A few thoughts on religion and God

[Stigmata]

Jesus said that anyone who speaks in his place is a false prophet. The Bible is full of false prophets. In fact, the Bible itself is a false prophet, because it twists the lessons and wills of God through the errors of translation and the words and wills of others. Priests, pagans, saints, sinners, none of them are God but they all speak in his place.

"Num 12:6 And he said, Hear now my words: If there be a prophet among you, I the LORD will make myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream."

If it is indeed possible to live eternally, beyond the capacity of our mortal physical bodies, then it is necessary that the physical world we live in is a temporary stage in eternal existence. A dream from which we will awake at the end. Jesus has not made himself known to us, or anyone, in this dream of ours. He has never taken physical form or spoken a word to any one of us. He is not here in the dream. So, any prophet in this dream, this world, is false.

"If a prophet, or one who foretells by dreams, appears among you and announces to you a miraculous sign or wonder, and if the sign or wonder of which he has spoken takes place, and he says, 'Let us follow other gods' (gods you have not known) 'and let us worship them,' you must not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer. The Lord your God is testing you to find out whether you love him with all your heart and with all your soul. It is the Lord your God you must follow, and him you must revere. Keep his commands and obey him; serve him and hold fast to him. 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" (Deuteronomy 13:1-5 NIV).

Here, even the will of God is obscured by the Bible itself. God wants nothing more than for you to love it unconditionally. God is everything, and is everywhere. I am God. You are God. The trees and the earth and the sky are God. God wants nothing more than for you to love everyone and everything unconditionally. Yet God follows this command by telling you to kill false prophets?

Because it is impossible to prove whether God exists or not, it is impossible to know whether you are sending the false prophets on to the eternal, or if you are ending their lives by the will of something that is not true and does not exist. By this, we can conclude that killing anyone, or anything, is in direct opposition to loving it, because killing teaches nothing. If you love something, you will not punish it without allowing it a way to mend its ways.

"The Lord your God is testing you to find out whether you love him with all your heart and with all your soul." False prophets are a test of your love of God, of the Universe. Will you kill? Or will you love, and share, and learn, and grow?

If there is a God, all it wants is for us to love, and think for ourselves. Because to think is to live, and to love is to live with each other.

If there is a God, we will live eternally through love. If there is no God, we will love eternally through life.

That is all.

What do you think?

 

[lefty]

Not that I care, but when did gee-zuss ever say anyone who speaks in his place is a false prophet? That's the basis of like the first half of your post at least, you should at least give a reference.

 

[lame-o]

I think these are your opinions, and I respect them. I can't argue with your views, but I think that religion has very little to do with God except to convince people to act a certain way using God as a crux, or a reason for people to listen.

Religions are merely meant to help make a healthier society when times are rough. Then some dumb people come along and make up ideas without using any foresight, and it all falls apart. That, or it just becomes too complex to sustain. Amid all the stories are the philosophies and insights which are the whole point, some of them are intelligent, some not so much. It's just a collaboration of views on a particular idea of God and the question of life...

So, IMO don't look too deeply into religion. Everyone has been trying to explain/find God since the beginning of humanity, and all it really comes down to is what you feel is right.

 

[Remus]

What do you think?

I think religion isn't worth thinking about...

 

[Stigmata]

Not that I care, but when did gee-zuss ever say anyone who speaks in his place is a false prophet? That's the basis of like the first half of your post at least, you should at least give a reference.

I used to know where he said this. I'll find it. It's in the book of Matthew.

 

[Eejit]

If there is a God, all it wants is for us to love, and think for ourselves. Because to think is to live, and to love is to live with each other.

If there is a God, we will live eternally through love. If there is no God, we will love eternally through life.

Thread title should be "A few thoughs on Christian religion and God". I think you mean "if there is this God..." - there's no reason the believe the lessons of the Bible would apply to any possible Creator, even assuming their existence.

 

[Shakermaker]

I used to know where he said this. I'll find it. It's in the book of Matthew.

Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes, nor figs from thistles, are they? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit; but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor can a bad tree produce good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. So then, you will know them by their fruits.

But JC was basically referring to competitors like Simon Magus and other prophets.

 

[Warped]

In the Old Testament God destroys a lot of shit, and in the New Testament hes a daddy and loves everyone more. Me thinks God is bipolar or not what he says he is

 

[MorganFreeman911]

I vote the Bipolar one.

 

[Polaris]

God this and that. I'm tired of all this nonsense...

 

[Glue]

God is a state of mind...that's it.

 

[MJ12]

Here, even the will of God is obscured by the Bible itself. God wants nothing more than for you to love it unconditionally. God is everything, and is everywhere. I am God. You are God. The trees and the earth and the sky are God. God wants nothing more than for you to love everyone and everything unconditionally. Yet God follows this command by telling you to kill false prophets?

Well, to answer this question, if we are speaking on "technical" terms of the belief system it goes like this-

God is broken up into three people, Father, Son, and The Holy Spirit.

Now God the Father is of the old Testament, the one who you will often hear of killing people/telling you to kill people who are evil etc.

However, the New Testament God the Son (Jesus) comes along and is all like "Hey, I'm supposed to teach you all how to love because you don't understand my Father because he's always so cranky and misanthropic"

That's why you always hear about God the Father talking about killing, etc. I know somewhere in the Bible God The Father states that he is a jealous god, and possibly even hypocritical.


I am just explaining it on the technical level that Christians believe. (Obviously it's a little messed up )

 

[swan_song1973]

religion is nothing but our way of coping with our own mortality.

 

[Krynn72]

That's why you always hear about God the Father talking about killing, etc.

Speaking of which. I find the Godfather movies boring and I can never watch one all the way through before getting bored and doing something else.

Also, these are the sort of thoughts I have about God.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEiKpVcp3zg

 

[Stigmata]

God is everywhere and everything. God is you, and me, the animals and the trees. If we can learn to love everything, it doesn't matter whether God exists, because without him, we can still create Heaven on Earth.

 

[Viperidae]

God is everywhere and everything. God is you, and me, the animals and the trees. If we can learn to love everything, it doesn't matter whether God exists, because without him, we can still create Heaven on Earth.

The counter argument is that then the word 'God' is meaningless. You are not expanding our knowledge by referring to essentially the physical universe as God, but merely replacing the known universe with a neologism.

 

[Stigmata]

The point is not to define, quantify, or prove God. The point is to love.

 

[Saturos]

I have a 'sort of' off-topic question:

Since the Big Bang Theory is up in flames right now regarding proof of a single point in creation, what's the new idea on the origins of the universe for those who don't believe in a creator?

 

[Murray]

Since the Big Bang Theory is up in flames right now regarding proof of a single point in creation

Wait... when did this happen?

 

[Sulkdodds]

Part of the reason that love is such a wonderful thing is that the universe doesn't run on it.

In any case, Biblical contexts impose their own meaning on a word like 'love'. Good old God the Father frequently means it in the way that Che Guavara does when he says a revolutionary has to fight with love in his heart. You can love the enemy, but you may still kill them, because ultimately you love the Law.

 

[Saturos]

Wait... when did this happen?

That's old news. Google it.

I don't feel like digging for the source right now.

 

[staticprimer]

I have a 'sort of' off-topic question:

Since the Big Bang Theory is up in flames right now regarding proof of a single point in creation, what's the new idea on the origins of the universe for those who don't believe in a creator?

Why does there have to be? There is currently no evidence short of educated speculation, and I for one have no problem saying "I don't know." The whole concept of the beginning of the universe is a mind**** anyway, considering the first law of thermodynamics. Even if a "god" (or gods) created the universe, what created that? Am I to believe that some intelligent entity was just chilling out for eternity, existing in non-existence until it decided to create existence? And why even bother? Was non-existence boring? Is that even possible if time doesn't exist? As for a scientific explanation, if our understanding of the nature of the universe is not advanced enough so as to give an answer that is more than speculation, then I am fine with "I don't know."

 

[Kadayi]

Jesus said that anyone who speaks in his place is a false prophet.

=

The Bible is full of false prophets.

= ROFLMAO

Seriously? Stig have you even read the entire thing? The Bible has a clear chronological order to it in terms of event sequence, and guess what? All the Jesus bit comes at the end (rolls eyes). The entire second part is almost all about him (aside from the mumbo Jumbo about Armageddon). Therefore to deduce that what Jesus says is somehow applicable retrospectively is both naive and foolhardy. ShakerMaker is on the money here.

If your going to rally against religion take a leaf out of Christopher Hitchens and stick to undermining though science and pure logical argument based upon the observation of real world facts: -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5INo7W2P-Jk

Not by attempting to quote chapter and verse and 'prove' the absurdity of religious works themselves. The vast majority of religious followers tend to view their chosen religions teachings in an allegorical/interpretive manner, rather than a literal one (the vast majority of Christians don't have a problem with evolution, because they never took the 7 days thing literally) . Its only really religious extremists who tend to follow the latter policy, so taking an anal literal approach just makes you come across as equally as extreme, which = FAIL

 

[Saturos]

Why does there have to be? There is currently no evidence short of educated speculation, and I for one have no problem saying "I don't know." The whole concept of the beginning of the universe is a mind**** anyway, considering the first law of thermodynamics. Even if a "god" (or gods) created the universe, what created that? Am I to believe that some intelligent entity was just chilling out for eternity, existing in non-existence until it decided to create existence? And why even bother? Was non-existence boring? Is that even possible if time doesn't exist? As for a scientific explanation, if our understanding of the nature of the universe is not advanced enough so as to give an answer that is more than speculation, then I am fine with "I don't know."

I suppose, "I don't know" is a decent enough excuse, but as for a creator chilling out in non-existence, what if he was just in some other dimension with laws radically different than our own universe? (maybe this might explain omni-potence?) You know about the whole, "string theory" thing and multiple universes right?

but... then again, if there was an infinite number of universes, then why couldn't our universe be totally infinite too right? According to Einstein though, our universe appears infinite, but really isn't. (forgot which theory that was)

Save all this for a different thread though. Now I'm just chasing rabbit trails and getting totally off-topic.

 

[Sulkdodds]

Yo kads, I'mma let you finish but you must have missed the part where Stigmata actually seemed to be trying to show evidence for his own radical interpretation of the Bible and God rather than to 'disprove' either.

 

[ktimekiller]

If by whatever chance that THE God was real, there is no way we could know if the bible is full of horseshit or not. I find the whole idea of written holy texts ridiculous in the fact that it was created by people with agendas and fueled by greed, even IF God was real.

 

[Sulkdodds]

That's old news. Google it.

I don't feel like digging for the source right now.

Nice. A google search for "big bang theory under threat" reveals episodes of the TV sitcom and a few pages on "science under threat from intelligent design". Maybe you could give people a few pointers for their 'research'?

 

[Saturos]

Nice. A google search for "big bang theory under threat" reveals episodes of the TV sitcom and a few pages on "science under threat from intelligent design". Maybe you could give people a few pointers for their 'research'?

Try "Big Bang Theory in question". That seemed to yield better results. Google is persnickety you know.

and if that doesn't work, just go to Wikipedia, the internet's meta-reference.

 

[Kadayi]

Yo kads, I'mma let you finish but you must have missed the part where Stigmata actually seemed to be trying to show evidence for his own radical interpretation of the Bible and God rather than to 'disprove' either.

If the horse falls at the first post there's no point waiting till the end of the race to see how it places.

 

[Stigmata]

What the hell, kad? That's not a response. Seriously, about half your posts are, or end with, you using some banal argumentative witticism that doubles as a thinly-veiled ad hominem attack.

Why do you act this way? As far as I can see, nobody's an asshole to you (except me to an extent, I'll admit), but time after time you all but outright attack people for having views or opinions that aren't yours. It's as if you push the envelope as far as tact allows, and expect that people will interpret it as nothing more than "hard love", so to speak. You're not fooling very many of us, and it makes your posts unpleasant. You're clearly intelligent, you have a lot to offer to discussions, and you could very well be nice in person, but your borderline insults and near-contempt for discussion drags everyone down.

I want you to know I don't hate you. I'd love debating with you, if you didn't act this way. Why do you do it?

 

[Saturos]

Here's a good source:

The Big Bang Theory does not disapprove or approve the existence of God or a god according to this. Probably just misinterpretation on Judeo-Christian's part really and thus how the Big Bang Theory got so overhyped on the topic of a supernatural creator.

The big question in relative to the Big Bang Theory and it's linkage to an omnipotent existence:

Which begs the question: What sired the singularity and its derivative natural world — a supernatural one, a God?

Where did the, "big ball of gas" come from?

“The big bang fits in with Judeo-Christian ideas that there was a creation event,” said Ray Villard, news chief at the Baltimore-based Hubble Space Telescope Science Institute, which is conducting pioneering research into the force — the so-called dark force — thought to be propelling the universe’s accelerated expansion. “So I’m a little amused that some [religious] people have a problem with it.

I shamefully admit many Christians probably weren't doing much research before making a big deal out of this.

 

[Stigmata]

Which begs the question, where did God come from? You can't assume God is impervious to the laws of cause and effect.

 

[Saturos]

Which begs the question, where did God come from? You can't assume God is impervious to the laws of cause and effect.

So then both atheists and Christians are at a stalemate because neither of us can prove anything.

End of thread?

 

[Stigmata]

No. Love never ends.

Besides, even though we can't prove anything, it can still be enlightening to debate it.

 

[Dynasty]

Well thats essentially the problem. We cant prove anything.

Its a constant fight of logic vs belief/faith/free will.

Personally I stand on the side of logic against things like witches, magic, Jesus, 'God' and alike.

If every person on this planet is a 'son or daughter of God' then what made Jesus so special?

Dont you think his 'abilities' would have been passed on? Or is he a 1 in a however many billion people that have encompasingly/totally lived on Earth? Unlikely.

 

[Uriel]

Please keep in mind that being religious, does not make you an idiot. With education and intellect being highly valued in this particular forum, wouldn't you think that well educated, well rounded, brilliant men that believe in God have a good reason to?

These are individuals that surpass our intelligence, yet they still continue to believe in God. For example, Mormon Scientists, Educators, Military Leaders & Astronaut, Computer Engineers and Mathematicians, Inventors, Surgeons and Physicians. These are just Mormon examples too.

As far as I can tell, I haven't found anyone on this forum that meets or surpasses the intelligence that many of these individuals hold. By no means am I saying we have a forum of idiots here. We have quite the opposite. I believe that most of the people here are highly intelligent and hold their particular perspective of God and religion because of their observations and their knowledge of knowing that they are above average when their intellect is compared to others. And because so, it is only natural to believe that you, yourself, actually knows what's true or untrue in this universe, especially when compared to the masses. But at the same time, shouldn't you respect or maybe even try to understand why people, with a higher intelligence than yours, still believe in a God?

We can revert back to the thread I made about rap. It was idiotic and unfair of me to state that all rap music is bland, uncreative and unintelligent because I had only been exposed to some of the most popular modern day rap artists.

At the same time, isn't unfair to claim that all religion and all belief in God is moronic, without understanding ALL the reasons why people believe in God, what ALL of them believe in exactly and knowing ALL those particular individuals who do believe?

Or are you just judging the whole issue by what most people appear to believe in?

I'm really not here to debate this, because that would be as useless as the previous religious threads. All I wish is for more understanding and more tolerance. Because I give you the same. Because I understand why most people here hold an atheistic perspective and don't judge you for having it. That's why I have remained here at this forum for so long (although I mostly ghost lately because I'm still in technical school for the Air Force, so I don't have a lot of free time) Nor do I even believe any of you are going to hell in my religious perspective, if that even matters.

Anywho, sorry for the long post.

 

[kineaesth]

The worst way to be anti-religious is to meticulously and laboriously find tiny flaws in religious texts.

 

[Eejit]

I have yet to hear a convincing argument from any religious person as to why their religion is true and the others false, let alone an argument convincing me of the existence of any sort of God in the first place.

Why do some intelligent people believe it Uriel? Indoctrination. Unwillingness to question their beliefs. Refusing to apply Occam's Razor to religion. Desire for a comforting belief in an afterlife.

 

[Sulkdodds]

The worst way to be anti-religious is to meticulously and laboriously find tiny flaws in religious texts.

Meanwhile, the best way to be anti-religious is to burst into churches with wild eyes and shout "GOD IS DEAD! I KILLED HIM! I TOOK HIS PLACE!"

 

[kineaesth]

I see you have read my style manual on being anti-religious. Good job, maybe I will keep you around.