The absurdity of Christianity

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Then how do you explain these:

I posted similar ones where the Christian God told his followers to kill.
I made the point that IF I was a Christian, this would be against the Ten Commandments ,and was probable a test to see if I would break them, or the Devil trying to tempt me.
I believe you missed my point.

Weirdly the 10 commandments of buddhism and hinduism are remarkably similar to 10 commandments of the bible.

There are a lot of assumptions made about how knowledge was acquired in the ancient world.

The ancient Greeks are quite honest in that almost everything they were taught about science, medicine and astronomy they learned from the ancient Egyptians.

Likewise much of christian beliefs that diverts from Jewish beliefs seems remarkably similar to buddhism and hinduism.

I'm not saying jesus went to India, but possible he spent some time listening to travellers from India. Pacifism and respect for all living things was a concept completely alien to the middle-east and Europe till Jesus Christ.

Last edited by cyberdad on 15 Jul 2021, 10:50 pm, edited 2 times in total.

False dilemma. You’ve never demonstrated that genocide actually happened or that what God commanded even qualifies as genocide. You haven’t proven that God is evil. All you’re doing is assuming those things, so it’s unreasonable from the outset. You haven’t proven that anything in the Bible is false. It’s logically possible that the Bible is not false and that God is good. It is NOT logically possible that God could be evil. If God is not evil, nothing he commands can be evil.

The assertion that “God commands genocide” assumes the Evil God. However, the problem of assigning good or evil to anything also assumes a standard by which something might be said to be good or evil. Assigning good or evil to something based on human experience assumes that human beings know good from evil. Human standards for good and evil outside of divine revelation are dynamic and even fickle. People in recent times who actually DO commit genocide certainly don’t believe what they are doing to be evil. Hitler thought he was doing Germany the greatest good from kristallnacht forward. So who is evil? Hitler? Or everyone else? Is it just the winners who are good? If the NAZIs had won, would that have made them good? Ancient Rome did some pretty atrocious stuff. Were they evil? On the other hand, they governed and protected all of the known civilized world at that time. So...they were good? Or is good just whatever I feel it is? There is no consistent, purely secular standard for good and evil. It doesn’t exist in any meaningful form.

If there is an absolute standard, such as murder being pretty much universally understood as evil, how can human beings know what that is? If human beings can only partially know objective, absolute good/evil, is there a way to know more than what we already do? Is there a reliable source for understanding good/evil in absolute terms? Well, the only way anyone can know good and evil in absolute terms is by being omniscient. Human beings are not omniscient and thus incapable of fully understanding good and evil. God is omniscient and does know in absolute terms what good is.

Since God is not evil, what he commands can only be good. So...genocide is not specifically mentioned in the Bible, nothing that qualifies as actual genocide was even carried out in the Bible by anyone chosen by God. There’s no reason to conclude that God commanded genocide, and what we’re left with is the ASSUMPTION that he did. So if the assumption for the sake of argument, however unlikely, is that genocide is what was intended, then it follows that God only being good could not have committed evil by commanding it—genocide by itself is neither inherently good nor evil. I’m not saying that genocide is good necessarily, only that if we assume genocide is evil that it is only contingently evil. If God knows a race of people to be so evil as to be irredeemable and to have forfeited their right to exist, it is God’s prerogative to wipe them out completely. If we are only God’s playthings, it is improper to presume to tell God what he can or cannot do with us.

On the other hand...

Because God is not evil and does not give evil commands, adding the assumption that we can know with certainty that genocide is evil (for the sake of argument), then it follows that God didn’t command genocide.

Either genocide under God’s direction is not evil, or what God commanded (assuming genocide is evil) was not genocide. Either conclusion would be reasonable. How one proceeds to take the argument from there will likely follow a modern bias against genocide. I don’t see the conquest of Canaan as genocide, but neither do I ASSUME that anything God does is evil simply because many people in the world feel so strongly about it.

The idea of OT genocide is settled. Anything else I’d add to the discussion on that was already mentioned in a previous post.

Or it could be all religions stem from a common tradition that predated Abraham.

I think it’s a blend of a common tradition and an objective religion. Everyone knew and accepted God created the universe. So anything and everything that resulted in the benefit to the individual must have been God’s will and blessing while the opposite resulted in a curse (negative consequences). People would have known what to look for from nature and reality in terms of morality and ethics after God began revealing how to discover it. For example, God did not tell Adam and Eve that consuming knowledge of good and evil was itself an evil act. Knowing good and evil is not a sin. Adam’s sin was presuming that God’s perfection could be improved on. Adam and Eve could be like gods, in other words, when they were perfect the way they are. Consuming knowledge causes the consumer to assume responsibility for it, hence human beings must take responsibility for their own actions. We may be cut off from the Tree of Knowledge, but its roots run throughout the world. We cannot help but touch the Tree, and it is from our desire to live that we utilize reality and reason in order to thrive while we live here.

---

If 'God' Sends His Creations to Hell,
Forever to Torture Them, God Is
Evil; No Ifs, Ands, Or Buts;

(Hint: 'God' Doesn't Do This;
It's Actually A Bold Face Lie)

It's REALLY Common Sense;

Of Course Without Common

Sense; It's Also "Fool's God";

That Strangely Enough,

Many Folks Take

As 'Gospel Truth',

HAHAHAHAHA

DESCRIBED AS GOOD NEWS...

TRUE, Cognitive Dissonance Much?

There is NO WAY THAT TORTURING ANYTHING

FOREVER

IS NOT

EVIL; SIMPLE AS THIS...

Of Course, This is Just A Story too...

Bro, IT Doesn't Even Exist in the Realm

Of Other Existence; Other than Human Being, And only me of Course, Until Someone

Else Reads it; Ahem, Amen? It's A Big Creation Out There Baby; Far from Humancentric; Ya, Get It?

IT IS TOTALLY ABSURD

TO SUGGEST THAT ANYTHING

THAT TORTURES ANYTHING

FOREVER IS NOT PURE EVIL...

Honestly, it Shouldn't Take A 'Rocket Scientist'

Or 'Biblical Scholar' to Figure this out, Now;

Only A Human Being Without Spoon-Fed Lies...

---

The interpretation of Adam's decision is subjective rather than doctrinal as we don't know what the original author of the adam/eve story was thinking, whether it was even mean't to be metaphorical?. Certainly in the Gnostic tradition all the scriptures must be interpreted in terms of a metaphor for a higher purpose that initiates can't understand until they train themselves.

The question of a common root for all religions predating Abraham makes sense. Prehistoric humans followed shamanistic traditions which did pay homage/respect to nature/animals/plants and belief in spirits (which monotheistic beliefs don't discount as spirits/demons/angels appear in all of the holy books).

The separation of nature/spirit world changed the respect humans had for the natural world. The Abrahmic religions introduced the idea that the earth was given to us to exploit/take stewardship over rather than being active participants in ecosystems.

The other issue is pacifism, compassion and peace, European and middle eastern societies evolved from many thousands of years of warrior culture which valued strength over compassion. The pagan gods of Europe and the middle east demanded blood sacrifice and war. If you read pagan stories of pre-christian Anglo-Saxons they involve divine beings that were quite horrible, The same with Roman and Greek gods who enjoyed drink, libation, fornication and other transgressions.

The god of the jews (whom Jesus followed) was a vengeful, spiteful god who demanded complete obedience from his followers but gave great reward for those who followed his laws. This god spurred the old testament jews to do the same to other tribes that they would have done. Sacrificing animals, taking slaves, waging war, murdering everybody.

All this changes in the new testament. Miraculously jesus was a complete pacifist who said "love one another as yourself" "turn the other cheek" "do not cause harm to animals be kind and compassionate". "Help the needy and sick" etc etc....
Although historians claim Jesus came from the Jewish essene sect its important to understand that none of these principles were ever espoused by the essenes or any other Jewish sect.

Where did Jesus learn this?? Only one culture on the planet these followed these principles at the time Christ was alive, That was the hindus and buddhists of India.

Quoting part of AR's post: "If God knows a race of people to be so evil as to be irredeemable and to have forfeited their right to exist, it is God’s prerogative to wipe them out completely. If we are only God’s playthings, it is improper to presume to tell God what he can or cannot do with us."


That sounds pretty messed up and disturbing - the concept that we're "playthings" - as if the toys in a playroom that the children no longerf like playing with, can simply be dispatched to the bin, broken or whatever. It doesn't square with our directive to look after the earth and all God's creatures. Admittedly we've done a pretty poor job of that and found wanting and many so-called curators of the earth should be fired!

Id say humanity in general have a pretty good idea what's good and what's bad. Iin my country recently, there have been riots and protests - people running amok allegedly because a former president was incarcerated for contempt of court. These people should know that they're shooting themselves in the foot and that their actions will lead to more starvation and troubles - it's self destructive behaviour. Therefore God permits them to act in such a crazy way so they will come to see how foolishly they're behaving. It hurts me to see people act in a way that makes wild beasts noble by comparison, but the good people outnumber the bad and already 40 000 people have been mobilized on a Facebook group to rebuild the infrastructure and assist those in need. Humanity, despite its many faults, can still make us proud and deserve a chance for good to overcome evil.

Or Jesus really was one with God who originated all of it.

Why is it disturbing?

Because it seems to imply that the OT god could capriciously destroy a race of people should he so choose - thus= genocide. Also appears to imply we're playthings that have no will of our own.

I am taking the objective view that the real Jesus travelled, learned and listened to others before arriving at his teachings. But of course the aliens could have programmed him to impart his teachings.

Alien-god theory....fits nicely with the idea we are literally playthings/stock animals

if early humans were meant to breed for whatever such aliens purposed for them - it wold explain why they weren't too keen on homosexuality or other diversities but preferred folk to have as many kids as possible.

Having the right to do something doesn’t imply that God actually does it. We don’t like the idea that we are someone else’s creation and property and ultimately powerless, but that is where we are. I’m not going to say God never wiped out entire cities or even hit the reset button by drowning everything—he did. The point is that God allows us to live even though he isn’t obligated to do so. He allows us the choice to trust him or not even though he doesn’t have to. He allows us autonomy when he doesn’t have to. Why do human beings choose to be destructive when we could just as easily choose gratitude?

Couldn't these entities choose rabbits instead?