challenge: try to describe a society more evil...

[SNOWBALL]

[ QUOTE ]

The society that produced Yahweh was one that lived in a tough, unforgiving environment, where nature was harsh, and life was difficult. It stands to reason that the god thereby created would be tough, unforgiving, harsh, difficult and not of the earth.

Contrast that with the gods that Native Americans created in their more beneficent environments.


[/ QUOTE ]

100% agreed. Your analysis is basically marxist FYI [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

[latefordinner]

hey all, you are all missing the thing the makes the xian God the most evil and it has nothing to do with Deuteronomy - it's this:

I'll give you a tiny tiny lifetime to listen to all these different stories. However, if you happen for whatever reason not come to the correct conclusion about these stories and accept the right one as true, you will suffer unbearable agony for all eternity.

That's like my telling my dog, look you have one minute to learn to roll over. If you don't learn it I'm going to chain you up in the backyard for the rest of your life. But it's cause I love you, don't worry.

[andyfox]

"I don't recall God ever advocating genocide in the stories of the Bible."

Why did Noah have to build an ark? What did Lot's wife see? What was the 10th plague in Egypt?

[Phil153]

[ QUOTE ]
Your logical error is that you somehow think that because the Bible contains instances of rape and genocide, that it is mandated by God. Please, do not back up this claim with evidence or anything.

[/ QUOTE ]
You have clearly never read the first four chapters of the bible. I wrote MANDATE in capitals to point out to you that God did indeed sanction these things. It's there is black and white. You are an idiot for aggressively debating something you haven't even read. As anyone knowledgeable about the bible, theist or not, can clearly see.

As for the evidence which you "mandate" I will not show...here's a list of quotations just for rape; there are plenty for genocide.

http://www.evilbible.com/Rape.htm

Don't be put off by the name, the chapter and verse are all there for you to look for yourself. These things are proclaimed as being said by God.

You can also look at the skeptics annotated bible. Browse through the first five chapters. For example:

http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/lev/1.html (burnt offerings)

See leviticus 20 where God states that adulterers must be stoned to death:

http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/lev/20.html

Why do you think the Muslims do it? They follow the same bible as you do.

God MANDATES (yes, madates) the destruction of cities that do not believe in Jehovah. Where do you think the Muslims get their ideas from?
http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/dt/13.html

I could fill 100 pages with this stuff. The bible CLEARLY states that God spoke unto Moses saying these things. i.e. Leviticus 20:1 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,

Here is my original point:

[ QUOTE ]
God MANDATES many of these actions. I chuckle at people who claim that God inspired the choosing of the books of the New Testament, but somehow let himself get quoted as mandating rape and genocide in his holy book. You can't have it both ways.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is 100% supported by the above quotes and you've made a fool of yourself with your response.

[vhawk01]

[ QUOTE ]
The actions of the Israelites were inspired by God? I think I've discussed this before. I've read those passages, I didn't see anywhere where it says the war atrocities (by today's standards) were inspired by God.

What a good number of Christians/Jews DO believe is that the Bible was inspired by God. In other words, God inspired the stories to be written (perhaps he allowed the author to see "truth" in the events, so they were reported properly or whatever). I've never seen a passage in the Bible which says that God gave that code of law to the Israelites. In other words, God did not inspire those actions, it is a historical account of what Moses and the Israelites did in a time of war. Perhaps some of it was justifiable? I don't think the Israelites had, for instance, camps for prisoners of war.

I just don't understand how a book about actions Israel committed implies that God is a madman, even if God inspired the authorship of the book.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes, God explicitly ordered the execution of many innocent people. He also condoned the execution of others.

[vhawk01]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Your logical error is that you somehow think that because the Bible contains instances of rape and genocide, that it is mandated by God. Please, do not back up this claim with evidence or anything.

[/ QUOTE ]
You have clearly never read the first four chapters of the bible. I wrote MANDATE in capitals to point out to you that God did indeed sanction these things. It's there is black and white. You are an idiot for aggressively debating something you haven't even read. As anyone knowledgeable about the bible, theist or not, can clearly see.

As for the evidence which you "mandate" I will not show...here's a list of quotations just for rape; there are plenty for genocide.

http://www.evilbible.com/Rape.htm

Don't be put off by the name, the chapter and verse are all there for you to look for yourself. These things are proclaimed as being said by God.

You can also look at the skeptics annotated bible. Browse through the first five chapters. For example:

http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/lev/1.html (burnt offerings)

See leviticus 20 where God states that adulterers must be stoned to death:

http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/lev/20.html

Why do you think the Muslims do it? They follow the same bible as you do.

God MANDATES (yes, madates) the destruction of cities that do not believe in Jehovah. Where do you think the Muslims get their ideas from?
http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/dt/13.html

I could fill 100 pages with this stuff. The bible CLEARLY states that God spoke unto Moses saying these things. i.e. Leviticus 20:1 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,

Here is my original point:

[ QUOTE ]
God MANDATES many of these actions. I chuckle at people who claim that God inspired the choosing of the books of the New Testament, but somehow let himself get quoted as mandating rape and genocide in his holy book. You can't have it both ways.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is 100% supported by the above quotes and you've made a fool of yourself with your response.

[/ QUOTE ]

Right. And if the Bible was written as a history book, and was purporting to be giving an objective synopsis of the history of a violent, tough people, that would be fine. But thats not what its doing at all. The Bible is claiming that this is the Ultimate Standard of Good, and that this is how God expects you to live your life. THAT is why its evil. At least, I presume thats why Snowball thinks its evil. I don't use the word evil, in general, at least not seriously.

[alphatmw]

wait so god, in his infinite power, divinely inspired people to include parts in his holy book that he did not agree with?

[ill rich]

i agree it is evil.

but these types of things still go on today.

[Matt R.]

Phil153,
No no, you don't get it.

I'm not interested in random Bible quotes. I am actually interested in content and understanding the underlying context of the Biblical events. I did read some snippets from a couple of your links. I found it quite humorous that the links are pretty much doing exactly what I said was logically incoherent earlier. Essentially, what they are doing is, "See? Here's a quote where someone did something bad. And since it's in the Bible clearly it is the Word of God, so God must be saying that doing these bad things are okay." No, Phil153. If I write a story about someone getting raped, it is my word. This does not mean that every single person writing a story about rape mandates rape.

I actually now understand why NotReady (I think it's NotReady), refuses to respond to random links to Bible bashing sites, when the person linking them fails to provide any argumentation. Let's see if I can respond by posting links to 100 Christian sites, and if you don't respond to each individual link then you must not have actually read the Bible!

It is possible that in the Bible, God advocates some "non-standard" methods of punishment by today's standards. This much I admit. I wish I could go into more detail, but unfortunately I don't memorize Bible verses with the intention of going on the interwebz to show how stupid another group of people is relative to my superior self. As a side note, you clearly do not have any interest in learning anything from the Bible. Why do you spend your time reading it to simply bash another group's belief system? Wouldn't your time be better spent learning stuff you were interested in? I don't read the Book of Mormon with the intention of showing those ignorant Mormons how silly their beliefs are. I think it's because I'm not a douchebag, and I actually have better things to do than making failed attempts to belittle others' beliefs.

Oh yeah, back to the "God may mandate non-standard punishments". I will go back to another point of mine that completely obliterates this thread, and surprisingly no one has responded to (orly?). So, morality is relative right? Since morality is relative, how do you "know" that advocating non-standard methods of punishment (relative to today's standards) is absolutely, morally wrong and that God is a monster for mandating the law? How can this contradiction not be obvious to you? You clearly do not have the perspective to judge the laws of a culture 2000+ years ago. Some "monstrous" laws could very well have been an improvement over previous laws, or have been necessary. You silly atheists and your moral absolutism. Don't you know the full story is important for making these decisions, and we may not know the whole societal context for these people living in a vastly different culture?

You have an intriguing personality mixture of arrogance and stupidity, Phil153. I would advise you to work on the latter as it makes you look silly, but it gives you a sort of endearing quality that I can't quite put my finger on. Maybe it's just because you make me laugh.

[SNOWBALL]

Matt R.,

How can you possibly go on insisting that god doesn't mandate the things mentioned in this thread when the citations state that he does? Are you saying that the bible purposefully misquotes and misrepresents god?

It's pretty clear that you don't care about what's true, and that your religion is very important to you psychologically. If you're so easily offended by people that like to discuss religion without presuming god-friendly conclusions, then you shouldn't be on this forum.

Ummm, and the reason NR doesn't respond to this stuff is that he has no response. If he had a response, you bet your ass we would be hearing it. He's certainly not shy about posting his baseless opinions on Bertrand Russel and Richard Dawkins (who he refuses to read)