Atheists....

[Redzeppelin]

No, I assume "take" to mean kidnaping. The scriptures say "take for yourselves" as wifes. Not slaves, not workers, not golf caddys. Wifes. Why bother taking 32,000 virgin women as wifes if not to start a family? Also see Judges 21:10-24. Using your analagy of the photo sugests that the person that is showing only part of the picture isn't being forthright because that person, having full knowlage of the entire photo is purposly keeping the most important information from the viewer, and thus manipulating the viewer into believing something that isn't there........

If an entire people are wiped out (their cities and possessions as well), the verdict of "taking" the virgins for wives (which also contradicts the rape interpretation) appears as almost a mercy of sorts (depending upon whether one saw death as more preferable to life married to a Hebrew). Being an unattended woman without the male population of your people around to support/protect you was not a desirable position to be in - even married to a foreigner was preferable to that. In terms of death vs. marriage vs. abandonment, well, with those choices, marriage might be deemed a merciful fate. (This in no way suggests that the women were happy with the decision).

The photo analogy sticks because not all photos are conscious attempts at manipulation; the sheer physics of reality dictate that it is impossible to see the entire picture of anything - there is no "lens" big enough to include all details of any particular picture; as well, when dealing with an ancient historical record and a decision made by a Divine Being, we are at a serious disadvantage in making a fair judgment because we cannot access all the facts. Would a court judge condemn God on the evidence presented - or would s/he say that there is insufficient evidence to convict God because we do not know the enough of the story to be certain "beyond a shadow of a doubt"?

You make a number of assumptions:

1) God had no good reason to doom the Midianites to death (God is unfair)
2) The Midianites did not deserve to die (God is not just)
3) Any killing is bad (context is irrelevant)

All assumptions within an argument ought to be considered and examined rather than assumed.

[NickAdams]

You can't judge the Old Testament's God by the New Testament.

[Redzeppelin]

You can't judge the Old Testament's God by the New Testament.

Both testaments provide different "sides" of God's character. They do interact and they augment each other.

[kiobe]

If an entire people are wiped out (their cities and possessions as well), the verdict of "taking" the virgins for wives (which also contradicts the rape interpretation) appears as almost a mercy of sorts (depending upon whether one saw death as more preferable to life married to a Hebrew). Being an unattended woman without the male population of your people around to support/protect you was not a desirable position to be in - even married to a foreigner was preferable to that. In terms of death vs. marriage vs. abandonment, well, with those choices, marriage might be deemed a merciful fate. (This in no way suggests that the women were happy with the decision).

The photo analogy sticks because not all photos are conscious attempts at manipulation; the sheer physics of reality dictate that it is impossible to see the entire picture of anything - there is no "lens" big enough to include all details of any particular picture; as well, when dealing with an ancient historical record and a decision made by a Divine Being, we are at a serious disadvantage in making a fair judgment because we cannot access all the facts. Would a court judge condemn God on the evidence presented - or would s/he say that there is insufficient evidence to convict God because we do not know the enough of the story to be certain "beyond a shadow of a doubt"?

You make a number of assumptions:

1) God had no good reason to doom the Midianites to death (God is unfair)
2) The Midianites did not deserve to die (God is not just)
3) Any killing is bad (context is irrelevant)

All assumptions within an argument ought to be considered and examined rather than assumed.

"Rape" is not an interpratation but rather an asumption of an act to happen after the virgins are taken to the homes of the kidnappers as they are forced to be thier wifes.

Mercy? Again with the " never question the Lord". So, let me get this right. For the few people that were "spared" the killing, the burning of thier villages, the systematic murder of thier children, the taking (stealing of personal items, animals, objects of value), the murder of mothers, brothers, fathers, cousins, uncles, for these people you see being obducted as mercifull? Whofa!

The photo analogy doesn't "stick". We are not talking about ALL photos, we're talking about the photo analogy you comunicated to me in your post. If we are ALL at a serious disadvantage in making a fair judgment because we cannot acesses all the facts, how then does one believe the biblical accounts if we cannot see all the facts.

I am not an attorney, but if Goldie Locks is guilty of breaking and entering and destruction of personal property, God can't be far behind.

Again, not an asumption.
1. God didn't kill the Midinites, Moses and his army did after being directed by God.
2.Deserving or not God doesn't seem to follow his own commandments. Thou shal not kill.
3. Al qaeda believes the same thing. You?

[Redzeppelin]

"Rape" is not an interpratation but rather an asumption of an act to happen after the virgins are taken to the homes of the kidnappers as they are forced to be thier wifes.

An ASSUMPTION is correct.

Mercy? Again with the " never question the Lord". So, let me get this right. For the few people that were "spared" the killing, the burning of thier villages, the systematic murder of thier children, the taking (stealing of personal items, animals, objects of value), the murder of mothers, brothers, fathers, cousins, uncles, for these people you see being obducted as mercifull? Whofa!

I said nothing about not "questioning the Lord" - please be accurate in your attempt to paraphrase my postition. I admitted that the episode described definitely appears to be a terrible one in terms of the picture of God it gives. I question the decision too - but since I believe God is who He claims to be - just, merciful, loving, compassionate, etc - then I make the assumption that there must be a good reason for His decision. Even our legal system recognizes that character counts (hence the "character witness"). The evaluation you are making of God is inconsistent with His character - and since God cannot be inconsistent in who He is, I must assume ignorance of certain knowledge that would - if known - perfectly justify God's decision.
To be granted life could be seen as "mercy" but I also qualified in my post that seeing it in that way is clearly dependent and not an in-and-of-itself given.

The photo analogy doesn't "stick". We are not talking about ALL photos, we're talking about the photo analogy you comunicated to me in your post. If we are ALL at a serious disadvantage in making a fair judgment because we cannot acesses all the facts, how then does one believe the biblical accounts if we cannot see all the facts.

We believe the Biblical accounts because the book is said to be the Divine Revelation of God - as such, since God does not lie, we assume that these things happened as we are told. To doubt so is to doubt who God is, and once we go down that road, we eventually arrive at the reality that there is no need to believe in Him at all.

I am not an attorney, but if Goldie Locks is guilty of breaking and entering and destruction of personal property, God can't be far behind.

If there were mitigating circumstances in Goldie's case, the writer didn't give them to us. If, however, the writer gave us a rendering of Goldie's character that indicated that she would never, ever do something wrong under any circumstances, then we would wonder what prompted her out-of-character behavior. Even our legal system recognizes such a thing.

Again, not an asumption.
1. God didn't kill the Midinites, Moses and his army did after being directed by God.
2.Deserving or not God doesn't seem to follow his own commandments. Thou shal not kill.
3. Al qaeda believes the same thing. You?

2. Already covered: God does not forbid killing - He forbids murder. Please make sure to read my posts carefully so I can avoid repeating myself. Thanks.

3. The difference is that we know why Al qaeda does what they do - they tell us. God's decision is based on things we cannot understand because God can read the deepest parts of the human heart (which is what He cares most about) while we are limited to what we see (which is not always what we think it to be).

[Whifflingpin]

Redzeppelin: "If an entire people are wiped out (their cities and possessions as well), the verdict of "taking" the virgins for wives (which also contradicts the rape interpretation) appears as almost a mercy of sorts (depending upon whether one saw death as more preferable to life married to a Hebrew). Being an unattended woman without the male population of your people around to support/protect you was not a desirable position to be in - even married to a foreigner was preferable to that."

This is pure dementia. According to the account, the entire people were wiped out by those who took their maidchildren into slavery. To justify the slavery on the grounds that the Israelites had already slaughtered their families, destroyed their cities and stolen their goods is utterly nauseating. It would be laughable, except that it is the sort of argument that has been used by the followers of the Book, right up to the present day, to justify all kinds of atrocities. It would be laughable if it did not provide atheists with the perfectly valid attitude - "If that is what god is supposed to be like, then I am glad not to believe in him."

Redzeppelin: "You make a number of assumptions:
1) God had no good reason to doom the Midianites to death (God is unfair)
2) The Midianites did not deserve to die (God is not just)
3) Any killing is bad (context is irrelevant)"

Wrong - I make one assumption, namely that the writer of the account was mistaken or lying in what he said about God.
The Israelites, by their own account, were a wandering horde, as merciless as the people of Genghiz or Tamburlaine, who slaughtered anyone living in lands that they coveted. Read the chapters before the one that was quoted and you will see that the "crime" of the Midianites was simply that they lived in Midian - a rich land that the Israelites wanted. The "war" that you mention as justifying the atrocities was nothing other than a war of conquest by marauding nomads against terrified and peaceful agriculturalists.

The fact that the chroniclers attempted to justify Israelitish depredations by claiming that God told them to do it just, in my view, makes them deluded or hypocritical or pursuing their own religio-political agenda. As I have said, I believe the account (which was not written down until at least three hundred years after the events, see for example http://www.catholicevangelism.org/bible-dates1.shtml) tells something about the people who carried out the acts, and something about those who wrote the story, but nothing whatever about God.

[kiobe]

An ASSUMPTION is correct.



I said nothing about not "questioning the Lord" - please be accurate in your attempt to paraphrase my postition. I admitted that the episode described definitely appears to be a terrible one in terms of the picture of God it gives. I question the decision too - but since I believe God is who He claims to be - just, merciful, loving, compassionate, etc - then I make the assumption that there must be a good reason for His decision. Even our legal system recognizes that character counts (hence the "character witness"). The evaluation you are making of God is inconsistent with His character - and since God cannot be inconsistent in who He is, I must assume ignorance of certain knowledge that would - if known - perfectly justify God's decision.
To be granted life could be seen as "mercy" but I also qualified in my post that seeing it in that way is clearly dependent and not an in-and-of-itself given.




We believe the Biblical accounts because the book is said to be the Divine Revelation of God - as such, since God does not lie, we assume that these things happened as we are told. To doubt so is to doubt who God is, and once we go down that road, we eventually arrive at the reality that there is no need to believe in Him at all.



If there were mitigating circumstances in Goldie's case, the writer didn't give them to us. If, however, the writer gave us a rendering of Goldie's character that indicated that she would never, ever do something wrong under any circumstances, then we would wonder what prompted her out-of-character behavior. Even our legal system recognizes such a thing.



2. Already covered: God does not forbid killing - He forbids murder. Please make sure to read my posts carefully so I can avoid repeating myself. Thanks.

3. The difference is that we know why Al qaeda does what they do - they tell us. God's decision is based on things we cannot understand because God can read the deepest parts of the human heart (which is what He cares most about) while we are limited to what we see (which is not always what we think it to be).

Redzeppelin: "If an entire people are wiped out (their cities and possessions as well), the verdict of "taking" the virgins for wives (which also contradicts the rape interpretation) appears as almost a mercy of sorts (depending upon whether one saw death as more preferable to life married to a Hebrew). Being an unattended woman without the male population of your people around to support/protect you was not a desirable position to be in - even married to a foreigner was preferable to that."

This is pure dementia. According to the account, the entire people were wiped out by those who took their maidchildren into slavery. To justify the slavery on the grounds that the Israelites had already slaughtered their families, destroyed their cities and stolen their goods is utterly nauseating. It would be laughable, except that it is the sort of argument that has been used by the followers of the Book, right up to the present day, to justify all kinds of atrocities. It would be laughable if it did not provide atheists with the perfectly valid attitude - "If that is what god is supposed to be like, then I am glad not to believe in him."

Redzeppelin: "You make a number of assumptions:
1) God had no good reason to doom the Midianites to death (God is unfair)
2) The Midianites did not deserve to die (God is not just)
3) Any killing is bad (context is irrelevant)"

Wrong - I make one assumption, namely that the writer of the account was mistaken or lying in what he said about God.
The Israelites, by their own account, were a wandering horde, as merciless as the people of Genghiz or Tamburlaine, who slaughtered anyone living in lands that they coveted. Read the chapters before the one that was quoted and you will see that the "crime" of the Midianites was simply that they lived in Midian - a rich land that the Israelites wanted. The "war" that you mention as justifying the atrocities was nothing other than a war of conquest by marauding nomads against terrified and peaceful agriculturalists.

The fact that the chroniclers attempted to justify Israelitish depredations by claiming that God told them to do it just, in my view, makes them deluded or hypocritical or pursuing their own religio-political agenda. As I have said, I believe the account (which was not written down until at least three hundred years after the events, see for example http://www.catholicevangelism.org/bible-dates1.shtml) tells something about the people who carried out the acts, and something about those who wrote the story, but nothing whatever about God.

Now there's a biblical history I can get my head around. Taking into account cultural history seems unavoidable. Really very succinct.

[kiobe]

Would you mind citing these different atheistic philosophies of which you speak? Atheism, by definition, is simply the rejection of religion. How can one make variety with that? In response to your "analogy correction", what do you mean by "not necessarily agreeing with the ideals of every soldier?" The soldier is the war, and the war is the soldier. We are not talking on an individual level here because a community is about the community, not the individual. If a religious person practices religion and believes in a god, it really doesn't matter why they are doing it. The fact is they are and because they are, what they stand for is contrary to atheistic thought. This can only mean that they themselves are against atheism. So, why support that?

I had no intention of stating that one religion was right for everyone, but I will state that once an individual is a declared member of a religious group he/she loses his or her individuality. If they feel the need to regain such individuality by disconnecting to certain doctrines of the said group, then they need to leave. Want a good example? Cafeteria Catholics- they pick and choose what they feel like believing. If you can't accept parts of a religion, why bother being a part of it? On another note, why do you think the Catholic Church is blamed for priest misconduct more than the individual priest? The priest is a symbol of Catholicism, and when a priest screws up the Catholic Church screws up. When you communicate your desire to support religion, you communicate the tendency for atheists to do the same and that is against the identity of our community. If you wish to go against atheistic beliefs, simply do not be atheist. If you are atheist then you do not support religion. If you do support religion, then you should not identify yourself as an atheist.

Sorry man but atheisim does cover many different styles.
Humanism
While atheism is merely the absence of belief, humanism is a positive attitude to the world, centred on human experience, thought, and hopes.
Secularism
Secularists oppose religion or the religious being afforded privileges, which - put another way - is the same as disadvantaging others.
Rationalism
Rationalism is an approach to life based on reason and evidence and rejects authority that cannot be proved by experience.
Atheist Buddhism
The Buddha did not claim to be in any way divine, nor does Buddhism involve the idea of a personal god.
Humanistic Judaism
Humanistic Judaism doesn't proclaim that there is no God, but it does do without God.
Christian Atheism
Christian Atheists, or non-realistic Christians, want to remove what they see as the fairy tale elements of Christianity.
Postmodernism
For postmodernists every society is in a state of constant change; there are no absolute values, only relative ones; nor are there any absolute truths.
Unitarian Universalism
Unitarian Universalism is not an atheist movement, but proclaims the importance of individual freedom of belief and so it is a movement into which some atheists may comfortably fit.

[Redzeppelin]

This is pure dementia. According to the account, the entire people were wiped out by those who took their maidchildren into slavery. To justify the slavery on the grounds that the Israelites had already slaughtered their families, destroyed their cities and stolen their goods is utterly nauseating. It would be laughable, except that it is the sort of argument that has been used by the followers of the Book, right up to the present day, to justify all kinds of atrocities. It would be laughable if it did not provide atheists with the perfectly valid attitude - "If that is what god is supposed to be like, then I am glad not to believe in him."

Well: you should not be having a debate with a demented person (because on the odd chance that you get bested, it might look really bad ). First off, I'd appreciate it if you'd read my posts carefully, because I never said anything about "justifying" slavery. I said that - to some - it might seem a mercy to keep at least somebody alive. Your response seems to indicate that death is preferable, and I'm not sure that that is a given. Either way, you're still avoiding the key points of my argument, choosing instead to express revulsion rather than deal with the point at hand. So - is it a) you cannot deal with what I've said, or b) you will not deal with what I've said? I'm clear on your feelings about me and Christianity - but how about the argument?

Wrong - I make one assumption, namely that the writer of the account was mistaken or lying in what he said about God.
The Israelites, by their own account, were a wandering horde, as merciless as the people of Genghiz or Tamburlaine, who slaughtered anyone living in lands that they coveted. Read the chapters before the one that was quoted and you will see that the "crime" of the Midianites was simply that they lived in Midian - a rich land that the Israelites wanted. The "war" that you mention as justifying the atrocities was nothing other than a war of conquest by marauding nomads against terrified and peaceful agriculturalists.

And what is the basis of this assumption about the invalidity of the scriptures (especially in comparison with any ancient manuscript)? Besides the fact that you don't like or believe in what it says? The ones who are mistaken about God are those who decide that they possess enough knowledge about an ancient event and the peoples involved to render their own judgment as to the appropriateness of God's actions. You claim that the writer is lying or mistaken about God - which implies that you have some idea as to what the character of God should be; I'd very much like to hear what your version of God looks like; care to share?

The fact that the chroniclers attempted to justify Israelitish depredations by claiming that God told them to do it just, in my view, makes them deluded or hypocritical or pursuing their own religio-political agenda. As I have said, I believe the account (which was not written down until at least three hundred years after the events, see for example http://www.catholicevangelism.org/bible-dates1.shtml) tells something about the people who carried out the acts, and something about those who wrote the story, but nothing whatever about God.

Upon what authority do you dismiss the veracity of the Bible? Beyond the fact that you don't like the picture it presents, what is the basis of your claims? Do you have any? The incident (I repeat) is troubling to Christians too - but your interpretation contradicts the known character of God. If you heard that someone you know very, very well had been accused of something that you know is TOTALLY out of character for that person, how would you respond? Instant condemnation, or would you say "Hold on - we need to get all the facts first before we rush to judgment." We do that for humans - but not for God?

[kiobe]

I disagree, Wiff was very clear as to every point. Not that he needs someone to speak for him.

[Whifflingpin]

Redzeppelin: "Well: you should not be having a debate with a demented person (because on the odd chance that you get bested, it might look really bad ). "

You are wrong about me, as you always seem to be, in assuming that I would mind being proved wrong by anyone.

The first part of your sentence is good advice, however, so I will take it. Thanks.

[Redzeppelin]

I disagree, Wiff was very clear as to every point. Not that he needs someone to speak for him.

I disagree.

You are wrong about me, as you always seem to be, in assuming that I would mind being proved wrong by anyone.

The first part of your sentence is good advice, however, so I will take it. Thanks.

1) Did you notice this: ? That was my way of making a joke.
2) I'd have preferred an refutation to an ad hominem.

[Scheherazade]

This thread is no longer open to discussions since it does not serve its original purpose.