Couldn't have put it better myself.

Off Topic
81

Come on, PtrEater. How am I mis-quoting this?

Genesis 6:19 You are to bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you. 20 Two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind of creature that moves along the ground will come to you to be kept alive.

Genesis 7:2 Take with you seven of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and two of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate, 3 and also seven of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep their various kinds alive throughout the earth. 4 Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made."
5 And Noah did all that the LORD commanded him.

82

The quote was supposed to read:
“A man convinced against his will, is of the same opinion still.”
I think this applies to all of us.

I am just humbled that much more brilliant minds than mine and great atheletes as well have found that Christianity is the TRUE and ONLY Way. These include CS Lewis; Lee Stroebel; General Robert E. Lee; JFK; Bill Clinton; George Bush; Mel Gibson; Lee Haney; Emmitt Smith; Chuck Norris; Lee Labrada; Walter Payton; Shawn Ray; Ron Coleman; Reggie White; Deonne Sanders; Mark Bavarro; Kurt Warner; Bob Christiansen; Joe Gibbs; Tom Landry; Gene Stallings; Michael Irvin; and the list goes on and on and on.
Are you prepared to call all these people stupid? or wrong headed…

83

“…grill him about Joseph Smith and his so called “visions” and the supposed angel who gave him the goggles to translate the golden plates that had the word of God on them from Egytian hyerogliphics into English. How absurd!”

More absurd than believing in a virgin birth and reserrection? More absurd than having God kick Satan’s ass and then banishing him to the pit only to have Satan escape, disguise himself as a snake, trick Eve into eating an apple, thereby damning ALL of mankind (and making God sad) and FORCING God to take on human form, come down out of his EZ chair in heaven, and be crucified to save the people he created to begin with?

84

“There can be only one right answer…as offensive as that may sound to your ears.
You sound very much like a New Ager and also like you subscribe to moral relativism.”

Why does there only have to be one right answer? Have you never stopped to think that God may just judge us on our actions rather than on some vain need for us to worship him. The God I believe in isn’t insecure. Couldn’t the right answer be that God judges us on how we lead our lives and treat other people (regaurdless of what religion brought us to that point) instead of how we subjugate ourselves to him?

“I am just humbled that much more brilliant minds than mine and great atheletes as well have found that Christianity is the TRUE and ONLY Way. These include CS Lewis; Lee Stroebel; General Robert E. Lee; JFK; Bill Clinton; George Bush; Mel Gibson; Lee Haney; Emmitt Smith; Chuck Norris; Lee Labrada; Walter Payton; Shawn Ray; Ron Coleman; Reggie White; Deonne Sanders; Mark Bavarro; Kurt Warner; Bob Christiansen; Joe Gibbs; Tom Landry; Gene Stallings; Michael Irvin”

Holy shit. Are you really going to hold Deon Sanders and Michael Irvin (cheating cocaine users) up as representatives of Christianity? Ron Coleman, who as a juicing police officer breaks the vow he took to uphold the laws of Texas and the U.S., is an example of your religions moral beliefs?

85

PtrDR, I am not calling you stupid. You are inferring that. Dogmatic and stupid are not the same thing.

For that matter, I have not yet said what my spiritual beliefs are, but apparently you have some presumptions about them obviously.

You missed the one part where I mentioned that my beliefs are also strongly held, but I don’t presume to possess the only truth. And my intent isn’t to change your beliefs either. You and I both know that would be impossible anyway.

I guess I am concerned that you feel so strongly about your belief that you feel that it is imperative that everyone convert. Assuming that this comes from a sincere place in you that values all souls, I am touched by your sentiment. I am not going to be the one to pass judgement on a Hindu, or a Sufi, or a Mormon, or a Jew. They too have been raised in the truths that are ubiquitous in their own cultures. Why should I change them? Why would you want to? What is the compulsion to make all others conform to your beliefs and to call all others the product of satan? Vedanta was around a good 2-3,000 years before the existence of Jesus. It has endured all this time. Maybe since it is one of the original beliefs it is correct.

For your info, I am NOT a new ager. I am a human with a fine mind that likes to question what I have been told. To accept only one to such strong opinions against all others without even the courtesy of listening to what they are about is dogma. The absense of logic is dogma.

Incidentally, along with the Bible, I have read Mere Christianity by CS Lewis, along with the Chronicals of Narnia. A good read. An even more interesting read was done by Baruch Spinoza, who set out to prove the existance of god through logic and math. He used Euclidean Geometry to write it in, and is therefore very difficult to read. Better to read the scholars who have read and understood him, or to read his letters to his friends. Incidentally he successfully proved Gods existance, but you would not probably like his interpretation of god, because all the human traits that you assign to God are not there.

He refers to it as “anthropromorphism”, which basically says that we have an intrinsic need to personify God, and to assign personality traits to somehting that is basically an entity, made up of intelligence devoid of all human characteristiscs. I guess Spinoza was kind of reductionist, like Witgenstein.

I don’t have the energy to go into it like Ken Wilber, Josheph Campbell, Voltaire, Nistche, but they are all worth reading.

Well, this post is growing more than I intended. Let me just close things here to say that I am happy with my beliefs. I don’t doubt that you are as well, therefore I have no desire to chahge you. I would rather be happy than right. Have a peaceful night!

86

Deonne Sanders & Bush as poster boys for spiritual enlightenment?

mmm, think I’ll go re-read some of the Dalai Llama’s writings.

no disrespect

87

Doogie…with respect to the order of the plants and man in Genesis; lets look at Ch.2 vs. 5; the one in question.
This verse is connected with the proceeding, and must be read in continuation with it; for he annexes the plants and herbs to the earth, as the garment with which the Lord has adorned it, or else its nakedness should appear as a deformity. The noun HYS (sicah) which we translate plant, sometimes signifies trees, as below (Genesis 21:15). Therefore, some in this place translate it shrub, which there is no problem in that. Yet the word PLANT is not unsuitable; because in the former place, Moses seems to refer to the genus, and here to the species. But although he has before related that the herbs were created on the third day, yet it is not without reason that here again mention is made of them, in order that we may know that they were then produced, preserved and propagated, in a manner different from that which we percieve at the present day. For herbs and trees are produced from seed; or grafts are taken from other roots or they grow by putting out shoots: in all this the industry and the hand of man are engaged. But, at that time, the method was different: God clothed the earth, not in the same way as now, (for there was no seed, no root, no plant, which might germinate) but each suddenly sprang into existence at the command of God, and by the power of his word. They possessed durable vigor, so that they might stand by the force of their own nature, and not the quickening influence which is now percieved, not by the help of rain, not by irrigation or culture of man; but by the vapor with which God watered the earth. For he excludes these two things, the rain from where the earth derives its moisture, that it may retain its native sap; and human culture, which is the assistant of nature. When he says, that God had ‘not caused it to rain’, he at the same time intimates that it is God who opens and shuts the cataracts of heaven, and that rain and drought are in his hand.

88

PtrDr

The Koran can make no such claim! Its a religion of Lucifer himself.

What? How did you reach this conclusion? Does that make all muslims statanists or are they unaware that they are part of satans grand plan?

89

Doogie…Yes…I have read Paines’ “reason” before. It espouses a philosophy that leads to a total vacuum of the soul. On your deathbed…please think about the age of reason and see if it helps any…just make sure its the right answer.

Roy Batty…first of all…you like making assumptions dontcha? You figure I was raised a christian so therefore I can’t imagine believing anything else…much less research anything out for myself huh?
Well…I have had tons of reasons to doubt the existence of God. A father who didn’t want me…one who committed adultery time and again and beat my mother bloody…a young childhood and adolescence of poverty. Yeah…why would I believe in God or that He really cares after that??..much less a storybook called the Bible?
From somewhere…I developed a curiousity for the human body…bodybuilding and medicine. This happened in my latter teen years. This lead to be joining the Air Force at a young age and growing up in the world and attempting to educate myself. Suffice it to say that my curiousity in learning more about how the body and mind operate made my contemplate the fact that any design requires a designer.
I decided not to believe everything I heard Bible thumpers said so I did some digging around of my own.
After researching the manuscript evidence for the Bible and looking at the supposed “errors” were in the Bible; I came to learn that most of the errors supposedly in the Bible were punctuation and grammatical errors. Nothing that changed the substance of the text has ever been found. In fact…in the aspect of fullfilled prophecy alone…the many many books that make up one book and the many many authors all fullfill each others prophecies!..and lots of these books were written hundreds of years apart…so there is no way someone could have gone back and rewrote what actually happened vs. what was prophecied! For example…Isiah was written hundreds of year before Christ…but yet it predicted he would be born in Bethlehem…that his bones would not be broken and that they would cast lots for His garments! And there are many many more that came true as well.
So, the point being…nothing else has the histrocity of the Bible. Islam may have started off with the Old Testament. Howvever…Christ makes ALL THE DIFFERENCE! Christ is God and no one comes to the Father except through the Son. He died and rose again…and that makes Him God and that makes Him the ultimate authority! Not muhammed or budha or confucious. None of these men made the claims that Christ did and none of them ROSE FROM THE DEAD and appeared to over 500 people! The empty tomb…the lack of ever being a body that showed up (the jews would have produced one believe me…they wanted nothing more than to discredit Jesus Christ!) and fact that men and women who did not believe before…and were ignorant of His fate of having to die and being resurrected; were willing to be tortured…burned alive…sawed in half…beheaded…crucified…fed to lions…all for a thing they knew was a lie???..GIVE ME A PHYSICAL BREAK!!! Stop living in denial…its a river in Egypt…not a place for a rational mind!

90

Just out of curiousity what do you have to say about all the brilliant people and great atheletes that werent Christian?

Oh, I think using Bill Clinton is kind of a bad example.

91

PtrDr,

I’ve read the explanation you cut and pasted about the trees five times now and I still don’t get the point. Could you put it in your own words? And feel free to touch on the 7 vs. 2 of every animal topic.

92

PtrDr,

If a willingness to die for your beliefs is proof of its truth, how do you account for Muslims strapping bombs to themselves or flying planes into buildings so they can have 72 virgins? Surely they wouldn’t do this if it weren’t true, right?

93

I dont think the bible was intended to be read like the minutes of a meeting.
Like someone else mentioned, its a translation of a translation, in its original form its at least 2000 years old and in its revised form its 5 or 6 hundred years old right? Did the people who wrote it intend for others to use it like an encyclopedia of facts and figures? somehow I doubt it.
In my opinion its kinds of dumb to pick apart every little discrepency and far fetched statement. Its a religous document, religion is about faith.
Faith means that you believe despite the discrepencies.

Thats why I also think that trying to convert muslims to christianity on the premise that christianity has more historical evidence proving it to be the only true religion is STOOPID with a capital S. Muslims have faith just like christians, and muslims have been willing to die just like christians, some muslims leaders have perverted their religion so that they can justify terrible acts, just like christians.

If you talk to a muslim man or woman for an hour trying to convert him or her to christianity would you also be willing to listen for an hour while her or she tries to convert you?

94

The problem I have always had with christianity is that it is tautological and self-referential - that is, it offers itself as validation for its own claims, this makes it equally hard to either prove, or indeed, disprove.

Ptdr, have you ever read, Barbara Thiering? She offers a different anthropological interpretation to the events of the period, very interesting.

95

I’m still curious, what is the current line on the issue of theodocy?

96

The primary characteristic of pristine Christianity was its intense proselyting fervor. In this, it was similar to the Jehovah’s Witnesses and modern communism, all distinguished by various common traits. First, while they proclaim certain popular economic, ethical, or soteriological doctrines, they are also intensely political, desire primarily to replace the current rulers, and seek passionately to control the lives of all; second, they direct their appeal to the poor, the downtrodden, the disinherited, who are filled with fierce resentment toward those superior to them socially, intellectually, and economically; third, they are based upon the fantastic promulgations which the missionaries themselves could never believe, were they not emotionally unbalanced; fourth, through absurd and impossible promises, they awaken false hopes and delusions in their converts, which can only lead to a new enslavement; fifth, the zeal of the prophet as well as the acceptance of his message by the convert derives from the mental and moral insufficiency of both; sixth, the basic drive to proselyte stems from a preternatural craving for power in those who cannot succeed in any legitimate enterprise; seventh, whenever these prophets achieve pwer, they quickly wallow in the very luxury which they previously condemned so fiercely, and they reduce their proclaimed beneficiaries to servitude; eighth, since they are fanatically convinced that none except themselves possess any truth, they are immeasurably dogmatic and intolerant, cannot endure the existence of any other opinion, and insist on the extirpation of every deviation and deviationist; and ninth, through their fanaticism, they provoke persecution while they remain in a minority, but when and if they achieve power, they inflict it universally and ferociously upon all who do not conform to their doctrines or bend to their will. No well-balanced personality will, therefore, have the urge to proselytize; and no one who does will ever have a message that can withstand analysis. Its appeal will always be to the most primitive emotions.

97

By referencing people who were Christians…that were well known…I am not condoning their behavior. As a matter of fact…they do sin…Just as I do…just as we all do. Thank the Lord they have accepted Jesus Christ as their savior!!..It doesn’t give them liscense to sin and if they are…as well all will…they will have to give an account to the Lord. Its not MY job to do that judging however.
If Michael Irvin or anyone else does the things they have done…at least they have forgiveness for their past sins. It would be tragic for them to do the things they (we) do and die without salvation.
The point is this:…we are all sinnners and need the salvation of Jesus Christ.

In closing…all I can say to all of you…because it seems I am the minority here and thats fine…is this: KEEP AN OPEN MIND AND DONT’ LIMIT YOURSELF TO WHAT YOU SEE WITH YOUR EYES AND WHAT THE WORLD SAYS IS TRUE…remember…we are in a age of moral relativism and the lack of absolute truth. Be on guard…

Peace…

98

RoyBatty…that last copy and paste was so much rubbish!..it was laughable though! Me nor any of my friends who are christians want to persecute…rule over or control anyone else!..thats not Christianity. It may be that some people have been that fanatical about it…but they aren’t reading the Bible very well if they are at all! WE are supposed to be salt and light to the world.
Believe me…I don’t say these things because I am lonely or don’t have good christian friends. I am spreading the good news of Christs shed blood so that others may be saved. I get no kickback at all! And its not like I need to know whether you or anyone else sees the truth in time. Its just that its great news that once discovered…you can’t help but want to tell people about the eternal life and forgiveness of sins you have through Jesus Christ…His gift to Us…something we could never and would never be able to attain on our own!
One of the posters was quite right…the Bible’s primary purpose is not to be a history book for the World. Its a series of love letters from God to us…a divine revelation of Himself making Him known to us and His continual pursuit of us. He doesn’t force us to follow Him. He just describes His love for us and how He wants to restore the broken relationship with us through Jesus Christ/God himself.
It just so happens that it is a very accurate history of the nation of Israel and Judaism and the early Christian church. ITs not meant to be a purely scientific dissertation on the creation of man and the universe.

I will say that mostly I am reading from people who are either against the Bible or for it.
I am quite surprised that readers of a publication like T-mag…where pursuit of knowledge is held in high regard…That there would be so many close minded people on this site…

KEEP AN OPEN MIND…AND RESEARCH FOR YOURSELF BEFORE CEMENTING YOUR OPINION…

99

The article and thread where fun to read. But the conspiracies from the X-files are more plausible. I can’t believe that a lot of people reacted to something so ridiculous. Mainly because I can’t believe any body could believe it.

Restless

Out of curiosity what is your background, your world view (i.e. what is important) and what is your ideal world (i.e. if you had the power what world would you create).

100

PtrDR,
First of all, why would you presume that I cut and pasted that post? Oh well, think what you want. You can read many of my other posts to get an example of my writing style if you like, although I doubt you will want to read many of my opinions.

You said, [quote]AND RESEARCH FOR YOURSELF BEFORE CEMENTING YOUR OPINION[/quote]

Why do you think I have come to these opinions? First of all, none of my opinions are cemented, except for a sad acceptance of the current state of human nature. Second, I have read the bible, several times, and several versions. I didn’t stop there though. I have also read the “Lost Books of the Bible” which were removed from the original scripture for various reasons. I have read much of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Essenes, a few texts from or about the Gnostics (Christian mystics) and then, branching out away from Judeo-Christian culture, I have read the Vedas, several books on Buddhism, Hinduism, Vedanta, and other schools of thought. So who is limiting themselves here? You want me to read one book and one book alone, and take as fact everything printed in it. I disagree with this notion. To me this is the essence of closing my mind forever.

I do however appreciate the fact that I believe you are sincere in your desire to “bring people to Christ.” I don’t feel like what is good for you will work for me though. I don’t think I am any smarter than you at all. For example, I doubt very seriously that I would ever make it as an Air Force Captain and a pilot. I have just made different choices than you with regards to my own spirituality, and I have NO desire to have someone elses beliefs foisted upon me.

To elaborate a little on a couple of texts that I referred to, the “Lost Books” were removed from the original scripture, which makes me question having total faith in a text that was edited by man. If the entire scripture had been the inspired word of God, why remove them? The book of Anna (mother of Mary) was removed, as well as the book of Mary (which is still part of some Catholic versions of the Bible) because they present Anna as also being a virgin, which makes pretty heavy implications about Mary being the product of an immaculate conception. The books of Infancy I and II were removed because in a couple of sections; they talk about Jesus as a child having an occassional mean streak, and being arrogant with powers he didn’t fully understand or have the responsibility (yet) to manage. In other words, it made him even more human. Over a dozen books were removed. Add to this that most of the Epistles of Paul were either altered or completely forged, and you have a pretty good argument for approaching the Bible (as with ANY religions scriptural text) with caution. Incidentally, this is the contradictions in the Bible I was referring to way up on this post, which I will elaborate on later, but I have to get back to work. I didn’t get these from doing any web searches though, so I am going to have to think this out and type when I have time. If you question my facts you are going to have to research it the old fashioned way… follow my references and read!

None of this is to try to convince you to change your faith, so don’t take it as that. Just please don’t insult me by presuming that my posts are just copied text from someone elses opinions. And trust me that I have spiritual faith and I am not looking for help. The main purpose of all of this is simply to let you see that others can have differing views from you, but we can all live together in peace without all having the same opinions.