INDISPUTABLE Rational Proof That God Exists (Or Existed)

[camanintx]

The verse:
New International Version (©2011)
So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them
or yours
New International Version (©2011)
Then the LORD God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.

Every major commentator believes these verses are literal. 100%
Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary
Barnes' Notes on the Bible
Clarke's Commentary on the Bible
Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible
Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament
Geneva Study Bible
Wesley's Notes
King James Translators' Notes
Scofield Reference Notes
Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary
http://bible.cc/genesis/2-7.htm

I guess you don't consider St. Augustine of Hippo, Philo of Alexandria, Origen of Alexandria, Ludwig Ott, Meredith G. Kline, Henri Blocher, or any of the hundreds others of the Alexandrian school or who follow the literary framework view to be major commentators on the Bible. All of these people have rejected literalistic interpretations of Genesis in favour of allegorical or poetic interpretations. Of course you don't because that would defeat your argument that theologians agree that Genesis is literal.

 

[camanintx]

It does not say that blowing up the Sun is wrong either. Is God anti-Sun?

Not to many people, either then or now, were in the habit of blowing up the Sun, were they? Slavery though was a common occurrance so you would think that the ultimate moral authority would have something to say about it other than "don't beat your slaves."

I get it, you hate the concept of God and apparently prefer the moral chaos our omniscience calls progress but this was not a sincere point of contention was it?

No, I can't hate something that doesn't exist. I just think we can do a lot better than a two thousand year old book.

 

[SkepticThinker]

If I was not in a hurry I would repeat again here: because you have countered nothing. I did not say they stuck to their favorites for ever and ever. I said they used theological preference in determining scientific truths. They did and that is that. I do not care if peer pressure or the eventual weight of scholarship eventually forced them to adopt something so theologically inconvenient as truth in the end,

NO THEY DID NOT, or they would NOT have accepted big bang. They accepted it when the evidence leaned in its favour (Which is how science is done!). That negates your argument. What do you not get about that?

they still let preference influence fact and that is all too common in science

You say that with no evidence to support your claim (at this point). It's not the case with the big bang model, so please tell us, since you keep saying that it's all too common in science, what other examples do you have? Because this one doesn't fly.

 

[SkepticThinker]

It does not say that blowing up the Sun is wrong either. Is God anti-Sun? Yes it is detailed in some instances and not in others therefor God is guilty of anything he did not prohibit in detail I suppose. We can melt the ice caps, make new volcanos with hydrogen weapons, and definitely kill all the holier than thou cats. God obviously never gave us a moral conscience to help solve these issues and should have written down every conceivable act that was objectionable even if that made a book taller than the Burj Khalifa.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burj_Khalifa

I get it, you hate the concept of God and apparently prefer the moral chaos our omniscience calls progress but this was not a sincere point of contention was it?

Oh dear, I find this sun example to be rather odd and out of place in this discussion. I mean, it's not like slavery simply isn't mentioned in the Bible.The rules for owning and treating (beat them but don't kill them!) slaves are laid out very clearly in the Bible, with nothing indictating that god was against the practice (and why would we think so given that he lays out the rules for the treatment of those slaves?). And on top of that, there is a lengthy list of commandments laid out, which are to be obeyed without question, and yet no mention of the owning of other human beings as being a bad thing. See the difference?

 

[alternative_child]

How is anyone supposed to REALLY know who started it all? I mean, all we have is ancient books (which could just actually be stories, fiction) ; science aka government..and how much stuff does the government hide?! -this is just me

 

[SkepticThinker]

How is anyone supposed to REALLY know who started it all? I mean, all we have is ancient books (which could just actually be stories, fiction) ; science aka government..and how much stuff does the government hide?! -this is just me

Science aka government? That's a new one.

 

[1robin]

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Not to many people, either then or now, were in the habit of blowing up the Sun, were they? Slavery though was a common occurrence so you would think that the ultimate moral authority would have something to say about it other than "don't beat your slaves."

Ok, I guess proclivity is the arbiter of all truth. God never said to stop building meth labs, having cocaine parties, or watching porn. So I guess they are ok then. What he did do was leave a system in place that if eradicated would have starved thousands to death, released a gang of desperate and hungry men loose on the countryside, and gave at least 30 verses that made a practical institution of (servitude) the most benevolent system of forced labor of any kind in the ANE. There are tens of thousands of perfectly just, loving, and kind verses in the Bible why are you ignoring all of them and instead concentrating all your attention on a few about slavery especially when only a few could possibly be seen as bad and having so sufficient moral explanation (that we have available to us, that is). It seems you showed up hating the concept of God and are simply cataloging reasons why, even if that requires stretching things quite a bit, the disallowance of ANE context, and when it could go either way always going to the God is bad way? I can't imagine a goal less worth the effort.

No, I can't hate something that doesn't exist. I just think we can do a lot better than a two thousand year old book.

Well with all these ubermen around why haven't we? The greatest empires in history, the greatest writers in history, and the greatest scientists in history have been trying. He converted the great empires (Rome, Greece, and Egypt), he converted the writers and then used their skill to justify faith (C.S. Lewis, Simon Greenleaf, and GK Chesterton), and he has routinely embarrassed the scientific community and stacked their ranks with Christians for over a thousand years. 2000 years later there is greater faith in the Bible than any other book of theology and many of science and history and it is still the best-selling book in human history. If you wish to surpass the Bible you have a poor showing so far.

 

[1robin]

I guess you don't consider St. Augustine of Hippo, Philo of Alexandria, Origen of Alexandria, Ludwig Ott, Meredith G. Kline, Henri Blocher, or any of the hundreds others of the Alexandrian school or who follow the literary framework view to be major commentators on the Bible. All of these people have rejected literalistic interpretations of Genesis in favour of allegorical or poetic interpretations. Of course you don't because that would defeat your argument that theologians agree that Genesis is literal.

I never suggested that these scholars were all there is, I said it was a random sample not chosen for their views on Genesis and they were 100% literalists. Of course there are exceptions. I used them because I know of a site where all ten are provided on one page. They are all accepted and not of a single type or era. If you find a like number that contend against their claims then post them. Finding a few names I had no reason to put in a list is not really an argument. IOW I knew of a site that had a list of ten accepted commentators that were not grouped by their thoughts on Genesis yet they were 100% in agreement. That was a good test. Oh and by the way the issue was about disagreement concerning a single verse or story not about an entire doctrine like creation. That doctrine contains so much material that I am sure many scholars are on one side of it at one point and the other side at another. I have forgotten why this even matters. Was there some verse you said was literal that I did not or vice versa, and why did it matter?

 

[1robin]

NO THEY DID NOT, or they would NOT have accepted big bang. They accepted it when the evidence leaned in its favour (Which is how science is done!). That negates your argument. What do you not get about that?

Good night nurse your stubborn. I can use anything I wish as a factor in determining truth and yet not select it. I can use female gender to bet on car races but in the end choose the male driver. That does not undo the fact I used gender in my calculations. The same evidence existed when the objected based on theology. I think peer pressure and it's widening acceptance probably did more to change their minds than anything. In modern science the one thing you can't be is outside whatever clique currently exists in a chosen field. They at one time objected to a scientific conclusion based on theological preference. What about this is alright?

You say that with no evidence to support your claim (at this point). It's not the case with the big bang model, so please tell us, since you keep saying that it's all too common in science, what other examples do you have? Because this one doesn't fly.

What are you talking about? I gave you their statements that exhibited their disagreement with a scientific conclusion (now known to be true) based on a theological preference. Even if their grant money being pulled or peer pressure changed their minds their comments were examples of what has corrupted much of theoretical science. Until you get a time machine and go back and stop their statements from being made there is no counter to my claim and no additional examples needed.

However just to bury the body even deeper.
Please post all the hard evidence available for Multiverses and life coming from non-life. That should take less than a sentence. I do not have the quotes but it is pretty obvious that both these concepts lean toward God and are contended using baseless faith and science fiction.

 

[1robin]

Oh dear, I find this sun example to be rather odd and out of place in this discussion. I mean, it's not like slavery simply isn't mentioned in the Bible.The rules for owning and treating (beat them but don't kill them!) slaves are laid out very clearly in the Bible, with nothing indictating that god was against the practice (and why would we think so given that he lays out the rules for the treatment of those slaves?). And on top of that, there is a lengthy list of commandments laid out, which are to be obeyed without question, and yet no mention of the owning of other human beings as being a bad thing. See the difference?

In what way does the latter 90% of your post make the sun a strange choice? Anyway slavery is mentioned in the Bible, maybe because slavery was practiced by every nation on earth at the time. Economies were built on it, it provided an existing institution to resolves indebtedness, hunger, and homelessness. God in most cases chose to act within a human institution or weakness and as usual make it better. The "slavery" or more properly servitude laws were lights years ahead in benevolence than any ANE nation. I have already addressed this in about a thousand ways and could not understand why it simply will not be let go of. I dawned on me that given our present times and the MODERN stigmatism "slavery" earned that non-theists think this is something that gives them moral high ground. When if in fact their instruction were followed as usually it would have wrecked entire economies, left millions homeless and starving, left defeated armies homeless and raiding the country side, and made many forms of debt impossible to resolve. As usual the no God solution would cause ten times the very thing complained about by the critic. You may cling to this issue like a drowning man does anything that will float but I am done. There is more than enough information in this thread and the links I gave to satisfy anyone willing to think a little and who does not have an overriding preference concerning God.

 

[camanintx]

What he did do was leave a system in place that if eradicated would have starved thousands to death, released a gang of desperate and hungry men loose on the countryside, and gave at least 30 verses that made a practical institution of (servitude) the most benevolent system of forced labor of any kind in the ANE.

So you're saying that chattal slavery, if it is benevolent and used to prevent a greater harm, is morally acceptable?

There are tens of thousands of perfectly just, loving, and kind verses in the Bible why are you ignoring all of them and instead concentrating all your attention on a few about slavery especially when only a few could possibly be seen as bad and having so sufficient moral explanation (that we have available to us, that is).

I'm not the one arguing that Biblican morality is perfect, am I? I have never claimed that the Bible is not a good book, quite the opposite, I find many good things about the teachings of Jesus. I just don't think it's perfect.

Well with all these ubermen around why haven't we? The greatest empires in history, the greatest writers in history, and the greatest scientists in history have been trying. He converted the great empires (Rome, Greece, and Egypt), he converted the writers and then used their skill to justify faith (C.S. Lewis, Simon Greenleaf, and GK Chesterton), and he has routinely embarrassed the scientific community and stacked their ranks with Christians for over a thousand years. 2000 years later there is greater faith in the Bible than any other book of theology and many of science and history and it is still the best-selling book in human history. If you wish to surpass the Bible you have a poor showing so far.

This is not a problem for those of us who see morality as subjective. When everyone carries their own ideas of what is right or wrong, writing a book of morality that everyone agrees with is a futile effort. It is only those who claim that an objective morality exists that must demonstrate which one it is.

 

[McBell]

2000 years later there is greater faith in the Bible than any other book of theology and many of science and history and it is still the best-selling book in human history. If you wish to surpass the Bible you have a poor showing so far.

Nor has any book caused nearly as much division, have so many different versions, as many conflicts between versions...

Seems you are merely counting the hits and ignoring the misses...

 

[camanintx]

I never suggested that these scholars were all there is, I said it was a random sample not chosen for their views on Genesis and they were 100% literalists.

You suggested that there was agreement among 100% of theologians that Genesis 2:7 was the literal truth. The names I provided hold the belief that ALL of Genesis is symbolic.

Of course there are exceptions. I used them because I know of a site where all ten are provided on one page.

This wouldn't have been a page supporting the idea of Biblical literalism, would it? Because that would be an example of selection bias.

 

[1robin]

So you're saying that chattel slavery, if it is benevolent and used to prevent a greater harm, is morally acceptable?

Nope, I just meant that the diabolical form of slavery everyone thinks of when the word "slavery" is mentioned was never allowed by God. IT can in fact in certain circumstances be the lesser of two evils but I am not claiming it ever has been.

I'm not the one arguing that Biblical morality is perfect, am I?

Perfect is not really the most applicable word here. As Divine command theory states (and I have had to conclude it would be correct even if the terrible Allah existed) whatever a God would command would be correct. It can't help but be. There is no greater standard to judge it incorrect even possible. However that was not what I was arguing at all. I am saying that given that God acts within Human frailty and the non-optimality that produces God's actions were morally justifiable to our human sense of morality.

I have never claimed that the Bible is not a good book, quite the opposite; I find many good things about the teachings of Jesus. I just don't think it's perfect.

Well I have stated from Go that the Bible has approx. 5% scholarly error but I do not see any substantial moral problem with the Bible if once again you allow God to do what he obviously did, to operate many times within the realities our depravity produces.

This is not a problem for those of us who see morality as subjective. When everyone carries their own ideas of what is right or wrong, writing a book of morality that everyone agrees with is a futile effort. It is only those who claim that an objective morality exists that must demonstrate which one it is.

The claim that objective morality exists is no more of a demand to indicate in what form than it takes to claim the claim that there is a tallest building is dependent on my even knowing its name. Of course it is a valid question but it certainly is not mandate for its existence. There isn't much that is a problem for subjectivism as it has no boundaries or applicability. Anything goes is what it allows in general, given time and what modern man is doing and reaping the ruin of. It takes no stand and makes no objective claims. No problem, except for the Babies this ambiguity has allowed to be killed. At least slaves of the actual terrible form of slavery understood that their plight was objectively wrong (only true if God exists), then 90% of them prayed to him to end their plight (only true if his revelation made that possible, being that the Bible never shows God as liking slavery), and were actually delivered from their bonds primarily by Christians (only possible if faith existed), for reasons that are only true if God exists (objective equality, sanctity, and dignity of human life). At the very least in the 1860 US atheists did not have the validation, will, or power to deliver the slaves. I will let who the slaves selected for a deliverer and in what theological group form the deliverers came from conclude the matter to a finality neither you, I, nor the meaningless dissertations of moralists could ever do. I am burned out on slavery. Try and get blood from another turnip.

 

[1robin]

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You suggested that there was agreement among 100% of theologians that Genesis 2:7 was the literal truth. The names I provided hold the belief that ALL of Genesis is symbolic.

No I did not . I said I gave all ten at a specific site and THEY were 100% in agreement. I have never thought it possible that even any one verse would have a unanimous interpretation. I think it the case you misunderstood what I wrote but if not it was a type O. IN fact I went back and looked and I even said specifically that it was 100% of a RANDOM SAMPLE:

My Quote:

I said it was a random sample not chosen for their views on Genesis and they were 100% literalists.

How much clearer could I have been?

This wouldn't have been a page supporting the idea of Biblical literalism, would it? Because that would be an example of selection bias.

You should know I gave you the link. I see I am wasting my time in doing so. It was a general Bible education site and has nothing to do with any particular doctrines. In fact it gives all sides as resource material. Once again how much more clear can this have been:

My Quote again:

I said it was a random sample not chosen for their views on Genesis

Camanintx I do not know what you’re doing but when you twice suggest the opposite of what I said in a very simple statement specifically claiming the opposite it makes the effort kind of futile. This is worse than false assertions of confirmation bias, it is reality bias.

 

[greenfish77]

Wow, some people are just really oblivious to reality.

 

[camanintx]

Nope, I just meant that the diabolical form of slavery everyone thinks of when the word "slavery" is mentioned was never allowed by God. IT can in fact in certain circumstances be the lesser of two evils but I am not claiming it ever has been.

Apparently it is less evil than eating shellfish or wearing wool blend fabrics because your Bible saw fit to mention those.

At least slaves of the actual terrible form of slavery understood that their plight was objectively wrong (only true if God exists), then 90% of them prayed to him to end their plight (only true if his revelation made that possible, being that the Bible never shows God as liking slavery), and were actually delivered from their bonds primarily by Christians (only possible if faith existed), for reasons that are only true if God exists (objective equality, sanctity, and dignity of human life). At the very least in the 1860 US atheists did not have the validation, will, or power to deliver the slaves. I will let who the slaves selected for a deliverer and in what theological group form the deliverers came from conclude the matter to a finality neither you, I, nor the meaningless dissertations of moralists could ever do.

In that case, I'll leave you with a few quotes from former slave Frederick Douglass:

"I prayed for twenty years but received no answer until I prayed with my legs."

"The church of this country is not only indifferent to the wrongs of the slave, it actually takes sides with the oppressors.... For my part, I would say, welcome infidelity! Welcome atheism! Welcome anything! in preference to the gospel, as preached by these Divines! They convert the very name of religion into an engine of tyranny and barbarous cruelty, and serve to confirm more infidels, in this age, than all the infidel writings of Thomas Paine, Voltaire, and Bolingbroke put together have done!"

 

[SkepticThinker]

Good night nurse your stubborn. I can use anything I wish as a factor in determining truth and yet not select it. I can use female gender to bet on car races but in the end choose the male driver. That does not undo the fact I used gender in my calculations.

Yeah, I'm definitely stubborn when it comes to pointing out to someone that they're making a bad argument. Pardon me.

And I'm sorry, but I have no idea what you're talking about here.

The same evidence existed when the objected based on theology. I think peer pressure and it's widening acceptance probably did more to change their minds than anything. In modern science the one thing you can't be is outside whatever clique currently exists in a chosen field. They at one time objected to a scientific conclusion based on theological preference. What about this is alright?

The reason that big bang became generally accepted, MIGHT have something to do with the fact that actual observable evidence for big bang didn’t really start accumulating until the 1940s. I mean, the point is, they ended up accepting it, based on the available evidence. This is how science works.

Scientists love to attempting to falsify current models and theories, because if they can do so, they will become famous. Going along with the crowd isn’t really going to get you much notice.

What are you talking about? I gave you their statements that exhibited their disagreement with a scientific conclusion (now known to be true) based on a theological preference.

What are you talking about? You didn’t provide any statements, you provided a Wikipedia article claiming that some scientists didn’t accept it based on theological reasons.

Even if their grant money being pulled or peer pressure changed their minds their comments were examples of what has corrupted much of theoretical science. Until you get a time machine and go back and stop their statements from being made there is no counter to my claim and no additional examples needed.

What? You think they only ended up accepting it because somebody threatened to pull their grant money, rather than the obvious conclusion that they accepted it based on the accumulation of evidence in its favour? Where do you come up with such wild speculation?

The fact that they accepted it based on evidence negates your argument.

However just to bury the body even deeper.
Please post all the hard evidence available for Multiverses and life coming from non-life. That should take less than a sentence. I do not have the quotes but it is pretty obvious that both these concepts lean toward God and are contended using baseless faith and science fiction.

I don’t even know what you’re saying here. Both concepts lean toward god, but are asserted by scientists using baseless faith and science fiction? Are you negating your own arguments now?

I’ve already given you plenty of evidence indicating that life can arise from non-life. There have been many studies on the subject.

The main line of reasoning behind the multiverse hypothesis has to do with observable evidence of cosmic microwave background radiation left over from the big bang. Here’s some work being done on it:
http://prd.aps.org/abstract/PRD/v84/i4/e043507

Here’s a discussion about it, featuring physicist Alexander Vilenkin:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=multiverse-the-case-for-parallel-universe


I don’t get it. I mean, do you think there are a bunch of god-hating scientists sitting around in a room somewhere desperately trying to come up with random ideas with no basis at all in science, for the sole purpose of falsifying this idea of god you have?

 

[1robin]

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Apparently it is less evil than eating shellfish or wearing wool blend fabrics because your Bible saw fit to mention those.

So you have now redefined the Bible to be a book containing 750,000 thousand words preceding from the worst possible action in decreasing severity as you see fit to assign severity. Why can’t the Bible just be what it is, instead of whatever you feel like demanding at the time? The Bible should contain what you wish or it is not from God is your argument I guess? Maybe you should apply for divine editor.

In that case, I'll leave you with a few quotes from former slave Frederick Douglass:

"I prayed for twenty years but received no answer until I prayed with my legs."
"The church of this country is not only indifferent to the wrongs of the slave, it actually takes sides with the oppressors.... For my part, I would say, welcome infidelity! Welcome atheism! Welcome anything! in preference to the gospel, as preached by these Divines! They convert the very name of religion into an engine of tyranny and barbarous cruelty, and serve to confirm more infidels, in this age, than all the infidel writings of Thomas Paine, Voltaire, and Bolingbroke put together have done!"

Well, since we all know that Fredrick Douglass is the cumulative voice of every slave in the old South and is the arbiter of all theological truth I guess God does not exist or if he does he must be evil. I like Fredrick so even though the argument is over let me see what we have here.

1. "I prayed for twenty years but received no answer until I prayed with my legs."

The man went from fatherless illiterate slave to well-educated Government official. I don't think he ran all the way there. I guess you think this is a commentary on God by a slave. Here is what his actual faith was: In My bondage page 265 Mr Douglass says "slavery is a crime against God”. He also points out the distinction you don't, that the Christianity of some Churches is different from the Christianity of Christ. So far this is exactly what I claim. Also note that Douglass had been given the means of his deliverance from God all along though I do not think this the point of his statement.

2. "The church of this country is not only indifferent to the wrongs of the slave, it actually takes sides with the oppressors....

He contradicts himself here. He distinguishes the southern Church members as traitors to the faith but concludes the northerners are true and conscientious to their faith. Besides being only generally true this is also determined by a single personally important condition that is unjustified in it's sweeping claims and does not reflect his views on many other occasions. That being said it would only be an indictment of the Church not God or the Bible even if perfectly true and consistent. However am not defending the practices of all Christians so this is irrelevant and inaccurate. The very first major armed action against slavery was by the preacher John Brown.

3. For my part, I would say, welcome infidelity! Welcome atheism! Welcome anything! in preference to the gospel, as preached by these Divines! They convert the very name of religion into an engine of tyranny and barbarous cruelty, and serve to confirm more infidels, in this age, than all the infidel writings of Thomas Paine, Voltaire, and Bolingbroke put together have done!

Now this is an inaccurate cheap shot taken in desperation I guess. Pay very close attention to his separation of the actual teachings of Christ and what certain churches were teaching. He is not condemning the Bible he is condemning it's perversion. He is not praising atheism he is saying at least Thomas Paine etc.. was not corrupting Christianity to justify slavery. If God was for slavery then why was it necessary to pervert the Bible to justify it?

So what did we have here.
1. The words of a single former slave mistakenly applied to the whole of slavery and the God they worshipped.
2. The false assertion that Douglass was against actual faith. He even believed in God and the Bible, it was its misuse he condemned and I agree with him.
3. You used a statement in a vacuum about his saying that all of US Christianity supported slavery when he said the exact opposite many times.
4. The miraculous improbable rise from illiterate slave to advisor to 5 presidents does anything but close the door to the miraculous even if he did not see it that way and that is debatable.

Counter claims:
1. He was a believer.
2. 90% of all slavers were depending on the God you condemn to deliver them from the situation you suggest he desired.
3. They were delivered by 100's of thousands of people who were Christian's for reason that do not exist if God doesn't.
4. The man who had more to do with ending slavery in the US than any other human in History besides Christ was Lincoln who was a believer and did so because he believed.
5. The man who opened the ball "so to speak" of armed rebellion against slavery was also a Christian.

You claim he person who said this desired slavery to exist.

"The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free.
New International Version (©2011)
Is it even possible to be more wrong than your claim is here or to have a more obvious agenda?

After returning to the US, Douglass produced some abolitionist newspapers: The North Star, Frederick Douglass Weekly, Frederick Douglass' Paper, Douglass' Monthly and New National Era. The motto of The North Star was "Right is of no Sex – Truth is of no Color – God is the Father of us all, and we are all brethren."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Douglass

The work of instructing my dear fellow-slaves was the sweetest engagement with which I was ever blessed. We loved each other, and to leave them at the close of the Sabbath was a severe cross indeed. When I think that these precious souls are to-day shut up in the prison-house of slavery, my feelings overcome me, and I am almost ready to ask, 'Does a righteous God govern the universe? and for what does he hold the thunders in his right hand, if not to smite the oppressor, and deliver the spoiled out of the hand of the spoiler?' (10.23)
http://www.shmoop.com/life-of-frederick-douglass/religion-quotes.html

Well I guess this backfired on you enough for one day, I will leave it here.

 

[SkepticThinker]

In what way does the latter 90% of your post make the sun a strange choice?

Uh, because the sun isn't mentioned in the Bible and slavery is? In response to someone pointing out to you that slavery isn’t condemned as immoral in the Bible, you said something about god not telling us not to blow up the sun but he’s not anti sun. I pointed out that that is a poor example because slavery IS mentioned in the Bible (and condoned) while the sun isn’t mentioned at all, so the comparison isn’t equal. I have no idea why you even brought up the sun at all. The comparison might work if slavery WASN’T discussed in the Bible. But it is, at length.

Anyway slavery is mentioned in the Bible, maybe because slavery was practiced by every nation on earth at the time.

Right. Which to me is evidence that the Bible was written by human beings for the time they were living in, rather than by a god supposedly inspiring some universal, timeless book that turns out not to be timeless at all.

Economies were built on it, it provided an existing institution to resolves indebtedness, hunger, and homelessness. God in most cases chose to act within a human institution or weakness and as usual make it better. The "slavery" or more properly servitude laws were lights years ahead in benevolence than any ANE nation.

So what? Then effectively what the Bible (and by extension, the god you believe in) is saying is that slavery is not immoral. And judging by the way you keep trying to put some kind of context around it, I’d have to conclude that you do not think the owning of another person as chattel is immoral. Furthermore, the only reason you would HAVE to say that is because your god condones it in your holy book.

Your god could have made it better by writing a commandment condemning the practice of slavery! Such a simple idea, too simple for your deity, I guess. Instead “he” decided to “make it better” by telling people it’s cool to beat your slaves, as long as they don’t day within a certain number of days. My, how benevolent!

I have already addressed this in about a thousand ways and could not understand why it simply will not be let go of.

Well, let’s see, I won’t let it go because you are attempting to justify the practice of one person owning another person as property as a moral concept! And all because you have to because your Bible says so. That’s why!

I dawned on me that given our present times and the MODERN stigmatism "slavery" earned that non-theists think this is something that gives them moral high ground. When if in fact their instruction were followed as usually it would have wrecked entire economies, left millions homeless and starving, left defeated armies homeless and raiding the country side, and made many forms of debt impossible to resolve. As usual the no God solution would cause ten times the very thing complained about by the critic. You may cling to this issue like a drowning man does anything that will float but I am done. There is more than enough information in this thread and the links I gave to satisfy anyone willing to think a little and who does not have an overriding preference concerning God.

Oh okay. So slavery is okay because it supports economies. Way to go, you just justified pre-Civil war slavery in the US!