God's love and the destruction of Sodom? How is this reconciled?

[74x12]

Just for the record, I don't believe in Hannibal. I certainly don't believe he led an army of elephants across the Alps. Did you ever hear anything more ridiculous in your life?

If you can find ANYTHING in the secular historical record that supports John writing the epistles--or anything that mentions John, period I will change my mind. Otherwise it's just tradition with no evidential foundation.

Even in the Matthew gospel the writer(s) botch the donkey verse. He has Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a horse AND a donkey. How on earth did a man inspired by the Holy Spirit to write the gospel manage to pull a boner like that??????

"This took place to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet:

5 “Say to Daughter Zion,
‘See, your king comes to you,
gentle and riding on a donkey,
and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’” Matthew 21:4-5

The Greek word can mean a colt of either a horse or donkey.

 

[PruePhillip]

Just for the record, I don't believe in Hannibal. I certainly don't believe he led an army of elephants across the Alps. Did you ever hear anything more ridiculous in your life?

If you can find ANYTHING in the secular historical record that supports John writing the epistles--or anything that mentions John, period I will change my mind. Otherwise it's just tradition with no evidential foundation.

Even in the Matthew gospel the writer(s) botch the donkey verse. He has Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a horse AND a donkey. How on earth did a man inspired by the Holy Spirit to write the gospel manage to pull a boner like that??????

"This took place to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet:

5 “Say to Daughter Zion,
‘See, your king comes to you,
gentle and riding on a donkey,
and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’” Matthew 21:4-5

For the record, I DO believe in Hannibal - he's my all time fav General.
But the colt business - I think we know what is meant, through the
translations.
Compare Jesus to Mohammed who is portrayed as riding a great
white stallion - fits in with the picture of a violent and world loving
man.

 

[74x12]

Once again, there is no evidence of child sacrifice among the Canaanite culture. There is child sacrifice when killing 70,000 in a plague or telling Israelites to kill entire populations. That amounts to many children being killed. But all the evidence points to Yahweh being a myth so plague ever happened.

Here is Dr. Brendon Benz, Associate Professor of History at William Jewell College explaining what we actually know about the Canaanite culture. No child sacrifice.

There is tons of evidence like the bones of babies at Carthage mixed with animal bones which means they weren't able to separate the animal sacrifical remains from human baby remains before they buried them.

Then you have collaborating reports from different groups of people that all say the same thing about Canaanite religion. Romans, Greeks and yes Hebrews all agree that the Canaanites sacrificed their children.

Now you might say but the Romans and Greeks were enemies of the Phoenicians so they made it up. But ... that doesn't explain the Hebrew accounts which are not meant to condemn the Canaanites themselves, but rather their fellow Hebrews for adopting Canaanite religion and human sacrifice. So that's pretty unbiased.

So in a court of law we have ample evidence for Canaanite child sacrifice like the Bible describes.

 

[Subduction Zone]

There is tons of evidence like the bones of babies at Carthage mixed with animal bones which means they weren't able to separate the animal sacrifical remains from human baby remains before they buried them.

Then you have collaborating reports from different groups of people that all say the same thing about Canaanite religion. Romans, Greeks and yes Hebrews all agree that the Canaanites sacrificed their children.

Now you might say but the Romans and Greeks were enemies of the Phoenicians so they made it up. But ... that doesn't explain the Hebrew accounts which are not meant to condemn the Canaanites themselves, but rather their fellow Hebrews for adopting Canaanite religion and human sacrifice. So that's pretty unbiased.

So in a court of law we have ample evidence for Canaanite child sacrifice like the Bible describes.

Carthage? Carthage was nowhere near modern day Israel or where the Canaanites lived. Do you have any reliable sources that support your claims?

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

For the record, I DO believe in Hannibal - he's my all time fav General.
But the colt business - I think we know what is meant, through the
translations.
Compare Jesus to Mohammed who is portrayed as riding a great
white stallion - fits in with the picture of a violent and world loving
man.

Sorry, I know nothing about Mohammed. Never read Quran. Only know the Bible. Some would question that, I know.

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

The Greek word can mean a colt of either a horse or donkey.

How on earth did 200 English translators get that wrong???????

 

[Subduction Zone]

Just for the record, I don't believe in Hannibal. I certainly don't believe he led an army of elephants across the Alps. Did you ever hear anything more ridiculous in your life?

If you can find ANYTHING in the secular historical record that supports John writing the epistles--or anything that mentions John, period I will change my mind. Otherwise it's just tradition with no evidential foundation.

Even in the Matthew gospel the writer(s) botch the donkey verse. He has Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a horse AND a donkey. How on earth did a man inspired by the Holy Spirit to write the gospel manage to pull a boner like that??????

"This took place to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet:

5 “Say to Daughter Zion,
‘See, your king comes to you,
gentle and riding on a donkey,
and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’” Matthew 21:4-5

No, no, no!! You got it all wrong. This is what he did, except it was more difficult since a donkey and a colt are going to be different sizes:

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

No, no, no!! You got it all wrong. This is what he did, except it was more difficult since a donkey and a colt are going to be different sizes:

The things they taught you to do in carpenter school back then!

 

[The Anointed]

An explosion that powerful would have taken out everyone, including Abraham and his brood. But of course Yahweh miraculously protected them, right?

Well he protected Lot and his daughters, who reached the Mountains before the fiery destruction of the cities in the Valley. Abraham was earlier taken by one of the three men, who had accepted Abraham’s invitation to have their feet washed, and to sit in the shade of a tree and be fed with fresh bread baked by Sarah, and the meat of a fatted calf, killed especially for them, plus cream and milk supplied by Abraham, and that messenger of the Lord, who was one in the body of the Lord, had taken Abraham from his camp to a high point from where he could Look down into the valley, where the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were. Later Abraham went back to his camp, where early on the next day, he would have heard the blast and undoubtedly felt the shock waves, ect.

Genesis 19: 23- 25; The sun was rising when Lot reached Zoar. Suddenly the LORD rained burning sulphur on the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah and destroyed them and the whole valley, along with all the people there and everything that grew on the land.

27 Early the next morning Abraham hurried to the place where he had stood in the presence of the LORD. He looked down at Sodom and Gomorrah and the whole valley and saw smoke rising from the land, like smoke from a huge furnace.

The following Link, has the accounts of those who witnessed the Tunguska event.

Tunguska event - Wikipedia

 

[thomas t]

Maybe this is what 'Rain down fire' means, and why turn Lot's wife into salt? That is such a random way to kill someone! It suggests an alternate meaning. Possibly what it means is she becomes barren or that Lot refuses to love her afterwards. The description is so strange. Pillar of salt?

I had to think about it this morning.
Actually I believe it was a literal pillar of salt for one reason: it is very easy to clean up the place if it's a pillar of salt as opposed to a real corpse: it takes one rainy day and all is clean again.

 

[thomas t]

As with other stories in Genesis, there isn’t a shred of evidence it actually happened so why not see it as an allegorical story that teaches us about ourselves and our relationship to God?

I believe that Bible is inerrant and that the story literally happened.
In my opinion, there is at least evidence that shows us how God cleaned the site up.
So for me this may count as evidence that God did indeed destroy the city (before).
Bible tells us that God is a God of order. Once he destroys (doing an extraordinary move) he cleans the site up, it seems. See this post here: God's love and the destruction of Sodom? How is this reconciled?

But of course feel free to take this as a story that can be taken metaphorically, in addition to the literal understanding.

 

[thomas t]

Just for the record, I don't believe in Hannibal. I certainly don't believe he led an army of elephants across the Alps. Did you ever hear anything more ridiculous in your life?

If you can find ANYTHING in the secular historical record that supports John writing the epistles--or anything that mentions John, period I will change my mind. Otherwise it's just tradition with no evidential foundation.

Even in the Matthew gospel the writer(s) botch the donkey verse. He has Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a horse AND a donkey. How on earth did a man inspired by the Holy Spirit to write the gospel manage to pull a boner like that??????

"This took place to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet:

5 “Say to Daughter Zion,
‘See, your king comes to you,
gentle and riding on a donkey,
and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’” Matthew 21:4-5

Hi SAT, nice to meet you.
Why not: Jesus rode on a donkey first and on a colt last?

 

[PruePhillip]

It is pretty much only fringe believers that insist that the Gospels were written by the names on them. The date that they were written refute the claims that they were written by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John alone.

Did the Gospels come with dates ??????

 

[Subduction Zone]

Did the Gospels come with dates ??????

In a way, yes.

 

[blü 2]

In another thread a poster said, God might be seen as immoral.
There might not be any positive message from the Sodom story, according to her.
She doubts that this was fair trial and a jury. Only one that inspires fear, according to her.

In my view it's like that:
If he would allowed the people of Sodom to live on... potential guests passing through would have been raped.
They would have complained about this before God "God why do you create a world in which people get raped like that?"

So he changed his creation a bit and took Sodom off the map.

It could be that God wanted to save him all the complaining from potential future rape victims.
That's my take on the matter at least.

Interesting view.

What about all the other places in the world where you could get raped in those days? Were they spared because they were nicer at raping than the Cities of the Plains?

 

[Dawnofhope]

Roman historian Pliny claimed African warriors rode giant scorpions. He claimed Hannibal rode elephants over the
Alps and invaded Rome itself. And Hannibal's nemesis, Scipio Africanus, was born to the gods. See the problem?

Most atheists don't believe in Moses, but believe in Hannibal. Employing the same techniques of critical analysis we
should presume that Hannibal, if he existed, was nothing more than a local warlord or escaped slave who gathered a
band of men to himself. His story was crafted as a precautionary tale for the Romans, similar to what the bible is
claimed to have done with its figures such as King David.

So why don't we teach this? Why do we believe Hannibal, Cleopatra, Aristotle and Plato to be historic figures? Why
the double standard in our "critical analysis" of things.

Most historians of antiquity would agree Jesus was a real person who was an itinerant Jewish preacher. He was baptised and crucified. Even atheist historians tend to accept these facts. While bias can easily creep into how we view history, there are skills we can develop to assist us become more balanced and circumspect when viewing history. I see the NT Canon as legitimate historical documents. However they are not historical accounts in the sense we understand today. Jesus was almost certainly mythologised to some extent, for example with the resurrection and ascension into the stratosphere. I believe its a huge mistake to see Genesis as being historical. However we’re free to have independent investigation of reality and believe as we choose.

 

[Dawnofhope]

I believe that Bible is inerrant and that the story literally happened.
In my opinion, there is at least evidence that shows us how God cleaned the site up.
So for me this may count as evidence that God did indeed destroy the city (before).
Bible tells us that God is a God of order. Once he destroys (doing an extraordinary move) he cleans the site up, it seems. See this post here: God's love and the destruction of Sodom? How is this reconciled?

But of course feel free to take this as a story that can be taken metaphorically, in addition to the literal understanding.

I believe the Bible is Divinely Inspired and doesn’t need to be literally true in the sense history is being told. In the case we have a young earth created six thousand years ago, a serpent talking to Eve and a worldwide flood. We are all free to our respective beliefs in regards Genesis but both our views are faith based as opposed to concrete facts. Long story short, there’s too many assumptions to take the Genesis story literally. All the best.

 

[thomas t]

Interesting view.

What about all the other places in the world where you could get raped in those days? Were they spared because they were nicer at raping than the Cities of the Plains?

thank you for your thoughtful reply.
In Sodom it's something special, since ALL the men of that town gathered to commit rape.
To my knowledge this repeated itself only once (in the Book of Judges) and also there: the consequence was obliteration.

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

Hi SAT, nice to meet you.
Why not: Jesus rode on a donkey first and on a colt last?

Anything is possible. It's just a funny way of quoting OT scripture.

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

Well he protected Lot and his daughters, who reached the Mountains before the fiery destruction of the cities in the Valley. Abraham was earlier taken by one of the three men, who had accepted Abraham’s invitation to have their feet washed, and to sit in the shade of a tree and be fed with fresh bread baked by Sarah, and the meat of a fatted calf, killed especially for them, plus cream and milk supplied by Abraham, and that messenger of the Lord, who was one in the body of the Lord, had taken Abraham from his camp to a high point from where he could Look down into the valley, where the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were. Later Abraham went back to his camp, where early on the next day, he would have heard the blast and undoubtedly felt the shock waves, ect.

Genesis 19: 23- 25; The sun was rising when Lot reached Zoar. Suddenly the LORD rained burning sulphur on the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah and destroyed them and the whole valley, along with all the people there and everything that grew on the land.

27 Early the next morning Abraham hurried to the place where he had stood in the presence of the LORD. He looked down at Sodom and Gomorrah and the whole valley and saw smoke rising from the land, like smoke from a huge furnace.

The following Link, has the accounts of those who witnessed the Tunguska event.

Tunguska event - Wikipedia

This is all speculation. We can talk about a UFO zapping the cities with a ray gun if you like.