6399 replies to this topic

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I only have the time to get to this bit for now. You're severely missing the point. I'm not talking about anthropic bias at all. Your hypotheticals are meaningless. In any possible universe, the way said universe would work would be flawless. The only way it wouldn't be is if the universe did not exist.

Than your statement is redundant. If any form of existence lacks flaws, why mention, "the universe is flawless, therefore god"? It's no different from "the universe exists, therefore god", which is a very different argument.

Jesus was not on earth during the time of that event. Don't be a sarcastic ass.

Lol.Me: bible passage showing that Iesu isn't limited by his temporal or physical proximity to work his divine magicks.You: Jesus wasn't there to cure the diabetes girl you idoit!

The point of the story is that the couple that adopted that little girl didn't want a girl like her at all. They wanted someone that could feed themselves, clothe themselves, bathe themselves, and speak. That girl couldn't do any of that, and the couple new it. And yet the couple felt some "force" (for lack of a better word) pulling them toward that child. That force is what Christians would refer to as the Holy Spirit.

It's not at all possible that they were normal people who felt empathy and just weren't assholes?

You haven't given me any evidence. In Genesis 1, it talks about the order in which things were created. In Genesis 2, it goes into detail on the creation of man (humanity).

http://en.wikipedia....#Eve_in_JudaismI can post more if you want. I'd appreciate it if you stop trying to discredit what I post and respond to it directly.

Seriously, work on your grammar. And I'm guessing you're once again suggesting that I was redefining terms. By the way, I never defined, nor redefined, conclusive evidence. Go ahead and check. I gave definitions for "evidence" and "speculation" to show that, contrary to what you said, the two aren't antonyms.

What exactly do you mean by grammar? Perhaps you are critiquing my syntax or word choice, but I'd appreciate it if you can take a certain sentence and correct it for me, I'm truly confused.

Actually, the donkey jaw was poetic, and rather ironic. I'm not arguing that the message that was supposed to be conveyed was not supposed to be taken literally. You start off with "the passage is literal", now you're saying "the message is literal", and I'm supposedly the one backing down?

This argument is so idiotic. I obviously don't believe that some guy actually commanded bears to kill people and the bears obeyed, nor do I think some guy killed an entire army with a piece of bone. I'm the guy that don't believe in god remember? I think that the passage is literal, that doesn't mean that I think it was true.I'm saying that the story was constructed in a certain way to appeal to the readers, such as Jesus sometimes doing random things in the gospels that had don't ever get mentioned again to fulfill some obscure prophecy. That doesn't mean that that particular event was not meant to be taken literally.

Yes, I read that. You apparently like to avoid my point. It's a folk tale. None of the events described in it are found in the Bible.

No, the adaptation of Lilith as the first women was a folktale, the writings noting that there were two accounts of creation is dated around the 400s and were written by Rabbis who presumably understand the text a bit better than you or me.

The account of creation in John says outright that "the Word was God". "The Word" is understood to be Jesus in all sects of Christianity, including the Jehovah's Witnesses. However, in the Witnesses Bible, they took out the part that says "the Word was God". They based their conclusions on the parts of the Bible that they want to believe, and then change everything that doesn't fit their views in the Bible until it does. The fault isn't the source, it's the religion.

John was the illiterate son of a carpenter, who somehow wrote a book with the first chapter referencing a concept imported from Greek philosophy.That wasn't my point though, the point is that Iesu is referenced as being part of creation.

And I am still waiting for you to give even one inconsistency.

I already did with the two accounts of genesis.But if you really want more:Ecclesiastes 9:3-6This is the evil in everything that happens under the sun: The same destiny overtakes all. The hearts of men, moreover, are full of evil and there is madness in their hearts while they live, and afterward they join the dead. Anyone who is among the living has hope —even a live dog is better off than a dead lion! For the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing; they have no further reward, and even the memory of them is forgotten. Their love, their hate and their jealousy have long since vanished; never again will they have a part in anything that happens under the sun.Luke 24:40-43But the other criminal rebuked him. "Don't you fear God," he said, "since you are under the same sentence? We are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong."Then he said, "Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom."Jesus answered him, "I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise."Oh, and since we are on the subject of not providing evidence or answering questions, where exactly is your reply to the mitochondrial record or the evolution of wheat, or the summoning of Samuel, or the use of magick by the Egyptian priests.

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Someone should really shut this topic down.According to my calculations, 55.33% of all the replies (this one not included) on the first page go to this topic.Add the other topics pretty much concerning theology, such as: Who the hell would believe in evolution???, or that dumb*** question Do Muslims & Christians beleive in the same God , and you've got at least half this board's replies on pretty much unprovable topics. Which is a great usage for a debate board.[/sarcasm]I'm fairly certain that I have no sway on if topics get closed down anyway, but if this site is still operating twenty years from now, 38542788Jr. and HimJAHR080T will likely be having this pointless debate.

That's sort of the point.When something is unfalsifiable, we assume the simplest position and operate under that.So long as god is defined coherently, of course I can't prove that god doesn't exist, it's impossible to prove a negative.Unfortunately, we can't even arrive at that point because because the Christian god makes no sense, it's a logically impossible construct.I could stick to the first argument and leave the Christian god alone I suppose. That would simplify things somewhat.As for evolution, there are still people who believe that the Earth is flat or deny the existence of AIDS, or campaign against vaccines, it's quite possible for people to act like idiots for a variety of reasons, religion just helps it along most of the time.

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No, you're correct in saying that Jesus isn't limited by physical proximity. However, had Jesus been physically present, he would have done what it was under the parents obligation to do.

Than why would he have had to be physically present to prevent the girl's death?Obviously you believe that Iesu still exists in some form, what exactly prevents him from acting in the same manner he supposedly did in the past?

Presumably. And Iesu, as you call him, spent a good deal of his life mocking the rabbis for such things. The passage in Genesis 1, if you really stretch it, can be construed as "man and woman were created simultaneously". Fact is, that's not what it says. It does say that they were created on the same "day", and that God created both of them. It doesn't say that they were created at the same time however.

Somehow Jews over 1000 years ago already noted that the two accounts of creation were different, the original Hebrew was also translated into Greek and Latin, and in modern times, into English.The all contain this difference in account between the first chapters of genesis, which as I just said, was noted a very long time ago.Why do you think arguing over the latest in a long line of translation is going to help when people have already analyzed the original writing and noted that the two accounts were different?Do you think those Rabbis somehow lacked faith and wanted to corrupt the record? They obviously noted this inconsistency and wanted to account for it, that's why they came to their particular rationalization (two women were created in different ways, at different times), instead of the more obvious conclusion, which I and many others have happened to reach (the two accounts were different because it obviously wasn't a literal record of the actual creation of the world, the writer messed up).

That's what I mean by grammar. Your sentence makes no sense. The best I can do is guess at what you were trying to say. My guess this time? "such as Jesus sometimes doing random things in the gospels that are never mentioned afterward in order to fulfill some obscure prophecy". The gospels were written by four different people. Two of the gospels were written accounts of the men that walked with Jesus, and also wrote those Gospels (Matthew and John). The other two were written based on eyewitness accounts of the people that witnessed Jesus' miracles. I would suppose that anything that fulfilled some obscure prophecy actually happened then, unless of course those hundreds of eyewitness accounts were lies. But all those people coming up with the same lies? Highly doubtful.

No, the books were attributed to those people, the actual record are much more confused.For example, like I had just mentioned, it would have been impossible for John to literally "write" the gospel of John, he was illiterate. Suggesting that he dictated it to someone else also held problems since John was written in a very different manner from the synoptic gospels and like I said, the ideas that were incorporated into it added elements of Greek philosophy and religion, which an old Jewish dude whose dad was a carpenter probably wouldn't have decided to add if he was just putting down an account of his brother's life.Of course, the dating also presents some problems, since the three synoptic gospels are supposed to be based off of each other, with Mark being the earliest.The timing of the writing attributed to John is particularly troublesome since he would have to have been really really old given the dates involved. The early Church even added a new character called John the Presbyter to rationalize this.It might also help to read up on this: http://en.wikipedia....ynoptic_problem

This one actually goes back to that bit about the physical plane and the spiritual plane. Your quote from Ecclesiastes is referring to the physical plane. When someone/something dies, their physical body no longer feels emotions, no longer has thoughts, etc., and cannot enjoy any sort of physical reward. "Never again will they have part in anything that happens under the sun" loosely meaning they will no longer have a part in the physical world. Your quote from Luke has Jesus mentioning the spiritual reward.

No, like I've mentioned before, the Jewish view death was at first very similar to the Sumerian one (which would seem obvious since Abraham supposedly came from there).Aside from Ecclesiastes, there were other times when death was mentioned as being final, and as being a state of where the consciousness no longer exists (Job for example, I can probably find others references if I looked).As for this hypothetical spiritual plane that you mention yet again (which isn't in the bible by the way), would that also involve the secession of human consciousness?There have been many references in the bible to the afterlife being physical, such as the resurrection and ascension of Iesu, or the ascension of various other characters in the old testament (where they were literally carried up to heaven instead of dying as normal mortals). As well as god's disruption of the tower of Babel. Or perhaps we can look at revelation and the account of the physical resurrection it gave as well as the physical reformation of the Earth (measurements and all). Why add a "spiritual plane" to all of this? Is it really necessary?

I've told you I don't have the time to do the research to reply on the mitochondrial record or the evolution of wheat. I wasn't the one in the midst of the argument about the summoning of Samuel, or the use of magics by the Egyptian priests, hence I didn't reply to them.

Why didn't you admit that you didn't know anything about the subject instead of responding?So you're suggesting that because all living things contain mitochondria, all living things sprang from the same life form? All cars contain an engine, but not all cars are made by Mitsubishi. Come on man, seriously. As for the Egyptians and the summoning of Samuel, I would think the presentation of deities or powers other than god would be a pretty big thing, as well providing another of those inconsistencies you keep on insisting I provide.

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I do know something about it, but obviously I haven't studied it to the extent that you have, hence the need for research, which I don't really have a lot of time for.

"I don't know enough but I still think you're wrong" isn't exactly a very satisfying reply.Why exactly don't you believe in evolution?Can you at least agree that common descent or the creation of a new species in one generation is adequate as far as evidence goes?

Spirits are actually mentioned quite often in the Bible. Demons, Baal, God, Angels, etc. We don't see such spirits because they exist on a different plane than we do. That's the basic idea behind the spiritual plane anyway. Regardless, the scriptures you provided about death are about the death of the body. Physical death. Not spiritual death.

This is stupid, why is physical resurrection or the ascension of the living such a big deal if there's a "spiritual realm"?I'm also not contesting the fact that spirits were mentioned, for example, you have still failed to say anything about how Samuel was summoned by the medium.I'm saying that concepts like physical resurrection, the ascension of the living, and a seperate spiritual realm do not mesh together to form a coherent whole, there's no need for one if we already have the other. Thus it's a contradiction.