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Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
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Simple. We shall always "cherry-pick" whatever verses we wish. In fact, taking any text from the Bible is nothing more than cherry-picking and taking it out of context. The only way to avoid the "taking out of context" is to quote the ENTIRE Bible.
rmfr
AMEN!
Even genocide?
God doesn’t command this
@HumbleThinker
So people command it instead. Good job! Progress! So what other things can you think of that people do instead of "god."
Okay keep thinking of examples.. great!
Now, start thinking about things you heard that god does actually "supposedly" do.
- Judge and punish sinners? Well we certainly never seen god do that. (It supposedly all happens only after people die and naturally people can not report back on this or evidence it in any way.)
- Listen to prayer? Prayer has never been shown to, when studied, to change outcomes beyond already established scientifically measured "random chance."
- Perform miracles? There is exactly zero miracles around that left evidence of a "god." Or of any "god" idea.
What do we have left?
- Created humans, the planet and the entire universe? Well "god" forgot to put his signature on it, it is completely unclaimed work, except for a few books written by humans, edited by humans, printed and distributed by humans that say god gets credit. There is no "made by god" stickers, (or anything of the like,) to be found anywhere in the universe.
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▮I am an atheist that always likes a good debate
▮Please include @LogicFTW for responses to me
▮Tips on forum use. ▮ A.R. Member since 2016.
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HumbleThinker,
"God doesn’t command this"
I see that you have never read the biblical fairy tale. https://www.openbible.info/topics/genocide
Have you not read the Old Testament?
HumbleThinker: "God doesn’t command this."
Joshua 6:2-3, 21
And the LORD said unto Joshua, See, I have given into thine hand Jericho, and the king thereof, and the mighty men of valour. And ye shall compass the city, all ye men of war, and go round about the city once. Thus shalt thou do six days. And they utterly destroyed all that was in the city, both man and woman, young and old, and ox, and sheep, and ass, with the edge of the sword.
The Sky Faerie commanded that Joshua and his army to kill every last living person, including the little children.
Try again.
rmfr
HumbleThinker: "God doesn't command this."
Slaughter of 42 children.
2 Kings {2:23} And he [Elisha] went up from thence unto Bethel: and as he was going up by the way, there came forth little children out of the city, and mocked him, and said unto him, “Go up, thou bald head; go up, thou bald head.” {2:24} And he turned back, and looked on them, and cursed them in the name of the LORD. And there came forth two she bears out of the wood, and tare [tore apart] forty and two children of them.
This one is definitely a “What the fuck?!” Little children. Little children, which means no older than 10 years, mocks a man for having a bald head. For a bald head! He then curses those little children and your God, your maniacally psychopathic God, sends two female bears to tear 42 of those little children apart. Forty-two little children! Now I ask you, does mocking someone for having a bald head deserve the death penalty? At any age? What kind of morality is this? Oh, I forget, even though He is a sadistic filicidal psychopath, your God is ultimately good. As above, if you can define this as morally good, then what is left to call evil?
Care to change your tune?
rmfr
What’s wrong with killing little children?
***tree falls over with a resounding thump, slowly returns to standing, reads the above, again falls over with a resounding thump***
Seriously? Dude...
rmfr
arakish,
"This one is definitely a “What the fuck?!” Little children. Little children, which means no older than 10 years, mocks a man for having a bald head. For a bald head!"
Remember who Elisha was. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elisha He was Jealous' chief mouthpiece, in effect being God in the flesh. In the story the kids were mocking God himself. The penalty for that was immediate death.
The story is an update from the one in Leviticus chapter 2410-16 (ERV) = "10 There was a son of an Israelite woman and an Egyptian father. He was walking among the Israelites, and he started fighting in camp. 11 The Israelite woman’s son began cursing, using the Lord’s name in a bad way, so the people brought him to Moses. (The name of the man’s mother was Shelomith, the daughter of Dibri, from the tribe of Dan.) 12 The people held him as a prisoner and waited for the Lord’s command to be made clear to them.
13 Then the Lord said to Moses, 14 “Bring the man who cursed to a place outside the camp. Then bring together everyone who heard him curse. They will put their hands on his head.[c] And then all the people must throw stones at him and kill him. 15 You must tell the Israelites: Anyone who curses their God must be punished. 16 Anyone who speaks against the name of the Lord must be put to death. All the people must stone him. Any foreigner or anyone born in Israel who uses the Lord’s name in a bad way must be put to death."
Notice that the death penalty applied to everyone without exception. That is also another example of justice being impartial.
Proverbs 24:23 (TPT) = "Those enlightened with wisdom have spoken these proverbs: Judgment must be impartial, for it is always wrong to be swayed by a person’s status."
If that sounds tough remember that parents are supposed to stone their disobedient children to death.
Such stories are usually repeated several times in the Bible using different characters and situations to illustrate the primary points.
@HumbleThinker
At least, you are being honest, not like the other believers here
Talyyn, had to give an Agree, but sometimes wish there were 100 Agree, 1k Agree and 10k Agree buttons.
Sorry, but I could 1 Agree...
And yes, at least HT is being honest, unlike others.
rmfr
Awww, thanks guys : )
If people really did, I imagine a lot of people who work on Sunday would be in danger.
SecularSonOfABi...,
"I imagine a lot of people who work on Sunday would be in danger."
Of all of the Commandments that is the most asinine of all. And the dummies did their damndest to make it the law of the land in America.
HumbleThinker I thank you for your honesty and candor. There are too many theists who refuse to stand on any issues.
I respect your viewpoint, but disagree. You are cherry-picking only what makes you feel warm and fuzzy, and turning a blind eye to the horrors described in the bible.
Matthew 5:17 jesus states "“Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill”. So let us not be ignorant that although jesus disagreed with the scholars of his day, he was fully committed to old testament values. For many years I also bought into the concept that jesus heralded a new path, and that the cruel and barbaric practices from the old testament were just part of a phase, one of growth. But further reading of the bible with a critical mind shows much more than the nice stories I read myself when I was too young to understand.
Jesus was old testament, he was selling something, but not at the expense of old testament laws and values.
And really, a god wipes out everyone but one small family just because he got things wrong and was pissed? Your god is either malicious and homicidal or incompetent, he created everything, was supposed to know everything, but really dropped the ball that time.
In response to the OP, I do not agree on divine command theory. This is just a cop-out by the followers, where they blindly do whatever their religious leaders tell them, and never take responsibility for their actions.
Hi David, I appreciate the compliment. I was really intrigued by the first part of your question, so much so that I reached out to my priest for an answer for that. I will try to update you when I hear back. For now I can not address it because *shocker* I don't know.
The second half of your statement deteriorated pretty quickly, and just simply repeats what other's have said.
"And really, a god wipes out everyone but one small family just because he got things wrong and was pissed? Your god is either malicious and homicidal or incompetent, he created everything, was supposed to know everything, but really dropped the ball that time."
Your premise "because he got things wrong and was pissed?" is wrong, and your conclusions "Your god is either malicious and homicidal or incompetent" do not logically follow anyway.
@Humble Thinker
"And really, a god wipes out everyone but one small family just because he got things wrong and was pissed? Your god is either malicious and homicidal or incompetent, he created everything, was supposed to know everything, but really dropped the ball that time."
I will attempt to summarize the flood story in one sentence, if you disagree, please correct me.
Mankind had become one of sin and god decided to drown everyone but one small family, of Moses.
The reasons for my conclusions are these ...
1) god created everything, and knows everything
2) god did not create mankind to be sinners but had intentions of a higher purpose
3) god decided to hit the reset button in the form of a great flood
If god created everything and is (supposedly) all-knowing, then mankind should never have strayed into such massive sin. That is the definition of incompetence or stupidity. God decided to wipe out 99.99% of the entire human race (and many animals) by drowning them, a quite nasty way to die. Any creature with any empathy does not inflict unnecessary suffering.
If I was god in that situation, I would have snapped my fingers and everyone would have instantly turned into a pile of salt, they would not have suffered. But imagine the horror, fear, and trauma of little children watching the water slowly rise, only to die from drowning. They would have climbed to the highest hills and tops of trees, only to see the water rise and overwhelm everyone. Mothers would have held their children above their heads, fell the water surround their mouth and noses, and died holding a child.
Bravo. Nice summary actually. But let me add to it.
1) God created everything, and knows everything
2) God did not create mankind to be sinners but had intentions of a higher purpose
3) Using their own free will, mankind fell into sin
4) Because God knew this was going to happen, out of love He gave us the means to survive after the fall (genitals for reproduction/sexual pleasure, vegetation for shelter, animals for food) AND began preparations for us to return to Him
5) God decided to hit the reset button in the form of a great flood
6) God sent down His only Son to bridge the gap between us and God, and allowed Him to be sacrificed for our sake
I will begin a new thread, to address your point about suffering.
1) yes
2) if you say so
3) They are basically children in term of being responsible, were tempted by a far more mature and knowledgeable being, who should have been incapacited if your god really was all-loving, omniscient and omnipotent.
4) Still incompetent, we already had genitals, food and vegetation.
5) GENOCIDE, also double standard because if we, humans, were to do that, we would be condemned.
6)It failed.
Attachments
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@HumbleThinker
Is is you that put a disagree on my comment? If it is indeed you, you may say why.
1) not contested
2) what was the higher purpose? You seem to know god's game plan, what was it?
3) not contested
4) god was loving, knew what was going to happen, yet allowed it to happen so basically all mankind suffered drowning. There is an obvious contradiction. One cannot be loving yet allow such horrors to happen. Additionally, did god place means of man's survival on this earth before or after man was created. I just read genesis and it seems to me god made man last. What were the preparations for us to "return to him"?
5) not contested
6) So jesus died? Is really gone in every sense, or is jesus back in heaven? If jesus is dead, OK. If not, then the entire sacrifice story is just BS.
David Killens,
"If I was god in that situation, I would have snapped my fingers and everyone would have instantly turned into a pile of salt, they would not have suffered. But imagine the horror, fear, and trauma of little children watching the water slowly rise, only to die from drowning. They would have climbed to the highest hills and tops of trees, only to see the water rise and overwhelm everyone. Mothers would have held their children above their heads, fell the water surround their mouth and noses, and died holding a child."
People die in floods every day some where in the world under the very conditions that you described. But according to the fairy tale Noah's flood was different. The rainfall was about 6 inches per minute for 40 days and 40 nights. That is a suffocating event.
The Noah story is simply a war story about foreign troops invading the land and killing everything. The Bible is filled with such stories. It used the image of an unrelenting flood to illustrate the point of complete obedience and total loyalty to the Boss. If the Boss tells you to build an interstellar spaceship that can zip through space at 10 light years per year you get busy and do it even if you don't have the slightest clue as to how to do it. That is what the Noah flood is about.
And as Gene Roddenberry once said, “We must question the story logic of having an all-knowing all-powerful God, who creates faulty Humans, and then blames them for his own mistakes.”
rmfr
@ AJ777
ANSWER, yes or no, TO THE QUESTION of my OP.
@ Talyyn
Here is hoping they may answer. But I shall give mine.
"Do you abide by divine command theory?"
7734 NO! Never shall. Why? Because it is the most monstrously immoral hypothesis ever created.
rmfr
@ I already know man... 384 views and only one honest anwser from a theist.
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