Quote from: Moloch on March 30, 2016, 03:45:09 PM

Quote from: BADecker on March 30, 2016, 03:35:52 PM

Revelation is a little bit difficult to understand. Some of it is literal, and some figurative. Some of it talks about the future, some about the past, some about all times.

This isn't simply a problem with Revelation... it's a problem with the entire bible...

How do you decide which part is literal vs metaphor? I read the bible... God did not include any hints or footnotes about what is meant to be literal vs metaphor...

Who are you to decide that God meant something metaphorically, instead of the way He literally wrote the bible? (Is God the author, or you?)

Do you really think you are qualified to be God's editor/interpreter of the bible?

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How do you decide which part is literal vs metaphor? I read the bible... God did not include any hints or footnotes about what is meant to be literal vs metaphor...

By interpreting it in different ways and creating new branches and sects of Christianity when there is a major/serious disagreement.

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Who are you to decide that God meant something metaphorically, instead of the way He literally wrote the bible? (Is God the author, or you?)

God isn't the author of the Christian bible, numerous followers of his were, followers that lived more than 2000 years ago in an environment with a completely different culture and common cultural moral code.

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Do you really think you are qualified to be God's editor/interpreter of the bible?

Anyone is. We're all humans after all. Otherwise there'd be no Christianity because everyone would not "deem themselves worthy" to interpret the Christian bible, even completely literally and to the word (in my opinion, the worst possible interpretation of any cultural or religious document (one that relies on the surrounding environment, current traditions and coomonplace behavior) written in times before our culture)

P.S. The fact that you are actually pursuing a discussion with BADecker (@BADecker No offense, but you seem to be leaning towards the aforementioned "zealously religious fundamentalist nut" with quite a few of your statements and your generally "enlightened" tone) regarding religion already shows that you seem to be picking easier targets just so you could win somewhere

P.P.S. Moloch, king of cherry-picking and master of ignoring arguments, you seem to have forgotten to answer to the following arguments, based on actual sources, after throwing out yours so boldly, some of which without anything to back it up:

Quote from: mprep on March 27, 2016, 10:27:13 PM

Quote from: Moloch on March 26, 2016, 05:44:59 PM

Slavery:

Quote from: Leviticus 25:44-46

As for your male and female slaves whom you may have: you may buy male and female slaves from among the nations that are around you. You may also buy from among the strangers who sojourn with you and their clans that are with you, who have been born in your land, and they may be your property. You may bequeath them to your sons after you to inherit as a possession forever. You may make slaves of them, but over your brothers the people of Israel you shall not rule, one over another ruthlessly.

Quote from: Exodus 21:20-21

When a man strikes his slave, male or female, with a rod and the slave dies under his hand, he shall be avenged. But if the slave survives a day or two, he is not to be avenged, for the slave is his property.

More slavery in the bible: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bible_and_slavery

Rape:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_in_the_Hebrew_Bible

Homosexuality:

Quote from: Leviticus 20:13

If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.

Witches:

Quote from: Exodus 22:13

Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.

Murder your own child:

Quote from: Deuteronomy 21:18-21

If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey the voice of his father, or the voice of his mother, and that, when they have chastened him, will not hearken unto them:

Then shall his father and his mother lay hold on him, and bring him out unto the elders of his city, and unto the gate of his place;
And they shall say unto the elders of his city, This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton, and a drunkard.
And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die: so shalt thou put evil away from among you; and all Israel shall hear, and fear.

Is that enough, or do you need more quotes from the bible before you will believe me?

Leviticus, Exodus and Deuteronomy are all part of the Old Testament (also often referred to as the Hebrew Bible), which is overwritten by the New Testament in many branches (and/or sects) of Christianity. The Old Testament was meant as a holy book for the time (not for eternity) and became obsolete in many situations. Also, in terms of cherry-picking, that's why different branches and sects of both Christianity and other religions exist - there's constant debate (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theology) on what is accepted and what is not, especially as time progresses and our culture changes.

Sources (in terms of what I based the arguments upon):
http://christianity.stackexchange.com/questions/15/do-we-have-to-obey-the-laws-of-the-bible-if-so-what-laws/506#506
http://christianity.stackexchange.com/questions/3733/does-the-new-testament-override-the-old-testament

Quote from: Moloch on March 27, 2016, 07:06:11 PM

Question: If God asked you to murder your own child... would you?

God asked Abraham to do this, and Abraham was ready to kill his son... would you blindly murder your own child if God commanded it?

I really doubt the following written in the Old Testament was literal, just like with Adam and Eve being interpreted as 2 actual people, rather than a metaphor for humanity.

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Quote from: mprep on March 29, 2016, 04:00:09 PM

OK, guess it's time to pitch in:

Quote from: Moloch

Do you really want to compare the 2000 year history of christianity murdering half the world...

Source? I do agree that Catholic church has done quite a few horrible things during the Middle Ages, however your claim seems rather bold with no evidence to back it up.

Quote from: Moloch

...with the 1,000,000 year history of atheists making advances in science, medicine, philosophy, morality, etc, etc, etc?!?

You do understand that quite a few scientists were or are Christians - Blaise Pascal (Pascal's law (physics), Pascal's theorem (math)) and Isaac Newton (Physicist, discoverer of gravity) to name a few. Also, some of these scientists (namely Theodosius Dobzhansky) criticized creationsim and argued that science and faith does not conflict (which is a stance I can firmly stand behind).

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Christians_in_science_and_technology

Quote from: Moloch

I'm sorry you don't understand history... or much of anything...

The Dark ages had a single cause... Christianity... Christians attacked anything that was non-christian for 300 years! Don't pretend it didn't happen!

I'd have to disagree. Although the Catholic church did a lot of heinous things during the Dark Ages, which did harm the spread of knowledge, I think the much bigger reason was the fall of the Roman Empire:

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It emphasizes the demographic, cultural and economic deterioration that supposedly occurred in Western Europe following the decline of the Roman Empire

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Ages_%28historiography%29

The main issue in terms of knowledge is the fact that after the fall of the Roman empire, quite a lot of research and literature was lost, setting back science rather far back. The first answer by Humphrey Clarke, MA in Modern History - University of St Andrews in this: https://www.quora.com/Did-Christianity-cause-the-Dark-Ages gives quite an interesting analysis. I suggest reading through as it goes through several possible arguments such as the Catholic church not accepting science.

The conclusion is rather relevant to the discussion as well:

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To conclude then, the two Christianity guilt theories suffer from a lack of evidence. They persist purely due to their illustrious pedigree and the fact that people insist on making the past fit into a modern framework.

Quote from: Moloch

Atheists invented morals and values... don't be silly...

You already admitted that christians did not invent "christian values"... it's only a small step to realizing that they came from either another religion, or non-religion (all religions came from non-religion, so obviously, atheists invented morals)

I'd say that your logical deduction isn't as logical as you'd think. Religion might've been created by humans in the primitive times to act as a placeholder for science, but as times progressed, these religions morphed and changed to analyze something either non-material such as morality or above the materialistic universal order (that being governed by natural laws such as gravity, the existence of light and various parameters that it follows when interacting with materials, the fact that materials are comprised of molecules, which are made up of atoms, which are made up of protons, neutrons and electrons, which are made up of..., etc.), which science tries to figure out. If you were to ignore the developments that took throughout history (developments that science has gone through too as various scientific theories previously made were debunked and replaced by new, more accurate ones) and attribute all that to a specific demographic, I'd say that it isn't exactly accurate representation of history.

In fact, I'd say the the current definition of religion would be the search for who created the system we are living in. I think the best way to describe it would be comparing it to computer software: imagine an extremely complex computer simulation, with it's rules and parameters, running constantly with the objects (with a crap ton of variables, methods and other OOP features implemented) inside acting independently (but predictably due the fact that author of the program knows what code he wrote and how it performs) based on their variables and the surrounding objects. The self-aware objects inside decide analyze the system and due to being withing that system and unable to detect anything outside it, deducted that since they can't detect anything within the system that there is no creator outside it. Seems familiar?

Quote from: Moloch

You are correct in that atheists don't have a written moral code, like the 10 commandments, but you are incorrect that we don't have values... Atheists are the only ones who took the time to think about morals on their own... we decided right from wrong based on the impact on society, not from some dusty old book...

I do agree that Atheists do have morals, however those morals were impacted, be it by indirect historical influence or (doesn't seem like in this case) directly by providing a base, by the "dusty old book" you are talking about.

Quote from: Moloch

Atheists believe in facts and evidence over feelings... just because a story "feels good", does not make it true... you need facts and evidence... that is what atheists believe in... reality... facts... evidence... not unsupported fairy tales

In science, this is quite important but if you were to only base everything on fact outside science, philosophy, art and possibly certain scientific advances which first were devised as hypotheses (unproven speculations only later to be debunked for the time being or confirmed) would probably not exist.

Quote from: Moloch

If some "God" told me to murder my child... I'd tell that asshole to FUCK OFF!... What would you do? Murder your son?

There's a few theological speculations on why, one of them being that it is a symbol of the sacrifice of Christ: https://carm.org/bible-difficulties/genesis-deuteronomy/why-did-god-tell-abraham-kill-his-son-isaac. If I were asked that, I'd probably refuse, since in this day and age, anything can be staged by someone with enough cash.

Quote from: mprep on March 29, 2016, 04:59:12 PM

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This is a common misconception...

We have already established that do not steal/murder are based in atheism/philosophy, rather than christianity...

I propose that all morals are based in such things... christians also did not invent the concept of the golden rule, "treat your neighbor as yourself", etc...

Provide solid evidence otherwise your claim is rather pointless.

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The only influences that christianity has had on society are negative... all of them... there is evidence to back up this claim

[X]All previous arguments in my post ignored
[X]Bold statement with no evidence

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Christianity has also preached that slavery is lawful and not a bad thing... in both the old and new testament, so don't get all, "but the new testament doesn't say that" on me...

[X]Bold statement with no evidence
[X]Previous arguments dismissed

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The entirety of christian history is nothing but war and murdering "the other"...

[X] The fact that these wars were often based on greed for fame, land, money and/or power ignored.
[X] The current status where modern major branches of Christianity (non-extremists) that live in peaceful co-existance rather than "killing the non-believers" ignored.

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You want to talk about the most savage murderer of all time?
God... no contest... God murders countless people in the bible... literally...
How do you count how many people God killed in the flood?
In just the places which give numbers, God is responsible for murdering 2,400,000+ people (not counting the flood, 10th plague of Egypt, and other uncountable genocides at the hand of God)... Which war had more than 2,400,000 deaths?
http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Examples_of_God_personally_killing_people

[X] Possibility of it being a metaphor for humanity that has plunged itself into it's own demise due to the lack of control of themselves ignored.
[X] The possible total count of murders committed throughout history including all wars, genocides and singular murders ignored and dismissed.
[X] Use of clearly biased source, that mocks the other side, while attempting to look professional.

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What sort of all-knowing God creates a planet only to declare everyone evil, wipe it out with a flood, and start over?

Couldn't he see that coming, and create humans slightly less evil the first time?

[X] Ignore possible different religious interpretations of an extremely old book. Like God saving the non-violent remains of humanity from the catastrophe the violent population caused themselves: https://redeeminggod.com/why-the-traditional-understanding-of-the-flood-is-wrong/.
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