theology is the theology you agree with right? So, I guess when vast numbers of christian theologians agree that the bible is full of 'editorial constructs' (their words), they are just practising 'bad' theology, right?
There are no be all end all arguments, of course, because intellectual assent is ultimately an act of will. For some people, an angel could show up in a dream or at the foot of their bed and they would still convince themselves it is a hallucination. This is not a dig or a hidden insult, it's an attempt to point out that words usually won't cut the mustard because even the greatest argument in the world can be rejected on technicalities, and because emotions can be stronger than reason on both sides of the aisle.
If it can be shot down on technicalities, it wasn't the "greatest" argument was it. Point is, christianity, far from being the "greatest argument", is not even a very good one.
May I again strongly suggest the value of being sure you know what you are criticizing before writing it off, and again point out that knocking down a straw man is not the same as knocking down the real deal.
I would strongly suggest to you of being sure you know what you are defending before laying down your life for it.
You are steadfast in your belief because you say you have met God. I say you are delusional, and that what you consider meeting god is just a figment of your imagination.
I know, I've been there. I was indoctrinated into christianity and was fully into my 'beautiful' (if only i knew!) religion. Because I so loved god, i too had experiences that i would swear up and down were actual experiences of god. Luckily for me, i lived in the 20th century, where information on the awesome power of the brain was available to anyone who would care to look. Dude, there are scientific, rational explanations for what you claim to have experienced, I doubt that you'd care to listen though.
BTW, what does God actually tell you when you met him? Did he affirm the veracity of the bible? If not, how did you know it was the god of christianity you met? How did you know it wasn't Allah or Zeus or Jupiter?
Just out of curiosity, how did you know it was actually a god that you met? How did you know it wasn't Satan playing tricks on you?
So I must mildly disagree Rs7 and assert that there IS 'proof' out there, but value judgment of that proof will remain a subjective issue. As you point out debate does have a sense of futility to it when both sides made up their minds a long time ago.
Of course there IS proof - overwhelming proof that christianity is load of hogwash.
Wow... I was about to call dark on his circular reasoning,
empty assertions and lack of evidence, but daniel
beat me to it and did a better job, although a little
bit harsh.
Your right on daniel, however, it helps to keep the tone
down a bit if you really want the person to listen.
A couple of additional notes:
I was raised christian, and like daniel and dark,
felt and knew god. After much study, I quickly realized
it was all BS and these feelings faded away.
It took a long time.
Followers of Benny Hin (sp?), FEEL his power when they
are healed right? Those people who touch their TV
screens FEEL the power of god right?
People who follow Voo doo also are effected by it
very strongly, emotionally, and sometimes physically.
People of all religions FEEL, and talk to and SEE their
gods. All through history this has happened.
They cant all be right.
Feelings are very misleading and easily fool you.
They dont make things true.
For example... I was riding my mountain bike
through the woods where there are known to be
a lot of rattle snakes.
I heard a rattlesnake...then turned to look out of fear
and SAW a rattle snake right by me as I FLEW past it
at high speed.
My heart was pouding...I thought I was soooo lucky
I didnt get bit and didnt die right there so far away
from any kind of help.
I had to see that bad boy up close, so I carefuly went
back to the spot.
There on the ground I observed a big STICK, and the
noise of the rattler I heard were some big crunchy leaves
in the wind.
My fabulous pattern matching machinery in my head
filled in the blanks. I SAW that rattle snake clear as day.
I could have described the color and texture of it.
It was a fantasy based on my expectations.
Dont be fooled people.
peace
axeman
empty assertions and lack of evidence, but daniel
beat me to it and did a better job, although a little
bit harsh.
Your right on daniel, however, it helps to keep the tone
down a bit if you really want the person to listen.
A couple of additional notes:
I was raised christian, and like daniel and dark,
felt and knew god. After much study, I quickly realized
it was all BS and these feelings faded away.
It took a long time.
Followers of Benny Hin (sp?), FEEL his power when they
are healed right? Those people who touch their TV
screens FEEL the power of god right?
People who follow Voo doo also are effected by it
very strongly, emotionally, and sometimes physically.
People of all religions FEEL, and talk to and SEE their
gods. All through history this has happened.
They cant all be right.
Feelings are very misleading and easily fool you.
They dont make things true.
For example... I was riding my mountain bike
through the woods where there are known to be
a lot of rattle snakes.
I heard a rattlesnake...then turned to look out of fear
and SAW a rattle snake right by me as I FLEW past it
at high speed.
My heart was pouding...I thought I was soooo lucky
I didnt get bit and didnt die right there so far away
from any kind of help.
I had to see that bad boy up close, so I carefuly went
back to the spot.
There on the ground I observed a big STICK, and the
noise of the rattler I heard were some big crunchy leaves
in the wind.
My fabulous pattern matching machinery in my head
filled in the blanks. I SAW that rattle snake clear as day.
I could have described the color and texture of it.
It was a fantasy based on my expectations.
Dont be fooled people.
peace
axeman
Sorry I omitted Daniel M from the list. But you know what? Two of the guys I most admire as far as their abilities to make cohesive arguments are Daniel M and Darkhorse.
Which goes to show that a good (but not necessarily convincing)argument can be made on both sides of this issue. Personally, as far as factual evidence I need to go with Daniel M on this. However I will not dismiss Darkhorses beliefs as Daniel does. Belief counts for a lot, so for Darkhorse his logic IS proof. To him.
But to me, I have yet to be shown a single shred of evidence that anything in the Bible was fact. New or Old testament. Is there any evidence? Real "provable" evidence? Of even one single thing?
No witnesses or written accounts from the time of Jesus. How is that possible? There are written accounts far older about other historical events and persons.
"[Hammurabi] was the ruler who chiefly established the greatness of Babylon, the world's first metropolis. Many relics of Hammurabi's reign ([1795-1750 BC]) have been preserved, and today we can study this remarkable King....as a wise law-giver in his celebrated code." - (Charles F. Horne: The Code of Hammurabi)
Now why is it that this code, along with thousands of supporting documents exist and are historically proven facts? Yet events that occurred 1800 years later are without documentation of the day?
Just seems hard for me to believe. Which is, I suppose, the bottom line. The Bible depends on belief. Faith. Not facts. So it is easy for me to understand how a guy like Daniel can reject it as "hogwash" (which I think is far too harsh a term....I do feel though that it is very easy to be "skeptical").
Nothing proves (in my mind) the Bible to be accurate. I would have to say that even the most steadfast adherents have to admit that "accuracy" is not a word one would use to describe the Bible. It is good we are each entitled to our beliefs. Because they are what counts for us. Hell, O.J. Simpson was "believed" innocent by a jury. Chasinfla believes Florida politics are too liberal. I believed I could stop the war in Vietnam. Martin Luther King believed in his dream. Lot's of kids believe in Santa Clause, and Gordon Gecko believes he can convince Thunderbolt to change his mind. Belief is a powerful thing!
Rs7actually, i believe the chances of that happening are pretty slim! i just felt like arguing a little cuz religion annoys me!
for the record, i hate NO ONE here (including thunderbolt, lobster, darkhorse, and all the other religious people). we are all free to have & express our opinions and believe what we want. NOBODY really has all the answers to this stuff for sure, including me.
I wasn't the one making the claims. Again GG let me spell it out. If you believe one way or other I can't find fault with that. But if you come out and make definitive statements that you can't prove, then the burden rests on your shoulders not mine. Again I ask, what is the proof or evidence or logic behind the statements you made?
i didn't want to get into this anymore, but...
if i ever made a definitive statement, it was strictly to get responses. NOBODY REALLY KNOWS, INCLUDING ME.
i find it funny that a religious person, i assume you are one, is asking for proof when it comes to definitive statements. you religious people claim all the time "jesus is god," "god created the universe," "noah's ark is a true story," etc. where is YOUR proof?
we have no disagreement at all when it comes to the issue of, if someone makes a definitive statement, the burden of proof is on them.
THAT IS WHAT ATHIESTS ARE ALL ABOUT! i'll believe anything, just prove it.
you religious people are assfuck!ngbackwards! you make definitive statements with NO evidence and then say, "you can't prove it isn't true because there's no evidence it isn't." WELL THERE'S NONE THERE TO BEGIN WITH!!!! how can i find evidence to disprove something that HAS NO EVIDENCE TO BEGIN WITH?!?!?! the fact that your side can't prove your own case should be enough to not accept it.
How so. If you make a great argument for something, then you may come to a stalemate, or you may lose because of WHAT you are arguing for, but you won't "lose" on technicalities as far as I can tell.
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