EADD Theology Megathread

[rickolasnice]

More harm being caused by religion:

http://www.richarddawkins.net/news_...s-stifling-climate-change-action-in-u-s-study

 

[pinkpapaver]

yes indeed. bible is better taken as a historical text rather than thee word of thee god. remember that there were other older texts burnt so the bible was the only book .

i also hear that when at the Vatican they like you to pay for your visits to the top attractions in cash. How much money has the vatican got? definitely the richest state per head and per km squared or whatever. But, there is a big difference between being a catholic and the roman catholic church. It's very sad the way that it took over Ireland.

It all boils down to superstition. love the way that christianity says stay away from the occult and all that, but come and watch us turn bread and wine into flesh and blood.

The quran really is the word of god. Ok, right, how do you know? because he told mohammed. righteo. so you don't know, you believe.

the old old jewish priests were experts at making the plural singular and the feminine masculine.

Just wondering, are there muslims, are there christians who have a problem with the word nature, or indeed nature itself. I had a lad ask me the other day if David Attenborough was an athiest. I said I'm not sure. They said "in his programmes he says look at what nature has done. This is nature"

again, feminine into masculine. Mother nature, see how god has created this as he sits in heaven.

May is the month of Mary. Queen of the heavens, star of the sea. At least catholicism reteains some of the female veneration, but they don't do it right really.

How anyone can really literally believe the creation story I don't know. In saying that of course everyone is entitiled to believe what they want. The bible seems to be a big book of myths and stories that has survived and been heavily promoted.

 

[Cornishman]

If you can't see sense or fairness in your life,you tend to turn to atheism.

Like Sir Richard Branson, or Bill Gates?
I imagine they're struggling to find sense and fairness in their lives as we speak.

 

[Shambles]

yes indeed. bible is better taken as a historical text rather than thee word of thee god.

Gotta disagree with the first part there. The Bible is anything but an historical text. Or the word of a god (or more accurately gods), It is a work of fiction and fable. We know this to be the case cos virtually every historical claim made in the Bible has been proven wrong every time they've been investigated.

Garden of Eden? Never happened.

The Flood? Never happened.

The Exodus? Never happened.

The birth of Jesus? Impossible to be 100% sure so far but we do know that if it did happen the Biblical accounts cannot be true and must've been radically altered to fit with pre-existing theology and OT prophecy (those pesky OT stories mattered a lot to the early Christian which seems to have passed by whichever denomination Raas attaches himself to) cos the historical details are simply not true. Romans never did a census of the whole empire. Nor did any of the local censuseseseseses ever required returning to the town of your birth. That would be insane and quite probably financially ruin large parts of the empire overnight. If all of just us folk living in the UK had to return to the place of our birth - and using 2000yo travel arrangement involving mostly walking and the occasional donkey if you're lucky (fnarr) - how well do you think our economy would last? Is a ridiculous idea made even more ridiculous by the suggestion that nobody except a small group of "New Jews" thought such a catastrophically stupid piece of one-off bureaucracy was worthy of a mention outside of said small, localised group of New Jews.

The geographical details of much of the stories involving Jesus are wildly inaccurate placing towns and cities in completely the wrong places. Almost as though they were written several decades after the supposed events by people who never lived in the area or knew anybody involved... Oh... wait a minute...

The crucifixion of Jesus? We'll probably never know - partly cos we're never likely to know if such a person existed and partly cos the biblical accounts - once again - make no sense when compared to standard practice across the Roman Empire. Or common sense. Or existing and actually historical accounts. Thousand of dead Jews did not rise from their grave and wander the streets of Jerusalem. You'd think one of the several historians living and working in and around the area at the time would've mentioned a lil thing like that, no? The accounts of the "Empty Tomb" also make no sense. They all directly contradict each other and - of course - make little or no historical sense when compared with known traditions and practices at the time. Almost as though they were written several decades after the supposed events by people who never lived in the area or knew anybody involved... Oh... wait another minute... I think I may have a touch of deja vu here.

The Book of Acts is another one that is known by everyone - other than some Christians, naturally - to be wildly inaccurate and getting all the details completely wrong .Almost as though they were written several decades after the supposed events by people who never lived in the area or knew anybody involved... Oh... wait a minute... I think I may have a another touch of deja vu here. Again.

In short, you'd have more luck trying to pick out bits that were clearly not historical than bits that possibly were

Archaeology vs the Bible (James Randi)

Why the Gospels Are Myth: The Evidence of Genre and Content (Lecture by Dr Richard Carrier - my favourite "celebrity atheist" as he really knows his stuff cos he's a historian who specialises in Biblical and Roman/Middle Eastern history - I'd highly recommend any and all of his lectures and debates on the subject)

Miracles and Historical Method (another good Carrier lecture on non-Christian accounts of miracles compared to Christian accounts of miracles)

There are plenty other good lectures on this kinda subject around and about too. These are just a scant handful. The evidence of absence abounds. The evidence of presence simply does not exist as far as anybody can tell.

I had a lad ask me the other day if David Attenborough was an athiest. I said I'm not sure.

He describes himself as agnostic but certain religious folk would probably label him a Darwinist (or - worse - an "Evolutionist" 8)). Like many people, he kinda shies away from the other Big Bad 'A' Word as it could be argued that's not a very scientific approach cos the answer to all currently unknown questions could be said to be more accurately an agnostic one: We just don't know cos there is no evidence for such claims. Could also be argued that evidence of absence is - in some case - actually is evidence of absence. I suspect it's more a case of just being a tad bit queasy about the term 'Atheist' as it has certain - unwarranted - negative connotations.

David Attenborough on religion and his agnosticism

 

[rickolasnice]

More harm being caused by religion:

http://www.richarddawkins.net/news_...te-to-keep-creationism-in-science-class-again

 

[Shambles]

There's a brilliant vid of a US senator (or congressman - US governmental structures confuzzle me ) up before a house committee (or whatever it was) seriously arguing the case that climate change is pointless to even try to tackle as it is god's will, After all, Noah had to deal with it so so should we. It is, of course, proof that the second coming is upon us.

Can't find it on PooToob at the moment due to not being able to recall the details. Was fairly recent (last year, I think) and very well-known though so y'all've probably already seen it.

 

[rickolasnice]

^

I don't know whether to laugh or cry :D :'(

 

[Shambles]

Both are appropriate responses

Is hilarious the levels of stoooopid involved :D

Is also saddening - and frankly terrifying - that this kinda stuff is still taken seriously enough to be able to have any kinda influence over policy in such an important nation

 

[Raasyvibe]

Sad news, boys, I have an extremely busy month ahead of me. As this thread has turned into "Bluelight Vs Raas", putting thought into all the replies becomes very time-consuming. Though I enjoy it and feel it is productive in sharpening my own understanding of religion, I must put it aside for now and concentrate on other important affairs. It's a shame because I felt a couple of the posts... were getting sorta half-decent..

I've given one last mega-post, but after this I must vanish from BL for a month.

How anyone can really literally believe the creation story I don't know. In saying that of course everyone is entitiled to believe what they want. The bible seems to be a big book of myths and stories that has survived and been heavily promoted.

Garden of Eden? Never happened.

The Flood? Never happened.

The Exodus? Never happened

Thing with the Garden of Eden story...

Whoever was writing it, has a job to explain to us why we're on this planet, why we encounter curses, our sinful nature, temptation and obediance to God.

Now, as a method of purporting this important information to us, the author illustrates his supposed knowledge, by means of a story. The book tells a story to demonstrate all of these points.

Was there an actual garden of Eden where eve was talking to a Snake? I highly doubt it. But that is not the purpose of the story - it's not meant to be a biography of Eve and Adam life - but a story to teach others why we're here. Genesis is one of my favourite OT books, before I was a Christian I enjoyed several verses.

A modern-day equivalent would be a fictional film, made to teach a point. The actors, story's and plot never really happen... but the film is made to create awareness of an issue (EG - The film - "Who's life is it anyway", not a true story, but created to raise awareness of euthanasia beliefs) and the film director uses the cast and plot as an avenue to express his beliefs and knowledge.

Same goes with Noah really. The story doesn't make much sense. If God wanted to kill off all the wicked, in his omnipotence, he could have just created a mass plague, or given all the evil ones heart attacks. Saves Noah all the stress of making a boat and having to find all the animals. I doubt it really happened, but the story serves it's point in teaching a lesson or 2 about God.

Creationalism

I've always dismissed creationalism as it doesn't make sense in the face of scientific evidence. Only recently however, I'm starting to realise it could have been a lot more accurate than we first believed:

Think what a day actually is. It is the sun orbitting around the planet for one cycle.

Now, considering the sun wasn't actually created until "Day 4", the creation of earth in "7 Days" can in no way be the 24-hour period days that we are familiar with.

In reality (or extra-reality, or something) If the planet we live on was created, the creation could be comparable to a computer programmer making a world on your favourite computer game (of course, a trillion times more complex)... The variety of animals, lands and elements of the earth we know... would have been predesigned.

Now evolutionmay well have been the method of implementation for bringing all these designs into fruition. But do you really think God and his angels would sit around for millions of years for the plan to slowly take effect? Of course not. Time in heaven... would run differently than time in this realm.

When we speed up the frame rate of a computer game, press fast forward on a video player... skip the boring, long, introduction on your favourite song on youtube... So God, I imagine, Could have watched "millions of years of evolution" in our time, in a matter of seconds.. in heaven... on his uber-complicated PC system after millions of years of processor updates.

Like Sir Richard Branson, or Bill Gates?
I imagine they're struggling to find sense and fairness in their lives as we speak

Yeah I guess so. They're obviously a bit chuffed at how the cookie has crumbled for them, but if they saw no logical sense in the crumble of that cookie,it could lead to atheism, for sure..

At this point I have to respectively discontinue. Never really spoken in depth to Bhuddists/Muslims and their experiences.

And nor do you need to. Followers of all religions obviously believe what they believe for a reason. Or several reasons. In most cases it's simply an accident of birth - if your parents were Jewish you would be a Jew and accept that nasty ol' OT as being the divinely inspired word of god and see the NT as little more than misguided at best and heretical at worst. If you happened to be born in Pakistan you would most likely see Jesus as just another prophet - almost (but not quite) as good as Mohammed. If you were born in Egypt three thousand years ago you would worship Ra, Set, Thoth et al. Odin, Thor, Loki and chums if a Viking. Just so happened that you live in a predominently Christian (well, primarliy agnostic/atheist in truth) country so naturally gravitated toward one of the 35000+ Christian denominations.


If you were born Jewish, in a Muslim, Buddhist or Hindu country, in an ancient foreign land, or any one of a gazillion other possibilities you would follow a different religion. And you would know you had it right cos you would see interventions, miracles, signs and wonders which were clearly caused by whichever deity or deities you were arbitrarily assigned by happenstance. You would have direct personal spiritual experience of this arbitrarily assigned deity/deities. Your prayers would be answered. Except when they weren't. They move in mysterious ways these deity thingies apparently so any action - or lack thereof - is further proof of what you already know to be true because it's all so very obvious that surely everyone must see it. And most do see it. Because you see what you want to see and find ways to make it fit with your pre-existing beliefs.

Nice surmise. And a popular arguement against religious faith; I've had this one argued at me before and it's something I have considered. Though there is clearly a lot of truth in that your place and time of birth can determine your religion, I don't feel it's applicable to myself.

I was bought up in a Christian family, and was Christian as a child. At this point your surmise holds true. However I rejected it all in my early teens. By the age of 17 I was quite confident Christiannity would be something no longer asociated with myself. And I too, was laughing contemptuously at those creationalists. If I could pick a religion i probably would have gone for Bhuddism... I love that discipline of those Shaolin monks and their cool martial art tricks. Puts the Christian monks to shame. And have you ever see Bruce Lee replicate the stuff they do??! [I'm rambling now...]

At the age of 21 I found God. Wasn't a while later until I considered myself Christian. Sadly it gets highly personal/subjective from this point, but I feel God lead me to this religion, and the more I became involved in it the more it made sense and rang of truth. It wasn't a case of picking a convenient religion...

besides your intuition how is your god real? also seen as the Jewish, Muslim and Christian religions are all abrahamic religions would you agree that all worship the same god in a sense the one creator of all religions??

It's a very good point. All these religions are worshipping the same God. I tried to get onto spirituality-forums.com, to discuss with those of other religions their experiences....would be mightily interesting to see what they say, and if it was comparable to my own experiences. Sadly the forum is full with members and won't let you register any more.

As my involvement with those of other religions is still non-existant, I don't really feel in a position to give you a good response.

 

[rickolasnice]

Well don't I feel special!

See you in a month, raas

 

[Shambles]

Thing with the Garden of Eden story...

Whoever was writing it, has a job to explain to us why we're on this planet, why we encounter curses, our sinful nature, temptation and obediance to God.

No he didn't. He supposedly was giving us the word of Yahweh (although - as previously discussed the evidence is clear he/they were actually reinterpreting existing pre-Hebrew polytheism and slimming it down to fit the new "atheism" (as also mentioned, Christians were who the term "atheist" was created for as they didn't believe in "the gods" and this presumably also applied to Jews as they also dismissed polytheism at some stage)). Why would he have to make shit up? Especially summat so silly?

Also, the "Genesis days were different to "our" days" argument is a non-starter. It makes no sense if you read Hebrew. The word used for "day" in the original text is the exact same word used throughout the OT (NT being written in Greek). This makes no sense as they obviously had words to describe longer time periods. Also, it makes no sense with that common modern-day interpretation being allegorical as the order of creation in no way matches what is known about the actual history of creation or evolution. Again, it is nonsensical. It does, however, closely tie-in with pre-existing religions that already existed in that area of the world around the time the OT was being composed making it an easy sell.

And, more fundamental to the problem, it also means there is no basis for the Christian concept of "original sin". No original sin, no need for Jesus' death and resurrection. Kinda hard to get around that as far as I can tell...

Same goes for Exodus. Absolutely fundamental to many Christian concepts. We know it didn't happen - even Israeli archaeologist agree on that now despite decades of trying to find a way round the awkward facts. I see you avoided responding to that part. And also the NT problems. I wonder why that could be...?

Same goes with Noah really. The story doesn't make much sense. If God wanted to kill off all the wicked, in his omnipotence, he could have just created a mass plague, or given all the evil ones heart attacks. Saves Noah all the stress of making a boat and having to find all the animals. I doubt it really happened, but the story serves it's point in teaching a lesson or 2 about God.

And presumably that lesson is that your god is incompetent and not at all omnipotent, no? He knew all this shit was gonna happen and could've prevented it in any number of ways. Instead he chose to let his followers make up shit again that he knew would be a major problem to the religion's credibility in a few centuries time. Apparently not even a day in "god time". Perhaps he was having a fag break or summat?

Nice surmise. And a popular arguement against religious faith; I've had this one argued at me before and it's something I have considered. Though there is clearly a lot of truth in that your place and time of birth can determine your religion, I don't feel it's applicable to myself.

That would be cos it's a bit of a major argument and problem to explain away

I'll grant you the other Abrahamic religions - essentially just variations onna theme - but what about Hinduism? That's polytheistic which I'm guessing you don't go along with. Or Buddism? That's atheistic so definitely not your kinda thang. Or what about the hundreds of thousands of animist-type religions? Ancestor worship? Goddess worship/Divine Feminine? Also totally incompatible with your current belief system. Would you burn in hell for being a heathen? Or does your god forgive and forget? That doesn't fit well with much of your bible now does it? Would your god accept these other religions are a result of his own incompetence in getting the message across? Particularly in timely fashion seeing as we - as a species - have existed for at least 100000 years - 250000 by some measures, 20000000 by other measures. Kinda slack leaving it to the last moment, no?

Have a good month off, Raas

 

[rickolasnice]

BOOM!

Shambles does it again

 

[Shambles]

More indepth breakdown of why the "Genesis days are not "our" days" theory here.

Also, Divine Inspiration & Biblical Inerrancy here.

That Brett Palmer fella on PooToob is excellent on this kinda stuffs. He's a Christian who "saw the light" and - like is often the case with converts away from religion - he really knows his stuff %)

Very indepth analysis of things and should be required viewing for all with an interest in this subject from any perspective.

 

[pinkpapaver]

ep and the thing is there are far too many christians and muslims (dunno about jews) who take the creation story literally. I find it hard to converse with a person when they have their mind closed on this sort of thing.

It's only recently that i have come to my conclusion that i have been tricked even though in my days of real belief i had an attitude of worship what you want and how you want, and all sorts of sympathy for religiously oppressed people.

If it's not the law of the land then concessions should not be made on religious ground. (laws of the land shouldn't be either but that is another story.) see i had a girl moan to me about the student loan system here because muslims aren't allowed to pay interest or something. it certainly is a great way to keep people divided and otherwise occupied while the powers that be get on with their satanic ( ) practices.

Sick of it. There are some very wicked people behind religion. You see prayer mats, them things that have to be used in prayer? I should imagine that one of Mohammed's friends or family had a little rug making business that needed a bit of a boost, OK, we'll make them the religious law. And there is a real thing against nice stuff, like music and art. Well, all them sort of things help to open the mind, help people to think, and realise how powerful they could be. They do not keep people in darkness. That is the thing. and it is actually quite obvious when you think on it. These 3 religions keep the people in darkness, that is the plan, because who was gotten rid of as the bad angel? Lucifer the bringer of light. I am a bit head mashed at the moment. It's a great god that takes a mother away from her little children .

 

[Shambles]

see i had a girl moan to me about the student loan system here because muslims aren't allowed to pay interest or something.

Actually Christians aren't either. But being Christians they tend to conveniently ignore that bit. Like they ignore the vast majority of the bits of scripture they personally don't like.

 

[gayorstraight]

Actually Christians aren't either. But being Christians they tend to conveniently ignore that bit. Like they ignore the vast majority of the bits of scripture they personally don't like.

Isn't that every religion? Or they just change small details, like DIVORCE, when it suits a la Henry VIII.
My favourite is the fact that even within the same religion there are numerous different sects that disagree with one another because it's all interpretation.
How can something so old like the bible rule how some people live in the now? It's crazy.

I think religious people should stop living in a certain way for what may happen when they die and live for now. Life's too short and chances are absolutely zero happens after death.

 

[Shambles]

Over 35000 Christian denominations and rising. For a work of divine inspiration it doesn't half seem to be rather prone to interpretations. Far more so than any other religion and that is saying something :D

Again, what makes one denomination's interpretation the "right" one and the others the "wrong" ones? The "it's all just minor details" argument doesn't work cos they aren't minor at all. They are fundamental and insurmountable differences on the absolute basics in many cases. Dunno which denomination Raas (or the other Christian EADDers) are but Raas' one is a new one on me. Admittedly there are so many it's impossible for anybody to know the details of more than a few. But have never heard of a denomination that dismisses the OT so completely. Makes no sense really. Hardly a surprise, mind. Although you could equally argue it makes perfect sense as the NT was required to correct the "mistakes" in the OT as it had become so corrupted... Which begs the question of why the problems with the NT are completely glossed over. I can understand it not being easy to face up to such questions but does seem a bit hypocritical. Again, hardly a surprise.

 

[gayorstraight]

Yeah, we need a Modern Testament to fix the NT. Actually, I'm not sure what we need...

What are people's take on Buddhism? I don't know much at all, all I know is they believe in treating people as you would like to be treated and karma etc.

If I had to be religious, I'd probably choose Buddhism

 

[StoneHappyMonday]

All organized religion is a consequence of ego and patriarchy. Ego, because it is all about finding some sort of immortality, the after-life, because we're just tooooo important to only live this insignificant life. I can't imagine dogs sit around wondering about an after-life. Patriarchy because every religion shits on women from a great height. Second class citizens. This is deliberate. Buddhists do it too.

Choose life. Insignificant but a bit more real than fairy stories.

 

[rickolasnice]

More harm being caused by religion:

This is being taught to children in school..

This image is now trying to be removed from facebook..