Refuting Religion - The Writings of K. Crady

[intilectual recipricol]

Reposted since it got merged with another thread

on an atheist website I frequent, a poster kcrady, makes these extremely well thought out and written arguments on a series of topics in religion. Not only are they concise and clear, theyre quite entertaining as well. Id venture to say that son has a book if one were to compile all his arguments.

He doesnt mind that people use his posts as long as he gets the credit so I shall c/p an example... Its a long, but good read. If youve suffered through "holy" books then this is a cup of tea.

Why oppose religion? - K. Crady

:
from: Justthinking

Question. Is it rational to oppose that which does not exist?

I was born into a family that sold Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oil is said to be a wonderful substance, and if you drink it, you will have peace and joy in your life, your life will have meaninng, you can know how to be a good person, and it will also make it so you can live forever.

So I grew up reading the company's Sales Manual. There, I leanred that if you join up and sell Yeshua's Amazing Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm, that you don't have to worry about your future, because Yeshua, the Compnay's CEO, will make sure you get taken care of. So, I spent the formative years of my life learnig all about Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm, the history of the Company as described in the Sales Manual, and about the wonderful future I had guaranteed, as an employee of the Company.

I tried to sell Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm as well as I could, and trusted in the life advice the CEO gave me, that I shouldn't plan for the future, since I had no control over the future anyway, but as an employee of the Company, I didn't need to anyway. And, I knew that if I stopped drinking Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm I would suddenly find myself alone, with no meaning or purpose to my life, and, having not planned for the future, I would be up **** creek. Furthermore, people who don't drink Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm will suffer terribly in the future.

Then, one day, I found out that Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm wasn't magical at all! It was just colored water with some flavorings and suspicious chemicals added! These chemicals would cause some people to become extremely violent. In fact, people had been burned at the stake, and horrible wars launched, by people under the influence of Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm

Not only had I wasted my life and energies up to that point, there were vast numbers of people who were still trapped in the Company's lies, wasting their lives trying to sell Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm.

And that wasn't all. You see, the company that makes Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm turned out to have an enormous amount of political influence, making legislation so that children in schools would have to say they liked Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm before class started, our money was printed with "In Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm We Trust," and our country even goes to war because the Yeshua, the CEO of the company that makes Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm is the President's favorite philosopher and chief advisor. Acting on Yeshua's advice, my country has declared war on a billion other people who drink another company's product, Mohammed's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm which turns out to be almost exactly the same stuff as Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm, but with different colorings added.

And so, I realized that Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm (as well as the other brands of Amazing Magical Snake Oil) was not merely some harmless fraud, it was a positive danger to the very survival of the human species and the biosphere of our planet. I started to oppose Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm and try to help other people stop selling it.

Then one day, a person who still sold Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm asked me, "but if Yeshua's Amazing Magical Snake Oiltm isn't really magical, why do you oppose it?"

__________________

 

[intilectual recipricol]

On Job - K. Crady

The most fascinating thing to me about the Book of Job is how blatantly revealing it is. "Satan" [1] gets in line with the other angels, [2] and he and God have a chat.

Paraphrase:

God: So, Satan, what brings you here?

Satan: Nothing much, just been cruising around on the Earth.

God: Yeah? Did you check out my servant Job? He, like, totally obeys me and everything! He even does tricks!

Satan: Meh. He's a mercenary. He only obeys you and praises you all the time 'cause you take such good care of him and put your shield of protection around his house. Why, I bet you 10,000 Quatloons that if you started being a ruthless, cold-hearted, unfair, capricious and just plain sadistic asshat, why, he'd tell you to eat slimy cow-poodoo and die!

God: You're on! Go ahead and cream his family and everything he owns. Just don't kill him though. Dead people can't give me any burnt offerings, and I just love those.

/Paraphrase

Now, the interesting thing about this is that Satan isn't tempting Job--he's tempting God, and God goes for it like a drunken sailor in a whorehouse. What happened to all that stuff about "how righteous are Thy judgements, O Lord"? If God was concerned with justice in the slightest (much less Perfectly Good In All He Does), the outcome would have been entirely different:

Satan: Meh. He's a mercenary. He only obeys you and praises you all the time 'cause you take such good care of him. Why, I bet you 10,000 Quatloons that if you started being a ruthless, cold-hearted, unfair, capricious and just plain sadistic asshat, why, he'd tell you to eat slimy cow-poodoo and die!

God: You're damn right! He serves me well, and I protect and reward him, as I promised in my Word. He praises me because I take such good care of him, and rightly so. For I am a good God, righteous and just, and he has put his trust in me! Far be it from me to betray him just to see if he'll still worship me when I don't deserve it!
If I did as you suggest, he should tell me to eat slimy cow poodoo and die! Get behind me, Satan!

What Satan is baiting God with is the prospect of receiving unearned worship and adulation. You see, if God is good, and people worship him for being good, then his ego-strokes only come because he's living up to his end of the bargain. But Satan tempted God with the chance to receive Job's adulation and praise regardless of his actions. God wanted to be able to throw all morality to the winds and be literally demonic in the cruelty of his deeds, and still be worshiipped as the 'perfect, just God'. He doesn't merely want unearned praise--he wants his worshippers to be so mindless, so utterly servile they will praise him to the skies even as he tortures them. Or, as Job put it, "Though he slay me, yet will I trust him."

The Book of Job makes it plainly, indisputably, blatantly clear that God cannot be trusted as a Protector, and that he has no ethics at all. But wait, maybe God, in his vastly superior Divine Wisdom (tm) knows something we don't and all of this will somehow turn out to be consistent with the idea of a Loving, Perfectly Moral God. Toward the end of the book, Job finally gets to talk to God, and ask, "WTF?!?!?!"

At last, Job falls silent, and we wait for the Almighty to speak. Here is God's chance to astound us all with some nugget of vastly profound insight that will answer the question 'why do good people suffer' in a way that will dazzle us with the greatness and majesty of the Divine! Well, OK, maybe at least we'll get the Stock Answer that always soothes the heart of the believer: "God works in mysterious ways."

Nope. Not even that. Instead, God goes on and on in a hugely bombastic "I am the Mighty Oz!" routine. Justice? Wisdom? Divine knowledge beyond the ken of mere mortal man? Nope. Just plain old brute force.

God: "I can do whatever the hell I want to you, because I'm bigger, stronger, and infinitely meaner than you will EVER be! Now take your PS2 and shut up."

Job: "Right...shutting up! Zzzzzip! Nothing to say here!"

And behold, Job's (2.0) daughters were the most beautiful in all the land! Bet he got alot for 'em on Ebay. Happy endinig? Yeah, right! The poor guy must have spent the rest of his life having nightmares and waiting for the other nuke to drop. Sorta like Isaac after that little hike to the altar with dear ol' dad.

Wow, I'm glad we have God...without him, why, we'd have no morality at all!

NOTES:

1. In Hebrew it's "ha-satan," meaning "the adversary" or "the accuser," a title--not a name--for a prosecuting attorney; Satan is to God as Torquemada is to the Pope.

2. Satan is not a mortal enemy of God here--can you imagine Osama bin Laden joining a tour of the White House and having President Bush pull him aside for a friendly game of Texas Hold-Em?

 

[intilectual recipricol]

WHAT IS THIS TRASH?

thanks for sharing

 

[intilectual recipricol]

Okay the 1st two were light. I know Coli-niccaz got ADD
But here is a really good one, but kinda long.


The Devil in Eden - K. Crady

There are quite a few misconceptions floating around the Genesis story, especially regarding the Devil. You Christians tell us the Devil began his career of evil in the Garden of Eden.

"The Devil was a liar and a murderer from the beginning" you say. Fair enough. Let's go to Genesis and see who's the liar and the murderer.

The very first death threat uttered in the Bible was given by God. "In the day you eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil which is in the midst of the Garden, you shall surely die." That's God's claim. OK, perhaps God isn't threatening them with death. Maybe the Fruit of Knowledge really is poisonous, and he's just warning them of the danger. We'll find out as we proceed.

What's the Serpent's claim? "You shall not surely die! For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you shall be as gods, knowing good and evil." To the Serpent, the Fruit isn't poisonous, but astoundingly beneficial, and God is hiding this truth from Adam and Eve because he's afraid "their eyes will be opened."

Two contradictory claims. Shouldn't be too hard to tell which of the two is telling the truth.

Adam and Eve eat the fruit. Suddenly, they become aware of their nakedness. Think about that. Adam and Eve had no more self-awareness than animals, until after they eat the Fruit. And here's something else interesting: The Serpent is described as more "clever" or "subtle" (i.e. intelligent) than the other creatures God created. The Hebrew word for ‘subtle’ is awroom (Strong’s Concordance #6175). It is derived from awram (6191) "to be (or make) bare, used in the derivative sense (perhaps through the idea of smoothness), be crafty, prudent, deal subtly." (Underlined text is from Strong's Concordance)

The word ‘naked’ (6174) is also derived from this root. This is the word used of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. ‘They did not know they were naked.’ Using the other meaning, it could also say ‘They did not know they were clever’. They did not know they could use their minds to survive and flourish. They did not know they were sapient beings. When the Serpent gave them the Fruit of Knowledge, they became aware of both their minds (cleverness/intelligence) and their bodies (sexuality).

Linking back to the Ayn Rand quote, we see that in mythic terms, God created obediant automatons, but it is the Serpent that truly made them human.

The word for ‘serpent’ in Genesis is ‘nawkhawsh’ (5175). It is derived from the root word ‘nawkhash’ meaning ‘to hiss’ , i.e. "whisper a magic spell, prognosticate, certainly, divine (verb--see Gen. 44:5, Joseph’s divination) enchanter, (use) enchantment, learn by experience, diligently observe." (Underlined text from Strong's Concordance) Now, we atheist skeptic types usually have a rather low opinion of 'magic,' but for the moment, consider the contrasts between Magicians and Clergy, within the context of knowledge people possessed at the time the Genesis account was written.

The practice of "magic" assumed that there were certain spiritual operating principles, and that if a Magician learned what those principles were, he or she could use them to gain knowledge and/or affect reality. Do certain things, and certain results follow. As Heinlein put it, "One man's magic is another man's engineering." In other words, "magic" as practiced in ancient times was an attempt to develop a science and technology for dealing with the "spiritual" realm. We can say that it didn't work, but at least they were on the right track. Our sciences are descended from ancient magical practices. Alchemy---->Chemistry. Herbology----->Botany and medicine. Asrology----->Astronomy. Sacred Geometry, Numerology, etc.------>Mathematics. The Magician was also able to deal with spiritual reality on his or her own, through the use of his or her own intelligence.

Contrast the way of the Magician with the way of Clergy. The Clergy claim that the way to get things done is to seek to appease a Deity and the Deity's power will do what needs doing. Humans are fundamentally dependent on the will of the Deity. Clergy have an inside track to communicating with the Deity, knowing what is required to appease it, relaying its messages back to the people, etc. For Clergy, power-politics is the predominant cosmological principle. The way to "make it" in reality is to know who is Lord, and do their bidding. Obey, and you have good harvests, healthy children, etc. Disobey, and here come the locusts.

It is no wonder that Clergy loathe Magicians and, if given the chance, will have them burned at the stake.

God (and his priest Adam) represent the Clergy model. Right from the start, you have "Obey my orders and you'll get to munch free fruit. Disobey me, and you die!"

The Serpent (and his priestess Eve) represent the Magician model. He begins by asking Eve a question. "Did God say you could eat of every tree of the Garden?" He's employing the Socratic method to get her to see the bars of God's cage for herself. Then, instead of commands and threats, the Serpent offers a testable hypothesis: "You will not die, but when you eat the fruit, your eyes will be opened and you will be as gods." He never even asks Eve to eat the fruit. He just tells her the truth about it and lets her decide for herself. He does not threaten to bite her if she doesn't eat it. Instead, he offers her value.

Once Eve takes a closer look at the fruit, she realizes that it is pleasant to the eyes (beauty), desirable to make one wise (knowledge) and good for food (physical nourishment and pleasure). In other words, the Fruit is symbolic of all the elements of the good life. Notice further that the Serpent isn't trying to "rule the world." He never issues any commands, asks for worship and praise. Never has a crusade or jihad ever been waged in his name. In fact, he treats Eve respectfully, as an equal.

So Eve eats the Fruit, and sure enough, she doesn't die "in the day" she does so. Neither does Adam. Later in the narrative, he (women don't count in the Bible) is attributed an astounding life-span of nearly a thousand years. Given that "day" in Genesis is supposed to really mean "day" (as any fundamentalist Creationist will assure you), we have no choice but to accept that God's claim--that knowledge is poison--was falsified. In fact, God himself acknowledges the truth of the Serpent's claim:

"Behold the man (women don't count) is become as one of us, (and here I thought there was only one god) to know good and evil: and now, lest he put out his hand, and also take of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever: Therefore, the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden...and he placed at the east of the garden Cherubims (a type of spirit being) and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life."

So, rather than bringing humanity's death, eating the Fruit made Adam and Eve "like gods" just as the Serpent said, and not only that, it opened the way to immortality for them. And so, to prevent humans from completing their ascent to divinity (it was a Rise in the Garden, not a Fall), God responds with what would soon become his old stand-by: violence.

"But Adam and Eve died spiritually the day they ate the Fruit!" you say.

Where in Genesis does it say anything about a "spiritual" death? God just told Adam he would die "in the day" he ate the fruit. He didn't say anything about "spiritual" death, or expulsion from the Garden, or any other punishment. He would die, period. You claim to revere the Bible, but you twist the plain meaning of the text to prop up your theological "interpretation" rather than adjusting your theology to conform to the Bible. Furthermore, you Christians are always fond of tying morality and spirituality together. "If there is no God," you say, "then there's no morality either! There will be blood in the streets!" But, you see, it is self-evident in Genesis that God intended for humanity not to be morally good, but obediant. He wanted creatures that would obey his commands without regard to whether they were good or evil, because they couldn't tell the difference. There is no morality with God.

If you don't believe me, just look at all the moral excuse-making you have to do on God's behalf. "But it's OK for God to perform abortion (cause a miscarriage)." "It's OK for God to kill people for disobeying him." "It's OK for God to torture people forever." "It's OK for God to sanction mass child molestation (Num. 31:17-18)." It's OK for God to sire an illegitimate child with another guy's fiance.'" Etc. Then, look at all the atrocities you commit on his behalf. No, we don't even have to go back to the Salem witch trials or the Crusades. What's going on right now, today, in Iraq is sufficient. Or all the needless deaths from AIDS in Africa because you think it is better for black people to suffer lingering death than to use condoms.

So, if you wish to link "spiritual life" with such things as morality, self-awareness, the faculty of conscious deliberation and choice, etc. (i.e. the things that distinguish us, for the most part, from other animals), then it is self-evident in the narrative that the Fruit gave Adam and Eve spiritual life, awakening them from the zombie-like slumber God had hoped to keep them in.

Look again at the two claims.

God: "In the day you eat the fruit, you shall surely die."
Serpent: "You shall not surely die! For God knows that in the day you eat of it, your eyes will be opened, and you shall be as gods."
God himself endorses the Serpent's claim and reacts with fear and wrath not to prevent Adam and Eve from dying, but to prevent them from living forever.

"But Adam did die, because as a result of his sin, God denied him access to the Tree of Life, which he was free to eat from before."

That's quite an interesting admission. You see, Adam did not die because he ate the Fruit of Knowledge. It was not poisonous; nothing about the Fruit of Knowledge itself caused them to die or prevented them from living forever. Had God just shrugged and walked away, Adam and Eve would have been immortal. God, using violence, insured their deaths. In other words, slow-motion murder.

So, what have we seen here? God lied. That is self-evident in the narrative. Eating the Fruit of Knowledge did not kill Adam and Eve. It had the exact effects the Serpent said it would, a fact God carefully chose to hide from Adam, and which he later did not even try to deny. Everything the Serpent said was true. That also is self-evident in the narrative.

Furthermore, the Serpent did not kill Adam and Eve. He never threatened them or harmed them in the least. He simply gave them the gift of truth about the Fruit, and about God. And one more thing: he gave them freedom. He did not command them to eat the Fruit, or threaten to punish them if they didn't. As he promised, the Fruit was not poisonous or unhealthy. To the contrary, Eve acknolwedges that it was "good for food," and her account is never contradicted.

Who killed Adam and Eve? Who took violent action to insure that they would die? God. Again, this is self-evident in the narrative.

Remember that bit about the Devil being "A liar and a murderer from the beginning?"

“Whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness with which more than half the Bible is filled, it would be more consistent that we called it the word of a demon, than the word of God.”

--Thomas Paine Age of Reason, Part I, pp. 18-19

It all starts to make sense now, doesn't it?

 

[intilectual recipricol]

Crady's Wager - K. Crady

from: Darius

from: kcrady
[Darius, please stow the veiled threats. A threat is only as good as the entity making it. If your God wants to intimidate us into worshipping him by threatening to torture us after we die if we don't, he'd have a better shot at it if he came out of hiding and showed us all what a stupendous badass he is.

Hi kcrady,

Just saw your next post, not a veiled threat but a sincere question. I'm sure you have all already been told that Christians believe in Eternity in fellowship with Christ, and the lake of fire as the only final destinations.

The point I was making is if you don't know where you are going, why not?

I know where I am going, I'm making the point that anyone who does not know the creator cannot know where they are going because they have never been past death, and they don't know the only one who can tell them.

If I was here to preach hellfire & brimstone to the wicked sinners I could, but I sympathise with people who don't know God because I remember when I didn't and a lot of people I spoke to didn't make it clear, so I want to give a guide as how to seek God and meet with Him for real, for those who want to.

Darius
I do not know of any compelling evidence that "I" will be "going" anywhere after my death. Your claim to know is not very helpful, since there are people who claim to know, with equal sincerity, that you are going to Hell because you did not accpet that Allah is one (He has no son), and Mohammed is His prophet. Then there's the sects of Christianity that consider your views (whatever they are) to be heretical, whose members have equal conviction that they, not you (and certainly not I!) are the ones going to Heaven. Therefore, the looming threat of "where will you go when you die?" cannot be an effective persuader because you're not the only one who gets to play that game. Believers in other religions can, too. Unless I have the option of believing in all of them, accepting ideas in hopes of evading the Everlasting Marshmallow Roast would be futile.

Furthermore, despite your assurance, you can't "know" where you're going either. Why? You see, on another thread (I think it was the "Book of Job" thread), I posted a wager with God. It went something like this:

Dear God:

I know you're very proud of all these devout Christians who worship and praise you, and dedicate their lives to your service. And why shouldn't they? The retirement benefits can't be beat. You're offering them eternal bliss. Who wouldn't be willing to obey any orders, suffer any persecution, ignore any atrocity on your part, or happily accept martyrdom for an eternity of happiness? No matter what happens to your followers here on Earth, I'm sure that after the first thousand years or so of perfect joy, that none of it could possibly matter in the least.

Of course they worship you! Look what's in it for them! But I bet you, that if they thought you might send them to Hell after they died...or even just let them die and rot, ceasing to exist with their last breath...if they thought they didn't have that payoff coming, they wouldn't worship you for a second! See how long they praise you in Hell, I dare ya!

------

This is Crady's Wager, my antidote to Pascal's. Now, one thing the Book of Job makes crystal clear ("allegory" or otherwise) is that God values his vanity more than any promises he's made to his followers. This is obvious from the nature of the Old Covenant, which Job followed. He obeyed God, and made the proper offerings to cover his sins, and God himself declared that he was "upright" in his original boast to Satan. According to the Old Covenant, if God's people would obey his commands and make the necessary sin offerings, he would protect and bless them. It is apparent that God was doing this originally, as Satan refers to God's protection of Job in his wager.

Satan's challenge was: I bet he'll curse you if you break your covenant with him and let me kick him around some! The crucial teaching of the Book of Job is that God didn't say "Beat it, Satan! I am a just God, and I keep my promises!" Instead, God wanted to show off that he could garner unearned worship from Job, so he took the bet.

Which means: Now that my wager is published, and surely is within the purview of an omniscient deity, you have no way to know if he will take the bet or not.

 

[intilectual recipricol]

I'll read this later and destroy it since most atheist 'reasoning' is seriously flawed, circular and full of shyt.

Might elicit a couple chuckles, though.​

 

[intilectual recipricol]

The next few will be a string of posts in one discussion...

By their fruits - K. Crady

this was a long discussion where he obliterates zacchaeus post after post.

Rather than writing an epic reply to yours, let me try to cut the Gordian knot instead.

Among the words attributed to Jesus is the statement, "By their fruits ye shall know them." You can know what a person (or a movement) is by what they do, just as you can know what species of fruit tree you're looking at by the fruit it produces.

Now, we could debate for ages on whether or not an ideology can "cause" people to do good or bad things, or whether free will means a person can be good in spite of holding an evil ideology, or vice versa. Likewise, we could come up with all sorts of creative ways to explain how the Catholic Church can order and carry out tortures, exectutions, and brutal wars for centuries, following in the footsteps of tortures, executions, and brutal wars carried out in the pages of the Bible at express divine command, without any of that actually being "official" Christian doctrine or practice.

However, Jesus offers us a much simpler and quicker way to the root of the problem.1

By their fruits ye shall know them.

Christianity, Catholic and otherwise, claims to represent the foremost moral authority on Earth. Christianity (Catholic and otherwise) is supposed to be superior to all other religions and belief systems when it comes to morality or having a the right sort of relationship with God, Who is supposed to be the epitome of moral perfection.
Christianity claims to have at least some degree of supernatural assistance from God in the preservation of its authentic teachings and in empowering believers to live more moral lives.

By their fruits ye shall know them.

Jesus himself is portrayed making this point, claiming that it would in fact be possible to recognize his true followers by their behavior.

By their fruits ye shall know them.

Christianity (Catholic and otherwise) has a long and horrifying record of atrocities, wars, suppression of science, thought, and dissent.

By their fruits ye shall know them.

Christianity (Catholic and otherwise) has a record of brutality with few peers in pre-modern times (e.g. Genghis Khan and the Aztecs).

By their fruits ye shall know them.

The historical record as well as present-day statistics make it absolutely crystal clear that Christianity does not, in general, uplift and enlighten humankind in any way that suggests the presence of supernatural power. We see no evidence that it is inherently superior to other religions and philosophies, and it is arguably worse than some (e.g. Buddhism).

By their fruits ye shall know them.

Since tortures, executions, and brutal wars are portrayed in the Bible taking place at the command of the biblical God, it is no surprise that those who profess to follow this god should act in similar ways.

By their fruits ye shall know them.


Until these evil passages in the Bible are de-canonized and denounced by Christians (Catholic and otherwise) they are still part of Christianity, waiting to motivate the next generation of Inquisitors and Crusaders. With access to modern weapons and the power of the modern State, there is no reason that Christianity could not match or exceed the atrocities of modern totalitarianisms.

By their fruits ye shall know them.

It's really very simple. Because...

By their fruits ye shall know them.

NOTES:

1. Am I presuming too much to say that pronouncements attributed to Jesus in officially-canonized Gospels qualify as Christian doctrine?

 

[intilectual recipricol]

Eisegesis - Definition and More from the Free Merriam-Webster Dictionary

'Well thought out....'

The usual nonsense.​

I see, you werent able to refute anything... I'm takin my dap back

Read definition linked. No need to refute nonsense.​

I read it, all it does is describe how christians read the bible AND interpret their own personal made up god... weve coined the term SPAG

Self
Projection
As
God

its why no two theists agree, theyve made up their own shyt despite having the same book. Book says "A" theist doesnt like "A" so theists says, "Book says A but really means the opposite of A" and as coincidence would have it the theist also believes in the opposite of A.

You are a slimy bunch

Which Christians is/are he/you referring to and what is 'G-d'? 'Catholic and otherwise' is not explicit enough.​

ALL christians and ALL their made up gods. Ask 1 billion christians about their god and youll get 1 billion different answers. Its because youve each made up your own.

Who is 'you'? Also, what is 'G-d'?​

You is ALL Christians.
god is a made up concept that changes depending upon who we're talking about.

But anyways, you stated you were refuting something, youve failed to do that

So refute it with the usual sense. :chico:

Well, saying 'all Christians' is your first error since you haven't defined 'Christian'. Calling 'G-d' a made up concept doesn't answer the question of what 'G-d' is at all. Just ascribes an attribute to an incoherent idea......just like theists. Calling Mr. Crady's opinions eisegetical in reference to the text he used is all the refutation necessary.​

Eisegesis | Define Eisegesis at Dictionary.com

​

Meaning what, exactly?

**I'll take 'What's in a dictionary' for $200, Alex**

inb4

​

Lol

You cant ask an atheist what god is because it doesnt exist. All we can do is address the imaginary ones presented to us by theists and what holy books describe and falsify those. A christian is anyone claiming to be a christian.

Dont be dumb.

http://www.the-coli.com/3227624-post326.html
http://www.the-coli.com/3227767-post327.html
http://www.the-coli.com/3227903-post329.html
http://www.the-coli.com/3228118-post331.html
http://www.the-coli.com/3228282-post332.html
http://www.the-coli.com/3228310-post333.html
http://www.the-coli.com/3228702-post334.html
http://www.the-coli.com/3228763-post335.html
http://www.the-coli.com/3229299-post341.html

So you're saying it's impossible for a man who has no preconceived notions of God to hear the story of Job and come to the same conclusion as the OPs 2nd post, simply through critical interpretation?

That such an opinion must be, by definition eisegetical, as opposed to exegetical? Why?

Quite the contrary, any other conclusion other than OP's 2nd post would be eisegetical, seeing as how you would need to hear that story with the presupposition that god is good and that faith in him is a reward unto itself.

The idea that you will be rewarded for your faith in heaven after you die is not something that can ever be proven in the physical world through any form of sensory observation that we as people possess. That's not something you can ever know through ANY critical process. That's something you bring to the table on your own through faith, which is essentially presupposition.

So yes, intilectual recipricol's interpretation of probably far more critical, and therefore more exegetical, than what you see in that story. :cena:

No, I said eisegesis is not valid for the purpose of interpretation of ancient texts. You can't 'critically interpret' them by totally ignoring the language, context and culture in which they were used.​

Yes, and I said that what OPs was doing wasn't necessarily eisegesis for the reasons stated above. So what exactly are you saying? That anybody who doesn't have a command of Ancient Hebrew and Biblical Aramaic is not allowed to critically interpret the bible? Why couldn't a man without presuppositions who, let's say, has a command of ancient Hebrew and understands the historical context, come to a negative conclusion about the story of Job? Make a clear statement of your argument.

There's nothing in my post that suggests an objective man who draws OP's conclusions can only do so by "ignoring" the culture. The bible is not merely a historical document -- it directs people's actions in the present day. The context and culture in which the stories were used merely strengthens the idea that the stories themselves are extremely outdated. The context of biblical times assists us in understanding why the stories made sense THEN, not why they should guide our lives NOW.

Normally I dont do this, but Im gon keep the party goin

 

[intilectual recipricol]

By their fruits 2 - K. Crady

OK, OK, I finally get it!

All of your responses serve one single purpose: to explain how it is that the existence of an all-powerful, omnibenevolent deity who guides and empowers the Roman Catholic Church has no observable effects whatsoever on reality, including the aforementioned Roman Catholic Church. As you have explained, omnipotent supernatural power has no effect on "sin" (which is apparently even more powerful than omnipotence) or "free will," even that of people who profess to choose to have the omnipotent power help them overcome "sin," even sometimes.

Which is why we cannot expect God's chosen Holy Mother Church to be any more godly than the Buddhists or the Mormons or a religion I decide to start tomorrow.

Whenever these sorts of issues come up, Christians like you keep mentioning "free will" as if by reflex. Why should this be?

"Never bother to examine a folly. Ask yourself only what it accomplishes."

What does this particular folly accomplish? Why does "free will" even matter in relation to the truth-status of Christianity? No one asks whether the compelling evidence for the heliocentric model of the Solar System or the evidence against the phlogiston theory of heat transfer violates "free will." Why? Because these are aspects of external reality. In relation to external reality, your choice does not affect what is true, it only affects whether you choose to take the approach necessary to discover truth. Do you apply the scientific method, or just guess? Do you critically examine the method you used to develop your model of reality to find and correct errors? Do you compare your model of reality with reality to find and correct errors?

Reality is what it is. "Free will" is only relevant in regards to how we relate to reality. The goal of the scientist is to either falsify or validate a given theory so conclusively that choice is irrelevant when it comes to the truth or falsity of that theory. If a person was made aware of the facts supporting the heliocentric model of the Solar System and still "chose" to believe in the geocentric model, or that Earth was a flat disc sitting on the back of a turtle, we would consider that person either silly or delusional.

But with Christianity it's different. As you've admitted, there is no difference whatsoever in reality between the hypothesis "The Roman Catholic Church is the heir to the Apostles, the Body of Christ, supernaturally guided and protected by an all-powerful, omnibenevolent deity" and the hypothesis "The Roman Catholic Church is evil at its core, founded and ruled by false teachers through most of its history, and no better or more divine in origin or nature than any other religious institution."

In short: observation of reality (in this case the history and present-day behavior of the Roman Catholic Church as an institution) is irrelevant. What does matter? Choice. "Free will."

Christianity is something we "should" believe in not because it's a fact of external reality, but because we want to. If we don't make this choice, then we are, to some extent at least, immoral. To believe in Christianity or not is an arbitrary choice, like deciding to "wait until marriage" or have sex out of wedlock. We are to choose it not in the name of truth but in the name of morality, as the "proper" preference.

Why make this choice? Well, the answers come up as a visceral reaction to atheism: "If there is no God, your life has no meaning!" "If there is no God, you can have no morality!" Etc. We are to believe in Christianity not because of its objective truth (there is no fact of external reality that matters1) but because it offers us other benefits, such as a feeling that our lives matter, a code of ethics, and so forth. For those who practice prayer and meditation, it can also provide altered states of consciousness in which one can "experience God."

However, all of these things, including "experiencing God" are benefits that every other religion or spiritual practice worthy of the name can offer. The descriptions of mystic bliss given by St. Teresa of Avila are not so different from those given by Buddhists, Hindus, Sufis, Gnostics, or people using DMT, Ketamine, or the Persinger helmet.

In a nutshell: Christians believe in Christianity because they like it.

Hmm... I kinda like the idea that Faeries exist. Sexy girls in flower-petal dresses with butterfly wings fluttering around in the fields around my apartment complex, with magic powers. Yeah. That's kinda fun as a belief. Sure, I'll never actually see them under anything approaching normal circumstances, and I could never prove them to be an aspect of external reality. But it's kinda nice to imagine them. And, if I really mediate and visualize hard enough, maybe supplementing my efforts with some psilocybin mushrooms or LSD, I could probably get my brain to conjure a vision of them at least as good as any apparition of the Virgin Mary.

The Faeries dress sexier, and no doubt have a lot more personality. Plus there's no gruesome image of some poor guy getting tortured to death in the background. If I assume that the Faeries are at least as civilized as, say, modern Europeans, I'm sure they'd at least offer a basic "Bill and Ted Ethics" ("Be excellent to each other!"). And that's better than Christianity has practiced through most of its history.

So, can you give me a single reason why I should choose Catholicism over Faeiriism? I mean, it's not as if you can provide any evidence that Catholicism is true in external reality. As long as it's a matter of taste... I pick the Faeries!


NOTES:

1. The one objective claim that Christians still make is that God is necessary to explain the existence of Universe and life. People who actually research the issue, i.e. scientists disagree. Even if it were so that some divine agency or other were the only possible explanation, there is no fact of reality that substantiates the Catholic God over the Muslim God, the Hindu Gods, the Deist God, the ancient Egyptian Gods, a super-advanced alien species from another universe capable of creating Big Bangs, etc. etc.

 

[NoMayo15]

Been partying all night and didn't get any sleep but when I wake up I'm gonna go though this. Props breh.

 

[intilectual recipricol]

By their fruits 3 - K. Crady

So what we really have here is a reversal of the issues of truth and morality. In relation to truth, i.e. facts of external reality, free will is irrelevant. Does Earth orbit the Sun? That's a question of fact. An important thing to note is that I have no choice in the matter. If I choose to believe that the Sun orbits the Earth, or that Earth is a flat circle mounted on the back of a giant tortise, the Earth goes on orbiting the Sun utterly indifferent to my choice. I can be mistaken about the Earth (say, if I live in a pre-Copernican age) or I can be mentally unbalanced about it (say, if I'm a member of the Flat Earth Society today), but for most people, in relation to an issue of fact like this, both choice and morality are irrelevant. But to Christians, choice and morality are paramount and epistemology (how we know what we know and whether a given conclusion is justified) is unimportant by comparison.

As an analogy, consider someone living in Germany in 1941. Does Adolf Hitler exist? Does he rule Germany? In relation to these questions of fact, the person has no choice. Hitler exists and rules Germany. If the person chose to disbelieve in Hitler, and claim that Kaiser Wilhelm II ruled Germany, they would be considered delusional. However, the person does have a choice in how they respond to the fact of Hitler's existence and reign over Germany. This is where morality comes in. Do they join the Resistance, hide Jews and Allied pilots from the SS? Or do they eagerly spy on their neighbors between Nuremburg rallies?

With regard to the question of fact (Does Hitler exist?) they have no choice. When it comes to evaluating that fact (Is Hitler good?) they have a choice. Christianity reverses this order. Notice that the question "Do you believe in God?" is universally considered synonymous with "Do you worship and serve God?" Whenever someone asks "Do you believe in God?" they never expect to hear an answer like, "Yes, but I'm with the Spiritual Resistance. When Jesus and his heavenly host show up on horseback they're gonna be sooooo surprised when they see F-22's and Abrams tanks coming at them! Hahahaha!"

To the contrary, it is assumed that if you believe in God you will automatically serve and worship him as a matter of course. One of the Christians on this forum (I don't recall which one at the moment) claimed that to assume God's existence for the sake of argument (followed by an evaluation of whether his "Plan" as described in Christian belief is "perfect" or not) means assuming the Christian evaluation of God (that he is in fact perfect, good, etc.), and therefore one must also conclude that God's "Plan" is "perfect" even if it looks otherwise. Once you accept the existence of God, you're "locked in" to a positive evaluation of his character and a decision to worship and serve him. By the time you become aware of things like the massacres in the Old Testament or the doctrine of Hell, you've already been led to accept that these things "must" be part of a morally perfect God's perfect plan, which your puny mortal mind cannot comprehend.

In other words, from the Christian point of view, we have free will when it comes to the question of God's existence (i.e. whether he is a factual part of reality or not), but not when it comes to evaluating his character and deciding how to respond to his existence (if he exists).

Why is Christianity set up this way? What does it accomplish?

First of all, it defines the question of God's existence as a moral rather than a factual issue. If you do not believe in the Christian God, and/or believe in some other god(s), you are not merely mistaken or uninformed about the facts, you are morally wrong. To disbelieve in the Christian God is an act of wickedness, a sin. This enables Christian evangelists to bypass critical thought and appeal to guilt, peer pressure, and the like instead of validating their position with reference to facts in reality. "Jesus died for your sins. He loves you so much! How could you disbelieve in Him?" If guilt-tripping doesn't work, this approach has the benefit of legitimizing punishment for disbelief. After all, if disbelief is evil (rather than just mistaken or uninformed) then it is perfectly legitimate for God--or his appointed Spokesmen, from Moses to Torquemada--to apply threats or punishments, just as with any other crime.

We would never consider punishing someone for being wrong about the position of Earth in the Solar System or the existence of phlogiston. The very idea is absurd. But when it comes to religion, it is virtually universally accepted that having the wrong religion or none is a moral offense. Even in countries with vaunted rights of freedom of religion, atheists are inherently suspect (according to a recent survey, we are considered less trustworthy than Islamic suicide bombers), and people who hold to sufficiently foreign religions are criminal. To test this latter proposition, try parading a giant carving of a penis through the streets of New York as part of a fertility rite (as is done in Japan) or starting a church in which magic mushrooms or LSD is taken as a sacrament in order to commune with the Divine.1 Even in the "land of the free" and "secular" Europe, "freedom of relgion" is limited to "religions that Christians can tolerate." 2

And so we come back to the original topic of this thread. By defining the quesiton of God's existence as a moral choice rather than an issue of fact, Christians have implicitly legitimized punishing people for not being Christians. Even those who piously claim that we do not have the authority to do so on Earth3 still hold that God is entitled to punish unbelief with literally infinite severity. With a single stroke, Christians have relieved themselves of the burden of proof they would bear regarding any other claim4 while entitling themselves to use not only guilt manipulation and peer pressure, but force or the threat of force (even if it's just Pascal's Wager) as tools to manufacture assent.

How diabolically clever!



NOTES:

1. If I recall correctly, the Native American Church did win the right to use peyote as a sacrament after a prolonged court fight and activism, but this exception is racially based. Whites, Blacks, Asians, etc. cannot legally use peyote.

2. This is not to argue in favor of religions practicing human sacrifice and other forms of brutality. Such religions violate the human rights of their victims. Animal sacrifice is debatable issue. Since "animal sacrifice" is carried out on an industrial scale to provide us with meat, leather, and other goods, to me it seems harder to make the case that animal sacrifice ought to be forbidden, as compared with rites of human sacrifice or torture. If Tyson can kill thousands of chickens every day--after keeping them cramped in inhumane conditions for their whole lives--what is so horrifying about a Santeria shaman sacrificing a chicken to the spirits he worships? The answer is that Santeria is a foriegn faith, well beyond the Abrahamic pale, and thus spooky and evil. The same distinction appears when we consider a couple having recreational sex after meeting in a singles' bar vs. a couple having sex as part of a Pagan rite. Perhaps you can get away with doing the latter in secret, but don't try to set up a "Pagan Church" with a sign out front announcing an upcoming sexual fertility rite!

3. Even those who hold to this position must agree that it was legitimate for Moses, Joshua, the Judges, and the Israelite kings to punish unbelief, even by death. They merely claim that God has withdrawn his permission to do this because "we're under the New Covenant now."

4. Most Christians would probably agree that in other situations where a claim is being made (such as a physicist promoting a new theory, or a prosecuting attorney making the case that a defendant is a murderer) that the claimant has the burden of proof.

 

[Sensitive Blake Griffin]

god doc you're one of the most obnoxious posters on this website whenever it comes to religion always while hiding behind the "I'm not religious" defense

 

[Fervid]

Did I miss where these writings came from? I'd like to know.

 

[intilectual recipricol]

Did I miss where these writings came from? I'd like to know.

its in the first post. A person on an atheist message board.
theres a bunch. A moderator made it his business to collect many of the posts in its own thread, similar to this thread here. I figured some people here may enjoy it as much as I do.

 

[the cac mamba]

god doc you're one of the most obnoxious posters on this website whenever it comes to religion always while hiding behind the "I'm not religious" defense

i think youre referring to dirty jerz