Religion Thread II (originally posted by Callum Kerr)

[Garnet FalconDance]

Ok, Grungi, no problem. I wouldn't say John D. is an expert [img]smile.gif[/img] any more than any of the rest of us. Just very knowledgeable and amazingly non-offensive about it. [img]tongue.gif[/img] Some people I have met lord it over a person if they know something you may not...which makes me want to do physical harm to certain parts of their anatomy.

This thread seems to have quieted at the moment. Perhaps this is for the best. We all have themes important to the moment we'd rather discuss, I'm sure.

[Grungi]

im frequently wanting to do horrible things to certain anatomical parts of many people, though so far only 1 on this forum and hes not posted on here [img]smile.gif[/img]

just dont assume im greedy for knowledge [img]tongue.gif[/img] i like a good discussion and like learning through that, just feel my posts werent read properly as usual, i asked for some questions on judiasm, and got someone saying he'd help me with christianity [img]tongue.gif[/img] however nicely it was asked it annoys me because my post wasnt read properly.

but the actual discussion on this thread died out pretty much when it was swapped over by the moderator, its turned into people having unfair digs at me and arguments over other things im at work atm, so replying way too much [img]tongue.gif[/img] not doing any work at all, im gonna cite this forum as a reason for my lack of productivity, sound like a plan? [img]smile.gif[/img]

[John D Harris]

Grungi,
You're welcome and the offer stands for any future time also. My knowledge about Judism is limited , mainly from reading the Old Testament and talking to Jewish friends. I'm glad to see you have have a personal religion, one of the wisest sayings I've read from Albert Einstien (SP?) was religion is of No value unless it is personal (paraphrased by me).

[Cerek the Barbaric]

Alrighty then.....let's see if we can't drag this thread back on topic.

MagiK - I was planning to Reply to your post about God working through the natural laws of science before the forum went down. I do agree with that view...after all, He created the laws of science...we're just learning them as we go along. I do believe that God created the world in such a way that many events, theories, and ideas can be explored "scientifically" and that mankind can discern an underlying pattern or algorithmic equation that applies to a given set of circumstances.

The reason I argued so vigorously against carbon dating isn't because I disagree with carbon dating....it was actually a long, roundabout way of refuting a common argument presented by atheists against the Bible. Many atheists I've talked to try to "pick the Bible apart". They choose certain events or circumstances and try to "debunk" them. Then they say "Well, if PART of the Bible is wrong...then ALL of it is wrong."

OK, fair enough. As long as they accept the same standard. If SOME carbon dating (or other scientific method) produces erroneous results, the NONE of it can be trusted. I was just trying to "turn the tables" a little and let them see things from my perspective.

As I've stated before, I do believe the Bible is the literal Word of God. I believe God created the Earth and the Heavens in 7 days (not weeks, months, years, or millenia). I believe there was a global flood and that Goliath really was almost 10ft tall.

HOWEVER - even IF these events were somehow proven wrong.....it STILL would not affect my Christian faith....because the true purpose of the Bible is to tell Christians about our Creator and His Holy Love for us. It provides examples of how other Christians gave honor, praise, and glory to God through their thoughts, words, deeds, and actions...and it intrically details the Life, Death, and Resurrection of Jesus Christ. These accounts are provided as a "guideline" (if you will) of how Christians today are to conduct themselves in every conceivable situation. No matter what circumstance you are facing...someone in the Bible faced those same circumstances - and overcame them.

So whether the Earth was created in 7 days or 7,000 years really doesn't matter in the end. All that matters is the love, guidance and ultimate sacrifice that Jesus shared with us. This message of Holy Love and unselfish sacrifice is not diminished in the least if Goliath was only 8ft tall.

My point is that flaws concerning minor details (whether real or imagined) do NOT take away form the central focus and message of the Bible.

[John D Harris]

Miss Garnet FalconDance Ma'am,
Good to see you too... er read your words (I haven't got my super secret Internet spy cam up and running yet [img]smile.gif[/img] )

[Grungi]

eh? i dont have personal religion [img]tongue.gif[/img] i have a personal belief as such, insofar as i believe in me and if anything else exists its their problem [img]tongue.gif[/img] , but i dont really believe in much at all beyond that.

[Madriver]

Originally posted by Yorick: quote: Quoted by Madriver:The first "Gods" were created in the minds of men because of outside experiences they could not explain (lightning, storms, birth, death, etc.). By your logic, the older pantheon of Greek and Roman Gods actually existed because how could people have created them otherwise....right? It is not much of a stretch to go from many Gods to a religion that only has one.

First up, Abram ben Te'rah (2167BC - 1991BC) otherwise known as Abraham - father of Judaism, Islam and Christianity - predates the Trojan war (1184BC) and Homer's telling of it (750BC) which to my knowledge is the first literary account of the 'Greek pantheon' you claim later evolved into monotheism.

Secondly the pantheon consisted of 'gods' who are hardly a stretch of the imagination. They are little more than beefed up humans with superpowers. None are without a beginning. Even Zeus/Jupiter had a father - Saturn - and a mother. Much like a human. None existed outside time in the way we concieve the Creator to.

Heck, the Greek pantheon even had a war where they displaced the Titans (Saturn, Prometheus, Atlas etc were all Titans) to become the rulers of the earth. Sound like humans experiences to you? All the gods were prone to jealousy, politics, bickering, love, hate, lying, deceipt, whims, aggression, favoritism, fear, anger, war, etc, much like humans are.

Interestingly the pantheon included 'the unknown God". The Apostle Paul decided to use that as an "in" and tell the Athenians that he was speaking about "The Unknown God" who had created the world:

Acts 22 - 31 Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Now what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you. "The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. 'For in him we live and move and have our being.' As some of your own poets have said, 'We are his offspring.' "Therefore since we are God's offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone--an image made by man's design and skill. In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to all men by raising him from the dead."

This quite clearly was a radical idea to the idol making, pantheon worshipping Athenians.

Oh, hi Hiram btw. [img]smile.gif[/img] [/QUOTE]My argument here was against the notion that a supreme being is too much of a stretch of the imagination for humans to come up with, that it had to be handed to them becuase they couldn't think of it themselves. I was not trying to argue whether polytheism was first, or whether monotheism developed from it, that really doesn't matter for my argument (but it may have been a bad choice of words to use "first gods" as opposed to "ancient gods"). And polytheism was an example of how people "thought" of religions, and they weren't handed to them. Under your argument, every religion on the planet must be real since humans don't have the capacity to dream them up. Yes the Greek gods were different, but the people still worshipped them, so the result is the same. Same with the Hindu gods, the American Indian gods, the Aztec gods, etc.

Now you can argue that Christianity is different because it wasn't "dreamed" up, and I would agree that it is a possibility. But I disagree that humans are not capable of imagining a supreme being(s), it has been done throughout the ages and will probably continue to be done in the future, because some questions just are virutally impossible to answer. [img]smile.gif[/img]

[Cerek the Barbaric]

Welcome back, MadRiver. [img]graemlins/happywave.gif[/img]

In response to your example of birds evolving from dinosaurs as an example of "inter-species" evolution...I stand duly corrected. However, I still don't find that to be a completely compelling argument. Most of the information I've read on the subject say that scientists now believe some dinosaurs had bodies that were covered with small feathers (similar to an emu or ostrich) and that it is these species that eventually developed the power of flight as their feathers grew larger and more predominant. These species were already plant-eaters, so the developmental changes of their beaks is easily explainable.

The point I'm getting at is that scientists don't believe that the birds evolved from the majority of dinosaur species. Rather, they feel that a few species of dinosaurs were much more "bird-like" than they originally thought because of the similarities between their skeletal structures and those of modern birds.

I do not deny that evolution occurs in all species - including mankind. It's very evident that we are (on average) growing taller as time goes on. And different races have "evolved" to adapt to thier prevalent environment.

So, I don't deny evolution occurs within the human species....I just firmly disbelieve that evolution "created" the human species.

[Madriver]

Originally posted by Cerek the Barbaric: Welcome back, MadRiver. [img]graemlins/happywave.gif[/img] In response to your example of birds evolving from dinosaurs as an example of "inter-species" evolution...I stand duly corrected. However, I still don't find that to be a completely compelling argument. Most of the information I've read on the subject say that scientists now believe some dinosaurs had bodies that were covered with small feathers (similar to an emu or ostrich) and that it is these species that eventually developed the power of flight as their feathers grew larger and more predominant. These species were already plant-eaters, so the developmental changes of their beaks is easily explainable. The point I'm getting at is that scientists don't believe that the birds evolved from the majority of dinosaur species. Rather, they feel that a few species of dinosaurs were much more "bird-like" than they originally thought because of the similarities between their skeletal structures and those of modern birds. I do not deny that evolution occurs in all species - including mankind. It's very evident that we are (on average) growing taller as time goes on. And different races have "evolved" to adapt to thier prevalent environment. So, I don't deny evolution occurs within the human species....I just firmly disbelieve that evolution "created" the human species.

Thanks for the welcome, for some reason my browser wouldn't open Ironworks for a couple of weeks, couldn't find the page.

So, are you saying that because the dinosaur may have been "birdlike" it wasn't a dinosaur? It wasn't a reptile? Wouldn't these "birdlike" dinosaurs have evolved intraspecies first from other "nonbirdlike" dinosaurs and then evolved interspecies?

How about these recorded transitional fossils:
1. Primitive Fish to Sharks, Skates and Rays
2. Fish to Amphibians
3. Amphibians to Reptiles
4. Reptiles to mammals
5. Reptiles to birds

Check out the link below for more detail:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-transitional.html

[img]smile.gif[/img]

[John D Harris]

[quote]Originally posted by Madriver:

My argument here was against the notion that a supreme being is too much of a stretch of the imagination for humans to come up with, that it had to be handed to them becuase they couldn't think of it themselves. I was not trying to argue whether polytheism was first, or whether monotheism developed from it, that really doesn't matter for my argument (but it may have been a bad choice of words to use "first gods" as opposed to "ancient gods"). And polytheism was an example of how people "thought" of religions, and they weren't handed to them. Under your argument, every religion on the planet must be real since humans don't have the capacity to dream them up. Yes the Greek gods were different, but the people still worshipped them, so the result is the same. Same with the Hindu gods, the American Indian gods, the Aztec gods, etc. Now you can argue that Christianity is different because it wasn't "dreamed" up, and I would agree that it is a possibility. But I disagree that humans are not capable of imagining a supreme being(s), it has been done throughout the ages and will probably continue to be done in the future, because some questions just are virutally impossible to answer. [img]smile.gif[/img]

Interesting thoughts and reasoning.
I would argue that man Can conceive of or imagine superior beings but Not a supreme being. How can the mortal grasp the immortal? How can the finite comprehend the Infinite? What is the nature of enternity? Is it time without end or existance without time? Of what value would time be to an enternal being?
How can phsyical nature imgagine spiritual nature? When Moses asked God who to say was sending him God answered I Am (some translations read Great I Am) or as Jesus said the Alpha & the Omega, the Begining and the End. Through out history Man has imagned superior beings, the Greek pantheon, the Norse, the Roman, the Aztec, Maya, Inca, Souix, Hun, Mongol all had gods or goddesses they worshiped. But the common thread running through their gods were limits of some kind, usualy a time limit of some sort. Some may bring up what about Revelations? Revelations is about the end of the Earth or Time as we know it but Not the End of God.

[ 12-18-2002, 06:49 PM: Message edited by: John D Harris ]