Why do some people have religious beliefs?

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doesn't matter if the bible advocates it - the religion is made up of adherents who forced conversion. those actions were equally as bad as islam, whether jesus said to do it or not.

EDIT: not saying all adherents forced conversion. just the history of christianity is made up of such people in part.

Last edited by hyperlexian on 07 Feb 2012, 11:38 pm, edited 1 time in total.

If you can't find evidence of it anywhere you are turning a blind eye to this since systematic bigotry has been going on for the longest time. "Thou shalt not murder" didn't apply to non-Christians as well until sometime after the Crusades so whether Jesus approved of forced conversions or not means jack s**t since Christianity has a long track record of systematic bigotry. That's right, systematic. It isn't just a matter of isolated incidents nor is it exclusive to some crazy sects. All the bloodshed and bigotry were carried out on an organized and widespread basis.

As for Islam, I really don't know whether the rampant extremism in the Middle East is purely politics or if Islam is inherently worse than Christianity but I'm open to either explanation.

Yeah, I always thought it was a cop out when believers would insist it's just bad people, and not the religion itself. It loses credibility.

Yes it does. The tenets of Christian faith are defined by the words of Jesus. "Go and tell" does not equate with "go and kill." The idea of forced conversion runs contrary to the value placed on willing converts, not to mention Christ's instruction that we are to be peaceful people. If the behavior is not Christ-like, then the perpetrator of that behavior is not Christian. A wolf dressed up in sheep's clothing is still a wolf.

If you can provide evidence that Jesus taught His followers to wage holy war in His name and get conversions by force if necessary, then you can prove that Christianity is by nature a bully religion. Without scriptural evidence, all you can really say is that there are and always have been a number of people who claim to be Christians who pervert scriptural interpretation to fit whatever agenda they want. If a teaching stands opposed to Christ, it is not a legitimate Christian teaching, and this most certainly pertains to holy war and forced conversions.

Interesting... so despite the fact Christ explicitly says in the bible to maintain the old laws:

"Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven."

Matthew 5:17-19

It clearly states that the old law (Old Testament law) MUST be followed by a Christian if they are to enter heaven, which is surely the goal of any true Christian.

Now, in Old Testament law, here are some examples:

"That prophet or dreamer must be put to death, because he preached rebellion against the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt and redeemed you from the land of slavery; he has tried to turn you from the way the LORD your God commanded you to follow. You must purge the evil from among you. If your very own brother, or your son or daughter, or the wife you love, or your closest friend secretly entices you, saying, "Let us go and worship other gods" (gods that neither you nor your fathers have known, gods of the peoples around you, whether near or far, from one end of the land to the other), do not yield to him or listen to him. Show him no pity. Do not spare him or shield him. You must certainly put him to death. Your hand must be the first in putting him to death, and then the hands of all the people."

Deuteronomy 13:5-9

If there be found among you, within any of thy gates which the LORD thy God giveth thee, man or woman, that hath wrought wickedness in the sight of the LORD thy God, in transgressing his covenant; 17:3 And hath gone and served other gods, and worshipped them, either the sun, or moon, or any of the host of heaven, which I have not commanded; 17:4 And it be told thee, and thou hast heard of it, and enquired diligently, and, behold, it be true, and the thing certain, that such abomination is wrought in Israel; 17:5 Then shalt thou bring forth that man or that woman, which have committed that wicked thing, unto thy gates, even that man or that woman, and shalt stone them with stones, till they die.

Deuteronomy 17, the verses are in the passage

Would you like any more? There is the bible advocating the murder of non-believers, commandments that you as a Christian are bound to follow if you want to be great in the eyes of your psychopathic Yahweh and enter heaven.

We're talking about forced conversion here. "Bigotry" in the current sense can really mean anything you dislike based on personal biases, so approval of Biblical definitions of morality/immorality really just come down to a matter of subjective opinion for the non-believer. I could, as an example, accuse anyone here disapproving of Christians of bigotry if I wanted to. So "bigotry" isn't really what we're discussing here. The real issue is forced conversion and other violent tactics practiced by people who want people to believe they are Christians. If there is no scriptural basis for behavior that runs contrary to Christ's teachings for His followers, then you cannot accuse it of being an inherently destructive religion.

You should also carefully consider that various Catholics recognized the destructive tendencies of the Catholic church and split away from "The" Church in order to correct what they saw as unbiblical practices. Christians are perfectly capable of reading the Bible for themselves and coming to the conclusion that certain practices are blatantly contrary to the teachings of Christ and can act on their own to bring true Christian behavior back in line with what Christ actually taught. That kind of opposition brought the Church to its knees, and it really wasn't the same church after the Counter-Reformation because of the influence the Protestants had. We Christians are always a work in progress, but we're a few steps closer to "getting it right" than we were a few hundred years ago.


I don't know what that means... Prohibitions against murder have long been in place whether Christianity had influence over a group of people or not.


If Jesus didn't approve of it and someone does it anyway, how is that person following Christ?


The basis for this is where in the gospels?


I dunno. The Koran DOES advocate for violence against unbelievers and even believers who choose to coexist with them. I can't think how so many Muslims claim Islam is peace other than that maybe they aren't well-versed in the Koran. Read a few pages from the Koran at random and you should see what I mean. About the best I can rationalize it is that jihad refers to BOTH an inner struggle against sin and an external struggle against evildoers. In that sense, it's not unlike the Christian idea of figuratively "putting on the armor of God," which if you read it you'll instantly recognize it's not talking about a physical war but rather a spiritual one. In that sense, we are always at war, but it's a war against evil and not a war against humanity.

I could biblically justify going to war, for example, by pointing to passages that teach civic duty and the nobility of self-sacrifice, especially if it means defending your friends/neighbors, etc. But I couldn't biblically justify forcing conversions of people God wants to come to Him willingly, nor could I justify a "holy war" in the name of God.

I should also point out it is not my intention to pick on Islam, but that happens to be a frequent example being used in this discussion.

But the answer to that "problem" is right there in the quote: "I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them... ...will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished." Christ taught that He Himself was the fulfillment of the Law and that through His death, burial, and resurrection "everything is accomplished." That effectively frees the believer from the demands of the Law.


But if the OT law is accomplished by Jesus' sacrificial death, then the OT Law's demands have already been satisfied for those who trust Jesus.


There are different kinds of law in Torah. One type is concerned with ceremonial purity. Another type establishes Hebrew identity (dietary laws, dress codes). Still another is plain, old-fashioned law and order.

The wilderness period Israelites were of a large number but not sufficiently large enough to stand against foreign invaders. To set up a theocracy loyal to Yahweh, certain rules had to be in place that the Israelites completely devoted themselves to worshiping Yahweh and Yahweh alone. To worship other deities was tantamount to treachery and was intolerable. While establishing themselves in the wilderness as a fledgling nation, they were extremely vulnerable. Corporate solidarity and the sentiment that what affected an individual affected the entire community were crucial to their development as a nation. Such laws that established them as a theocracy devoted to the worship of Yahweh should come as no surprise.

Notice here that the laws applied to Israel and ONLY Israel. They were instructed to conquer Canaan and carefully maintain their laws within their borders. The laws that applied to the Israelites were not given to the Gentiles, nor was Israel instructed in actively waging war against other countries for the purpose of spreading their religion. Their "holy war" was strictly limited to reclaiming covenant lands. That didn't mean they couldn't or didn't fight other wars, but subsequent wars were fought for entirely different purposes. So aside from the conquest of Canaan, there is no justification for any kind of holy war for the Israelites. EVEN IF Torah was meant for the Gentiles, it STILL could not be used to support holy war and forced conversion.

Also, if you read the prophet Isaiah, you'll notice that even he hints that Torah was given to apply to the time period within which it was given (during the Exodus and the time period leading up to crossing the Jordan) and wasn't necessarily all "set in stone."


Nice try... That's the closest I've ever seen anyone get to it, but the issue is you can't make a case for holy war without referencing the OT--whose laws were never meant to be applied to Gentiles and which were fulfilled by Christ anyway.

The only way you can even come close is by ignoring much of what Jesus said. There are a couple of different ways of reading it.

For example: "Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches people to do so will be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But whoever practices and teaches these commandments will be called great in the kingdom of heaven." Both "whoever breaks" and "whoever practices" are included in the kingdom of heaven. It is impossible to avoid breaking "the least of these." Therefore all believers are the least in the kingdom of heaven. Only God will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

And finally, verse 20: "For I tell you, unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven." The scribes and Pharisees were known to be ardent keepers of the law, so the idea of "surpassing" their righteousness would sound absurd to an audience of that time period. At issue was the Pharisaic tendency not just to keep the law but avoid sinners and the unclean like the plague. They prominently displayed their self-righteousness while neglecting the spiritual needs of others. Their righteousness was effectively built on the backs of the marginalized. True righteousness, according to Jesus, was attained by keeping the spirit of the law rather than the letter of it, the whole of which is summarized as "Love God with all your being; love others" (obvious paraphrase, but hopefully you get my point). Righteousness that focuses on God rather than self surpasses that of the Pharisees, and thus those who trust Christ may enter the kingdom of heaven.

And this is why theistic arguments fail to convince people.


You are making assumptions, many of them illogical, and attempting to have them passed off as canon, irrefutable reality.

Can you find a biblical quote stating that through the human sacrifice of Jesus (Yahweh loves human sacrifice after all!) accomplished everything your pet psychopath wanted to do? As well as a quote stating that such barbaric laws didn't apply to anyone else, both then and now?

There isn't an error in the logic there is a reason as to why the argument is thousands of years old and hasn't been refuted. It depends on the chracteristics of said "god", in this case, we are speaking of a god that is omnipotent, omniscient and omni-benevolent. For instance, the Christian god or Allah, who are both said to be all-powerful, always good and all-seeing.

The "3O" argument or "The problem of evil" doesn't refute the existence of a god, it refutes the existence of a being with the specifically mentioned characteristics.

The argument that he is making about the old testament laws are based on a certain interpretation of the Pauline epistles, which is a popular argument from Christian apologists because it effectively takes away an opponents ability to criticize the majority of anti-social acts done by believers throughout history. It doesn't take away things like both the Lutheran and Catholic church preaching antisemitism as official doctrine until roughly 1950. It doesn't take away threatening children with hell, which is a concept first brought into Christianity by Christ himself. However, it does attempt to take away the criticism of the old testament because the generalized public view is that while the old testament god is a sociopath with severe narcissistic traits, Jesus is all cuddly and nice, despite saying that he didn't bring peace but a sword.

The challenge is that when one argues from scripture, one is arguing from very shaky premises because the texts themselves are open to so much interpretation. While some interpret the Pauline epistles to be carte blanche to toss the old testament out of the window and just needing to believe in Christ to be saved, others interpret them differently. While some view Christ as moral, some (including me) consider him and his statements to be both insulting an immoral. Therefore, an argument would have to be free from arguments that require interpretation of the scripture and rely only on the statements made in scripture that do not require interpretation.

According to the Old Testament, God commanded His chosen people to kill the wicked evil lost sinners partially for not converting to monotheism. And since you believe Jesus is God, then ...

Ok, so Christian faith is defined by the words of Jesus. The Mosaic law does no longer apply. That's great imho, because Jesus taught a lot of nice things.

And yet, in another thread (link) you wrote:



Can you please point to the gospel verse where Jesus says that? Did he ever say something like "don't judge others, except for gays" or "love your neighbor like yourself, unless he's gay?" Let's see some gospel quotes.

I agree with that, and yet I'll happily accept when people tell me that they only follow Jesus' teachings and not the Mosaic law. That means they won't go around and judge their fellow citizens.

Instead, they will support charity, oppose war-mongering and hate speech, and try their best to love their neighbors and even their enemies. They would never pull out Leviticus and start bashing gays. Or would they?

I am not a religious person, more of a Deist than anything, but I think atheists tend to throw the baby out with the bathwater. They think that just because the Bible is pretty easy to debunk, means that the Universe is just a random accident. They think because Yahweh doesn't exist, or Allah, that means there is no God at all.

It could very well be just a random accident.

I think it's more likely that the universe is just one of several universes generated randomly through singularities of all sorts by some eternal cosmic form of some sort that intrinsically brings forth these singularities ... than that a God with a mind exists eternally and created this universe. Of course, I wouldn't rule out his existence ... but it's less probable.

Less probable in your opinion. I find the idea of some kind of intelligence more believable than randomness. But then again, either of us could be correct.

It just annoys me when some atheists (not you) have an 'i'm right, you're wrong' mentality which is really just the same as religious people do.