Is God Perfect?

Nobody participating in this thread thinks God wrote the Bible.

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Originally Posted by Iain Sparrow

Honestly, you believe the Holy Bible is a good reference for humans to live wholesome, ethical lives?

Show me one line in scripture in which either God or Jesus says that one human owning another human is wrong. Slavery, is perhaps the most abhorrent thing one person can do to another, yet not only is it never outlawed in the Bible, God sets down rules and regulations, and lists in detail what shall be the ethical and lawful treatment of slaves... thereby condoning the practice and paving the way for institutionalized slavery.


Here are ten passages from the Bible that clearly demonstrate God's position on slavery:

Genesis chapter 17, verse 12:
And he that is eight days old shall be circumcised among you, every man child in your generations, he that is born in the house, or bought with money of any stranger, which is not of thy seed. He that is born in thy house, and he that is bought with thy money, must needs be circumcised.
In this passage God understands that people buy other people and, quite obviously, is comfortable with the concept. God wants slaves circumcised in the same way as non-slaves.

Exodus chapter 12 verse 43:
The Lord said to Moses and Aaron, "These are the regulations for the Passover: No foreigner is to eat of it. Any slave you have bought may eat of it after you have circumcised him, but a temporary resident and a hired worker may not eat of it.
God again shows that he is completely comfortable with the concept of slavery and singles out slaves for special treatment.

Exodus Chapter 21, verse 1:
Now these are the ordinances which you shall set before them. When you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years, and in the seventh he shall go out free, for nothing. If he comes in single, he shall go out single; if he comes in married, then his wife shall go out with him. If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her master's and he shall go out alone. But if the slave plainly says, 'I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free,' then his master shall bring him to God, and he shall bring him to the door or the doorpost; and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl; and he shall serve him for life.
Here God describes how to become a slave for life, and shows that it is completely acceptable to separate slaves from their families. God also shows that he completely endorses the branding of slaves through mutilation.

Exodus Chapter 21, verse 20:
If a man beats his male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies as a direct result, he must be punished, but he is not to be punished if the slave gets up after a day or two, since the slave is his property.
Not only does God condone slavery, but he is also completely comfortable with the concept of beating your slaves, as long as you don't kill them.

Exodus Chapter 21, verse 32:
If the bull gores a male or female slave, the owner must pay thirty shekels of silver to the master of the slave, and the bull must be stoned.
Not only does God condone slavery, but here God places a value on slaves -- 30 shekels of silver. Note that God is not sophisticated enough to understand the concept of inflation. It is now 3,000 years later, and a gored slave is still worth 30 shekels of silver according to God's word.

Leviticus Chapter 22, verse 10:
No one outside a priest's family may eat the sacred offering, nor may the guest of a priest or his hired worker eat it. But if a priest buys a slave with money, or if a slave is born in his household, that slave may eat his food.
Here God shows that the children of slaves are slaves themselves, and that he is completely happy with that concept.

Leviticus Chapter 25, verse 44:
Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property. You can will them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly.
Here God states where you may purchase your slaves, and clearly specifies that slaves are property to be bought, sold and handed down.

Luke, Chapter 7, verse 2:
Now a centurion had a slave who was dear to him, who was sick and at the point of death. When he heard of Jesus, he sent to him elders of the Jews, asking him to come and heal his slave. And when they came to Jesus, they besought him earnestly, saying, "He is worthy to have you do this for him, for he loves our nation, and he built us our synagogue." And Jesus went with them. When he was not far from the house, the centurion sent friends to him, saying to him, "Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; therefore I did not presume to come to you. But say the word, and let my servant be healed. For I am a man set under authority, with soldiers under me: and I say to one, 'Go,' and he goes; and to another, 'Come,' and he comes; and to my slave, 'Do this,' and he does it." When Jesus heard this he marveled at him, and turned and said to the multitude that followed him, "I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith." And when those who had been sent returned to the house, they found the slave well.
Here Jesus shows that he is completely comfortable with the concept of slavery. Jesus heals the slave without any thought of freeing the slave or admonishing the slave's owner.

Colossians, chapter 3, verse 22:
Slaves, obey in everything those who are your earthly masters, not with eyeservice, as men-pleasers, but in singleness of heart, fearing the Lord. Whatever your task, work heartily...
Here God shows that he is in complete acceptance of a slave's position, and encourages slaves to work hard.


If the Bible is written by God, and these are the words of the Lord, then you can come to only one possible conclusion: God is an impressive advocate of slavery and is fully supportive of the concept.

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Iain,
In the first place I fully agree with Ecurb: today no thinking creature would believe that God has written the Bible and that all words that are atributed to him really come from him.
I fully agree with you that slavery is something terrible! But a mistake we often make, is to atribute to people who lived long ago, the same values and the same manner of thinking and the same conciousness we have today. As terrible as it may sound today, slavery seems to have been something normal for the hebrews in those days. They took slaves and where taken as slaves too, as the story of Joseph and other stories show. And as it for them seemed to be an aspect of their life, there had to be rules about it. And it seems that a powerfull way of enforcing rules in those days was atributing them to God.
When I cited the Bible as an ethical reference I merely meant that it contains some sound general commandments, specially the one "You shall not kill", which still should work in our times.

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Originally Posted by Ecurb

Nobody participating in this thread thinks God wrote the Bible.

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That´s to the point, Ecurb.

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Originally Posted by ScumbagSteve

How can you even suggest that atheists think God is perfect unless it be in his/her/it's perfect ability/agility to hide.

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I would think popping a universe out of nothing is a perfect way to become visible.

:iagree:[QUOTE=YesNo;1316590]I would think popping a universe out of nothing is a perfect way to become visible.[/QUOTE

In this week's New Yorker there's a cartoon showing God looking down on the world and saying to one of His angels, "I'm starting to prefer the ones who don't believe in me."

He may or may not be referring to ScumbagSteve.

Aw Scumbag Steve is ok. Anyone who chooses a name like that must be. Here though, how come it's the existence of suffering that bothers people(atheists, agnostics, worried believers) Why are they not equally bothered by the existence of love, happiness, joy. Do they think that we automatically deserve these things from the omniscient, omnipotent one? How strange too that Hitler (Whose Germanic behavior led to the death of several of my Christian relatives) should be thought of as Christian. (Granted he was brought up as a Papist - so if that's all it takes...) It seems that old Adolf invaded the paradise of the prols to spread the word of God according to some semi-literate readings of reality. Anyway in that case he was yet another failed missionary. Omniscient? Omnipotent? Well there you go struggle on with these questions . Meanwhile in ordinary life ...

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Originally Posted by Ecurb

The "perfection" of the Judeo-Christian God is asserted by both believers and atheists. The atheists want to bash God for being omnipotent while allowing suffering.

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The paradoxes of perfection are present in both the agent-based religions and the non-agent based a-religions.

Some agent-accepting religious people wonder how a God could be "perfect" without totally determining the universe. Others suspect any God worth worshiping as a person is weak who cannot allow some free will.

Some anti-agent atheists and agnostics proclaim as reality a "perfect" mathematically-motivated, deterministic block universe. Others know that doesn't fit with their own experience but can't see a way out since they feel committed to a belief in objectivity.

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Originally Posted by ScumbagSteve

Who says the universe popped up out of nothing? I never heard any scientist claim that.

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I didn't know much about the Big Bang until someone posted some years ago a link to a video by Lawrence Krauss who was introduced by Richard Dawkins essentially proclaiming this very thing.

I think this is the video entitled "A Universe from Nothing": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ImvlS8PLIo

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Originally Posted by ScumbagSteve

Lawrence Krauss, aside from his terrible voice, is one of the people I most regard.

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Personally, I don't see Krauss as an authority that I would trust without confirmation, but under the current circumstances, having it come from him seemed appropriate.

After I saw that video for the first time I had to look into the Big Bang in more detail. At the moment I'm convinced. The universe popped out of nothing. The only question remaining is did that happen as the result of some agent's choice?

When I say "anything is possible," with regard to God, I mean almost literally that. Throw away semantic traps, and anything is a possible true history of the universe, except the propositions of mathematics being false.

Out of the infinite true histories possible, what leads me to believe one of the 4 or 5 major religions got it right? Accident? Insight? Nothing.

The visions of ancient goat herders are due to lack of refrigeration.

But I am an agnostic, not presumptuous enough (Socrates' own term) to claim I know the inclination of these ultimate questions for certain. Atheists claim to have figured out there is no God, while Christians and Moslems et al claim to know there is a God.

Neither has figured it out at all. They are polar opposites reacting off of one another. They hate the other's position.

Guys like Krauss and Dawkins would still be atheists, but probably not militant atheists, if they and their ilk were not constantly called upon by legislators and educational boards to defend against the incursions of creationists into critical areas such as textbook and classroom content.

in general reply to some of the earlier posts about "authorship;" this is the official roman catholic position, and it is more or less echoed by the conservative protestant groups:

"Since everything asserted by the inspired authors or sacred writers must be held to be asserted by the Holy Spirit, it follows that the books of Scripture must be acknowledged as teaching solidly, faithfully and without error that truth which God wanted put into sacred writings for the sake of salvation."

the common phrase one hears in conservative protestant churches concerning authorship is "Men, moved by the Holy Spirit, spoke from God."

support for that position comes in large part from: “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all goodworks.” 2 Timothy 3:16-17

“For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.” 2 Peter 1:21

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Originally Posted by desiresjab

Out of the infinite true histories possible, what leads me to believe one of the 4 or 5 major religions got it right? Accident? Insight? Nothing.

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What I think happened is they all got it more or less right, not just one of them.

Also, getting this right is not rocket science. We have a natural ability to recognize agency.

If we start arguing about perfect agents, those able to pop a universe out of nothing, we run into paradoxes, but those paradoxes are easier to live with than the paradoxes arising from belief in a perfect block universe, because they don't require us to give up our common sense.

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Originally Posted by ScumbagSteve

There are no agents.

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We are agents.

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Originally Posted by YesNo

We are agents.

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Secret agents?

Is an input an agent?

Mankind used to recognize more agents. The babbling of a stream was the chattering of river nymphs at play.

Once you admit that human beings are agents, that is beings able to exercise at least some level of choice, agents are recognized all over the place. That is why atheists need to deny human free choice or find some other way to eliminate the proliferation of agency in and outside the universe.

I am not interested in where atheists stand on the existence of whatever Gods, or perfect agents, they feel safe to deny. I want to know their stance on human agency.