Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
No, not at all factual. Resentment does not turn false claims into facts.LOL... not really personal - just factual. Then you have to figure out who is the hen that laid the egg.
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There is no evidence for God, so why do you believe?
- Thread starter an anarchist
- Start date
ppp
Well-Known Member
Not factual. You are attempting to mock and deride, rather than support or concede.LOL... not really personal - just factual. Then you have to figure out who is the hen that laid the egg.
Unfettered
A striving disciple of Jesus Christ
I don't understand such resistance. When a person is shown that his thoughts are harmonious with another's thoughts, why would he yet resist? Perhaps we're not all after peace?
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ppp
Well-Known Member
I am definitely not ptimistic, but I am ever hopeful that one of my fellow humans will demonstrate more probity than this foolishness:
ptimistic, but I am ever hopeful that one of my fellow humans will demonstrate more probity than this foolishness:This seems to be an example of a Flat-earther -- in full display!
Those are great questions and thoughts.
Ostronomos
Well-Known Member
For a more thorough treatment of my argument see my recent post in Philosophy. Not everyone is entitled.
Trailblazer
Veteran Member
Jesus never claimed to be the King of the Jews. It was Pilate who though Jesus was claiming that.
Jesus answered, "Thou sayest that I am a king." Jesus did not answer "Yes, I am a king."
Than Jesus explained the real reason that He came into the world, to bear witness unto the truth about God.
John 18:37 Pilate therefore said unto him, Art thou a king then? Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth my voice.
No, that doesn’t negate him from being the Heavenly King of God’s Kingdom that is in Heaven, but there is nothing in the Bible that says that Jesus will rule God's Kingdom on Earth.
There is nothing in the Bible that supports the belief that Jesus will be the King of God’s government on Earth.
Yes, the meek and righteous will inherit the Earth and live in it forever. The meek and righteous are the people who will establish the Kingdom of God on Earth and the generations of meek and righteous people who will be living on Earth after that Kingdom is established. The New Earth is not for people who have died since they will go to Heaven.
It doesn't matter which Bible translation you refer to. They all say something slightly different, but what they all say is one like. If Jesus was the Son of Man as He claimed to be, one "like" a son or man or one "like" the son of man cannot be Jesus.
This verse was intended to indicate that it is not about Jesus, who climed to be the Son of man.
NIVUK
‘In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence.
NKJV
“I was watching in the night visions, And behold, One like the Son of Man, Coming with the clouds of heaven! He came to the Ancient of Days, And they brought Him near before Him.
Daniel 7:13-14 I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near before him. And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.
Baha'is believe that these verses are about Baha'u'llah who was one like Jesus, who was the Son of man. People in more than 250 countries and territories are already serving Him.
Ebionite
Well-Known Member
Yes, you're quite right. The doctors probably just sellotaped the tubes to the patient for decorative purposes and they blew off in a light breeze.
Trailblazer
Veteran Member
I do not see these verses saying that Jesus will rule as a King, or have a Kingdom.
1 Corinthians 15:27 For he “has put everything under his feet.”[a] Now when it says that “everything” has been put under him, it is clear that this does not include God himself, who put everything under Christ. 28 When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all.
God put everything under Christ during the Christian dispensation, but that dispensation was never slated by God to last forever.
Just as the Mosaic dispensation ended when Jesus appeared, so too did the Christion dispensation end when another Messenger of God appeared.
Dispensation
- the divine ordering of the affairs of the world.
- an appointment, arrangement, or favor, as by God.
- a divinely appointed order or age:
Definition of dispensation | Dictionary.com
Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
@SkepticThinker , as to the question that you asked this is a "No". He cannot provide more details. He probably does not know them. Which of course means that he cannot support his "miracle" claims.
joelr
Well-Known Member
Is that supposed to be a response? Your Bible says? Yes, every religion sys there will be people who don't buy it because they know they are writing a fabricated story. That is non-sequitur.
This however, is. It's also incorrect. Your position has been shown evidence against it.
1) Mystical experiences happen to people in all religions and cults. One happened to Sam Harris, atheist writer and neuroscientist when he studies Hinduism and meditation.
So the religion the person is in will be the position they relate the experience with.
2) Studies actually have been done and I can show you evidence. It's ironic you ask for evidence when you hold a belief that literally has zero evidence.
Out of body experiences and their neural basis
The out-of body experience: precipitating factors and neural correlates
The out-of body experience: precipitating factors and neural correlates - PubMed
Out-of-body experiences (OBEs) are defined as experiences in which a person seems to be awake and sees his body and the world from a location outside his physical body. More precisely, they can be defined by the presence of the following three phenomenological characteristics: (i) disembodiment...
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
Mystical experiences also fall into this type of analysis.
Classic Hallucinogens and Mystical Experiences: Phenomenology and Neural Correlates
Classic Hallucinogens and Mystical Experiences: Phenomenology and Neural Correlates
This chapter begins with a brief review of descriptions and definitions of mystical-type experiences and the historical connection between classic hallucinogens and mystical experiences. The chapter then explores the empirical literature on experiences ...
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
Controlled laboratory studies show that under double-blind conditions that provide significant controls for expectancy bias, psilocybin can occasion complete mystical experiences in the majority of people studied. These effects are dose-dependent, specific to psilocybin compared to placebo or a psychoactive control substance, and have enduring impact on the moods, attitudes, and behaviors of participants as assessed by self-report of participants and ratings by community observers.
Definitely a red herring. Science doesn't know everything, therefore God. Hilarious. And red. And a herring.
The more science learns doesn't mean it's going to find Lord Krishna is real. Or any typical Near Eastern deity. Or any deity.
Now your link. That was predictable. So a biochemist reads Acts and finds he was "sure this was nothing anyone made up". A biochemist.
Yet EVERY historical scholar in the field who is an expert at literary analysis, intertextuality and so on says Acts is the most fictive and borrows the most from literary models and works of anything.
The Mystery of Acts: Unraveling Its Story
by Richard I. PervoThis is Pervo's amazing, clear, and unsullied conclusion to his long and magnificent scholarship on Acts. Pervo's conclusion is stunning because it is won by impeccable scholarship and thorough consideration of the traditional views of Luke as historian. It changes the picture of Christian beginnings, and should change the minds of New Testament scholars. --Burton Mack, Professor of Religion and Early Christianity, emeritus Claremont Graduate University
Pervo writes with verve and has a commanding knowledge of the literature on Acts, and his assessment of the theological intent of Acts is informative. --The Bible Today
Pervo's thesis is simple: Acts is beautiful literature, but it is not a historically accurate or reliable book. In the conclusion of the book he states, "...Acts is not a reliable history of Christian origins. One important point is that it does not attempt to be. Another is that the literary techniques are too artistic. The use of cycles, parallels, repetitions, melodramatic characterization, stereotyped scene construction, inventing or presenting stories that replicate biblical narrative, unbalanced narrative with evident symbolic import, and a balanced structure. History cannot be so symmetrical"
"Although it is implied in the preface of the book of Acts that it is supposed to be some kind of historical account, this couldn’t be further from the truth. In fact, Acts has been thoroughly discredited as nothing more than a work of apologetic historical fiction, and the scholarship of Richard Pervo conclusively demonstrates this to be the case.
All of the other sources that we can discern within Acts are literary sources, not historical ones. Included in these literary sources is what may possibly have been a (now-lost) hagiographical fabrication, and basically a rewrite of the Elijah-Elisha narrative in some of the Old Testament (OT) texts of Kings, although placing Paul and Jesus in the main roles instead, which obviously would have been a literary source of historical fiction (not any kind of historical account).
The scholar Thomas Brodie has argued that this evident reworking of the Kings narrative starts in Luke’s Gospel and continues on until Acts chapter 15
As an example, the scholar Dennis MacDonald has shown that Luke also reworked fictional tales written by Homer, replacing the characters and some of the outcomes as needed to suit his literary purposes.
Overall, Acts just shares far too many features with popular adventure novels that were written during the same period, in order to lend it any trust as history. Here’s an overview of those features:
1) They all promote a particular god or religion.
2) They are all travel narratives.
3) They all involve miraculous or amazing events.
4) They all include encounters with fabulous or exotic people.
5) They often incorporate a theme of chaste couples that are separated and then reunited.
6) They all feature exciting narratives of captivities and escapes.
7) They often include themes of persecution.
8) They often include episodes involving excited crowds.
9) They often involve divine rescues from danger.
10) They often have divine revelations which are integral to the plot
The Book of Acts as Historical Fiction
Previously, I wrote a series of posts that mentioned several elements from Richard Carrier’s historical/literary analysis of the Gospels in the New Testament (showing that they are not histor…
lagevondissen.wordpress.com
There are many papers and books by historians, the consensus is Acts is historical fiction.
Then explain why it makes sense? Nothing in reality, just a "being"?????? Literally the beginning of all reality is a fully functional, conscious, entity. That is more absurd than infinite regress.
This cannot get you to Zeus, Krishna or Yahweh. But I don't see a convincing argument for a deism.
It isn't in question that people can work together. The question is can you make any sense out of the idea.
No, beliefs based on evidence.
Are you actually going to suggest that these 10,000 children who die from starvation are not victims?
The victims mentality is buying into a narrative about life after death, with no evidence, clearly syncretic from older religions, also made up, and blocking out clear evidence it isn't true because you already put blocks up and will not see evidence against it and will employ irrational apologetics to defend it.
But now I'm curious, every time someone points out a tragic case of immense human suffering do you tell them they have the victim mentality?
This is a theological argument about the problem of evil and suffering which goes way back. The answer is not to tell your opponent they have a "victim mentality", that much is for sure.
Please demonstrate this isn't a perfect example of natural probabilities playing out because nature is not conscious and nothing watching over life is nor can it help out. If it could and it isn't then it's evil. That is the question, not am I having a "mentality"?
Who I'm helping or not doesn't advance this argument forward or backward in any way.
It's weird that you are even asking me and you believe in a theistic God? You can ask your God to fix it and feel like you did something maybe?
I didn't see anything in the UN literature about praying to Yahweh for help.
But you can donate to the The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) which is here:
Save Lives by Giving Food
Join me in helping save lives by giving food. Make a difference today by donating to the World Food Program USA.
secure.wfpusa.org
joelr
Well-Known Member
HA, I already know the apologetics they teach. Absurd musings to justify a brutal deity. Historical studies are where they teach actual real world facts about the Bible. In Composition of the Pentateuch Dr Joel Baden, for one, explains the OT. I just got Professor Francesca Stavrakopoulou, Professor of Hebrew Bible and Ancient Religion , new work on Yahweh and the Hebrew text.
But this passage is generally accepted, you have to kill them,
"or it put a slight upon the promise to admit Canaanites to share with them in the peculiar land of promise; and for another reason they must be utterly destroyed (v. 17), because, since it could not be expected that they should be cured of their idolatry, if they were left with that plague-sore upon them they would be in danger of infecting God's Israel, who were too apt to take the infection: They will teach you to do after their abominations (v. 18), to introduce their customs into the worship of the God of Israel, and by degrees to forsake him and to worship false gods; for those that dare violate the second commandment will not long keep to the first. Strange worships open the door to strange deities."
God can command to kill because he gave life. So you can kill all children you give life to?
No, a moral deity cannot then kill once it gives life, or it's evil.
A God who has people who are so easily swayed that they enter another nation (of a false god) and immediately take up their ways.
What can be said to this? Yahweh is real in the book. He can do anything, demonstrate his power and get the entire world to understand. So this is ridiculous.
But in reality it was written by people who hated those cities. They wanted to justify murder. Their God wasn't a God of humanity, it was the savior of Israel.
Personal salvation didn't happen until Hellenism.
-During the period of the Second Temple (c.515 BC – 70 AD), the Hebrew people lived under the rule of first the Persian Achaemenid Empire, then the Greek kingdoms of the Diadochi, and finally the Roman Empire.[47] Their culture was profoundly influenced by those of the peoples who ruled them.[47] Consequently, their views on existence after death were profoundly shaped by the ideas of the Persians, Greeks, and Romans.[48][49] The idea of the immortality of the soul is derived from Greek philosophy[49] and the idea of the resurrection of the dead is derived from Persian cosmology.[49] By the early first century AD, these two seemingly incompatible ideas were often conflated by Hebrew thinkers.[49] The Hebrews also inherited from the Persians, Greeks, and Romans the idea that the human soul originates in the divine realm and seeks to return there.[47] The idea that a human soul belongs in Heaven and that Earth is merely a temporary abode in which the soul is tested to prove its worthiness became increasingly popular during the Hellenistic period (323 – 31 BC).
Gradually, some Hebrews began to adopt the idea of Heaven as the eternal home of the righteous dead.
(Sanders)
Wright
Hundley
joelr
Well-Known Member
Perfect.
So, first please tell me knowledge that you got that you could not have obtained. Not an opinion or something subjective because that could simply come from your subconscious mind. Actual facts you did not know and are unavailable otherwise.
Then, since you have revelations, I have a 14 digit number written down. I also have one word written down, please ask for the 14 digits and the one word and tell me what they are.
Now If I claimed Krishna was real, and I offered my proof was revelation, I'm sure you would find it to be anecdotal, likely nonsense. Unless you use it to provide evidence you could not have known.
Solutions to issues, wisdom, those are anecdotal, information you likely have in your mind and picked a solution and attributed it to a deity.
So anecdotal tales are not evidence. The 14 digit number and word would be best for evidence.
I have a feeling your mind just decided on common solutions to issues, things you already knew were options or knew about. Then you attributed it to an outside deity and applied it to your life. You probably picked the best option and it worked. Because that is generally how life works.
Until it doesn't and you say "God has other plans for me"..
Not impressive. Not evidence.
joelr
Well-Known Member
Baha'u'llah wasn't modern enough to realize Satan is a complete mythological character.That does not mean that Jesus believed that Satan was a real entity that exists external to the self, even though it sounds that way.
Baha'u'llah also said things about Satan, referring to him as the Evil One.
“How high the reward of him that hath not deprived himself of so great a bounty, nor failed to recognize the beauty of his Best-Beloved in this, His new attire. Watch over yourselves, for the Evil One is lying in wait, ready to entrap you. Gird yourselves against his wicked devices, and, led by the light of the name of the All-Seeing God, make your escape from the darkness that surroundeth you. Let your vision be world-embracing, rather than confined to your own self. The Evil One is he that hindereth the rise and obstructeth the spiritual progress of the children of men.”
The Evil One is our selfish desire. That is what Satan symbolizes.
“Say: O people! The Lamp of God is burning; take heed, lest the fierce winds of your disobedience extinguish its light. Now is the time to arise and magnify the Lord, your God. Strive not after bodily comforts, and keep your heart pure and stainless. The Evil One is lying in wait, ready to entrap you. Gird yourselves against his wicked devices, and, led by the light of the name of the one true God, deliver yourselves from the darkness that surroundeth you. Center your thoughts in the Well-Beloved, rather than in your own selves.”
Satan in the OT is real. He is the Angel of Yahweh and one of the sons of Yahweh. They have conversations.
His import into the NT also continued to keep him as a real being.
There is no indication that Jesus considered Satan a metaphor. Jesus taught in parables, Satan is not part of that. We cannot re-interpret ancient text in modern terms or we will be mis-reading the literature.
joelr
Well-Known Member
Yes I blame men. I'm not talking about that. These are dictates from Yahweh to kill and take plunder of women and children.
How do you know a God helped you? As an atheist I have had many goals manifest, jobs, relationships, chance meetings, one door closes and a better door opens, these things happen when you aim in a direction and take action. If one believes in a deity then all the credit goes there.
So he's helping you with things, and 25,000 people die every day from starvation? I would be pissed if a God helped me with some trivial thing while 10,000 children are not getting to grow up.
joelr
Well-Known Member
I have been Christian in the past. I did pray. Some things work out and others don't. Nothing changed when I stopped. Some things work out and some don't. Some coincidences happen because you are aimed in a direction. That is normal. No deity is doing anything.
If I prayed I would say do not dare help me, an adult, help some children live to be able to grow up. But again, disease stats don't change, the same amount of expected deaths happen every year with each illness. So nothing is helping. Probabilities are just playing out.
joelr
Well-Known Member
There were wars in every century. The Black Plague was the most fatal pandemic.
300,000 died in the 1139 Ganja earthquake. Many millions died in wars in the Middle ages and before. Right now is the most peaceful time in history. We have medical care, hospitals, relief workers, red cross, UN efforts, NATO, advanced medical knowledge in comparison. It isn't the last days and every time they said it was it wasn't.
But Revelation isn't about the future, that is a misreading.
Its' also a borrowing from the Persian religion. Which is a myth.
Revelation is a Jewish/Christian take on Persian apoctalyiptism,
Noah is an updated version of Mesopotamian myths. You are being taught incorrect history they feed to members to scare them. Or did Satan influence the scholars?
John Collins, Introduction to the Hebrew Bible 3rd ed.
“Biblical creation stories draw motifs from Mesopotamia, Much of the language and imagery of the Bible was culture specific and deeply embedded in the traditions of the Near East.
2nd ed. The Old Testament, Davies and Rogerson
“We know from the history of the composition of Gilamesh that ancient writers did adapt and re-use older stories……
It is safer to content ourselves with comparing the motifs and themes of Genesis with those of other ancient Near East texts.
In this way we acknowledge our belief that the biblical writers adapted existing stories, while we confess our ignorance about the form and content of the actual stories that the Biblical writers used.”
The Old Testament, A Historical and Literary Introduction to the Hebrew Scriptures, M. Coogan
“Genesis employs and alludes to mythical concepts and phrasing, but at the same time it also adapts transforms and rejected them”
God in Translation, Smith
“…the Bibles authors fashioned whatever they may have inherited of the Mesopotamian literary tradition on their own terms”
THE OT Text and Content, Matthews, Moyer
“….a great deal of material contained in the primeval epics in Genesis is borrowed and adapted from the ancient cultures of that region.”
The Formation of Genesis 1-11, Carr
“The previous discussion has made clear how this story in Genesis represents a complex juxtaposition of multiple traditions often found separately in the Mesopotamian literary world….”
The Priestly Vision of Genesis, Smith
“….storm God and cosmic enemies passed into Israelite tradition. The biblical God is not only generally similar to Baal as a storm god, but God inherited the names of Baal’s cosmic enemies, with names such as Leviathan, Sea, Death and Tanninim.”
joelr
Well-Known Member
That is what confirmation bias is. When God doesn't give you what you ask for, you say "God has better plans".
So God gets credit no matter what. Confirmation bias.
I did it. Then I stopped and nothing changed. You still get things, coincidences, things work out, sometimes it seems like the universe is helping you and other times it's a string a challenges. That is life. Belief in a deity gets the credit but religious people and secular people live the same life. Same illness rate, same job success and fail, same relationship ups and down. You just use confirmation bias to give credit to a deity and when things don't work you wait until they do and say "this was the better plan".
Yes all that still happens to everyone, regardless of religion or no religion.
Unless you live in a starving country, then you watch loved ones pass away, every day. While those in other countries pray to a deity for mundane reasons and say "thank you God for this new relationship" (it's actually because you are on tinder and had 5 bad relationships and one was bound to workout).
The arrogance to think God is giving you anything you ask for while 10,000 children die daily from starvation.
joelr
Well-Known Member
Is there any position that I cannot take on faith?That is so simple to understand. It is on that basis , faith, that I call it a religion
Islam, Hinduism, white supremacy, gender superiority?
Faith is not a reliable path to truth.
joelr
Well-Known Member
You didn't. I asked and you said -
"There is no need for me to provide evidence to you in order to justify my faith. "
If there is a way outside the scientific method to provide evidence please explain it. Then explain by what methodology you use to demonstrate your anecdotal personal experience is any different than a Mormon, Muslim, Hindu or any cult where one is 100% convinced of the reality of the claims (on no evidence).
I don't want to dismiss it, I want to know it. If you provide anecdotal evidence that uses "feelings" than you have to show it's not the same as everyone else. Because the billions of humans in Islam are actually on average not different than the humans in your sect of Christianity. On a large scale you are equal. Their personal experience is no different.
You reject all the billions of personal evidence of Mormonism and Islam. Both have important updates, by the same method, revealed knowledge, that you trust. But you reject the evidence when it's them and not you. Seems like a cognitive bias here.