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Post by newschooled on Apr 5, 2010 13:44:21 GMT -5
Name one atheist whos blown up a building in the name of the big bang I lol'd |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Apr 5, 2010 13:45:50 GMT -5
Name one atheist whos blown up a building in the name of the big bang I lol'd ² |
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Post by presentedin4d on Apr 5, 2010 13:48:06 GMT -5
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Post by stephen5000 on Apr 5, 2010 14:23:14 GMT -5
(referring to original post)
The problem with thinking this way is that you're assuming that the Bible is accurate. It was written many years after the events within and by people who weren't there to see them happen, and as well has gone through many translations and interpretations over the centuries, so we have to be extremely skeptical of its contents. (as we would with any historical document)
Before it was written down, the biblical stories were passed around by word of mouth, which can lead to mistakes, exaggeration, things attributed to Jesus that someone else did (perhaps "Jesus" is multiple prophets?) or even things that are completely made up. Do to a lack of corroborating historical evidence, we can't even prove that the biblical Jesus really existed. (Note that Jesus was a common name at the time)
Also, as has been mentioned above in this thread, the divinity of Jesus was determined by a political decision; in the Bible he only claims to be the son of God, not God himself.
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Nakor
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Post by Nakor on Apr 5, 2010 14:31:15 GMT -5
Name one atheist whos blown up a building in the name of the big bang Adam Savage & Jamie Hyneman? >.> (Okay, they haven't, but they totally would if they figured they could do a small scale test on it.  ) There have been great leaders in the past who have been both incredibly intelligent and yet a little overzealous in their belief of themselves. The Egyptian pharohs all thought they were gods too, just off the top of my head. As was pointed out, you made a 'false trichotomy' -- which means you claimed Jesus must be one of three things (God, liar, crazy) when there could in fact be other options -- and failed to consider that he could have just been wrong. People can come to the wrong conclusions for reasons other than being crazy, you know. In the case of Jesus, a highly religious early-civilization society could easily lead to that in a leader of that calibre. |
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evets
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Post by evets on Apr 5, 2010 15:02:16 GMT -5
Jesus is referred to in context, as a prophet in both Islamic and Jewish scripture, but not as divine.
Please correct me if I'm wrong; I know the Bible a little bit, but I'm no expert - I don't recall anywhere in the Bible that says "JESUS IS GOD." Son of God, granted - But not GOD. I realize this is from a ways back in the thread, but I just had to address this one. From the standpoint of Christian theology, the divinity of Christ is firmly rooted in scripture. One example I can think of off the top of my head is from an Easter sermon I heard yesterday about doubting Thomas. When confronted with the risen Christ, he exclaimed "my Lord and my God!" (John 20:28). The traditional scriptural reference used for the doctrine of Jesus divinity is John chapter 1, which starts out "In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God." (John 1:1) Later on in the chapter, it goes on to make it explicit that the Word = Jesus. There's plenty more examples and passages one could use to show to that scripture (Old Testament and New) makes this claim. There's a reason this claim is at the heart and soul of Christian theology. However, you were correct in one thing: historically the doctrine of Jesus divinity was not hammered out fully until several centuries later, but clearly the idea was present right from the start. This is all assuming the Bible is true and accurate, but OTOH if you don't believe in that, then of course you aren't going to believe in Jesus either, so its a moot point whether or not scripture makes the claim. I'm just pointing out that it does in fact make that claim.  EDIT: ps.: The original poster's argument comes from C.S. Lewis, in his book "Mere Christianity." It also known as the "Liar, lunatic or Lord" argument, and if you want the full thing, go read the book. It's a popular argument, so the OP may not have known where it came from, I'm just saying, fyi. |
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Post by speedyreedy on Apr 5, 2010 15:28:45 GMT -5
I have also heard that argument, but the problem is this. Aside from religious texts, and documents based on religious texts there is actually very little evidence for Jesus living at all. At the time when he was supposed to have lived (try and find concrete dates for any part of his life or death!) there were thousands of people walking around claiming prophecies and miracle teachings. Maybe he was one of the many who got lucky a few times. Maybe he was a story told to give weight to the others.
If he died on a specific date, why is Easter based on the lunar cycle? If he was born on a specific date, why did they adopt December 25th as his birthday, based on pagan ritual regarding the solar calendar? Was he even born in 0AD? King Herod, who proclaimed (after hearing about Jesus' birth) that all baby boys born in Bethlehem were to be executed, wasn't even in alive in 0AD!
So do I think Jesus was God? No. I think there is a hell of a lot more to work on before people can start making that claim!
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Post by newschooled on Apr 5, 2010 15:45:59 GMT -5
So do I think Jesus was God? No. I think there is a hell of a lot more to work on before people can start making that claim! I guess if worst comes to worst, we'll all find out one day - One way or another... |
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Post by Johncoyne on Apr 5, 2010 15:49:15 GMT -5
I believe that if you're a good person, you'll get into heaven, but maybe just not directly (you may have to spend a couple thousand years in purgatory which is nothing compared to eternity in heaven). So you don't really have to worry too much.
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Post by Lex on Apr 5, 2010 15:51:46 GMT -5
I believe that if you're a good person, you'll get into heaven, but maybe just not directly (you may have to spend a couple thousand years in purgatory which is nothing compared to eternity in heaven). So you don't really have to worry too much. Couple thousand years? Isn't time irrelevant in eternity? |
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Post by Johncoyne on Apr 5, 2010 16:08:48 GMT -5
Purgatory is usually temporary, based on my beliefs.
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Post by Lex on Apr 5, 2010 16:16:57 GMT -5
Purgatory is usually temporary, based on my beliefs. Temporary implies the existence of time. It's really not possible given the eternal existence that purgatory, heaven and hell all must have. |
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Post by Johncoyne on Apr 5, 2010 16:27:46 GMT -5
The universe very may well exist forever, but we still measure time.
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Post by stephen5000 on Apr 5, 2010 17:49:34 GMT -5
I guess if worst comes to worst, we'll all find out one day - One way or another... I've noticed a few people make this comment on this forum with regards to religion. However, this only works if there is an afterlife. If there isn't, we'll never know the truth (barring large-scale divine revelation). It could be that Christianity is mostly true, but wrong on the afterlife issue. And depending on the logistics of the afterlife (or reincarnation or whatever) we may not be ourselves anymore and thus "we" won't know the truth in any case. |
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Post by Lex on Apr 5, 2010 18:11:17 GMT -5
The universe very may well exist forever, but we still measure time. It can't given the fact that everything that has a beginning has an end. The universe began, therefore it has an end. |
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Nakor
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Post by Nakor on Apr 5, 2010 19:21:58 GMT -5
The universe had a beginning and will have an end (eventually it will become so spread out that temperatures will drop to nearly absolute zero due to the law of conservation of energy, or something like that) but I wonder if the same can be said of time. We can't truly know if time began with our universe, after all, until science has determined what (if anything) there was before the big bang.
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