Raf

When you have a God who embodies morality, his law should embody morality. The Law does not. Either it is not God's law, in which case, oopsie, or Yahweh is not moral. The only other alternative is, slavery IS moral, stoning is a moral punishment for a petty misdemeanor, and marrying the person you raped is a fitting punishment for a rapist.

Really? Why could an omniscient God not make "Thou shalt not OWN PEOPLE" a commandment? He found plenty of time to ban lobster and shrimp. Different laws for a different culture? A morally just God was creating a society from scratch. He answered to NO ONE. All he had to do was say the word, and thousands of years of human suffering at the hands of our fellow man would have been averted. When was it EVER moral on ANY culture for a rapist to be "sentenced" to marry the woman he raped? Please.

1. For how many crimes do you feel it is appropriate to kill the perpetrator by having everyone in town surround him and throw heavy rocks at him until he dies? 1.a. Did a child being disobedient to his parents make the list? 1.b. Did picking up sticks after sunset on a Friday make the list? 2. If you were to start a society from scratch, how many laws regulating slavery would you require? 2.a. Would any of those laws crack your Top Ten list? 2.a.i. Why the hell not? 3. What difference should the marital status of a raped woman make in determining the punishment meted out to the rapist? 3a. Who is the victim in a rape case, and how much restitution is he due? To be continued...

"One often meets his destiny on the path he takes to avoid it."

Ruminating

I haven't forgotten this thread. It's just not a priority.

Another aspect of the outsider test: Listen to your own argument. Would you accept that argument coming from someone defending a different religion? If not, on what basis would you reject it? Now, apply that basis to your own faith.

I reject the book of Mormon because it makes demonstrably false claims about history, demonstrating that it is not based on a deity who has knowledge of the truth. I reject the Q'uran for the same reasons. I reject Jehovah's Witnesses because they made specific prophecies that failed to come to pass. I reject Scientology because it presents false information about human origins and ethereal nonsense about why people suffer physical and psychological ailments. Followers of those religions would be perfectly willing to testify on their behalf with stories nearly identical to those told by WW and Twinky in this thread. Any follower of any religion could say exactly the same thing. As an outsider, why should I give your testimony any more weight than the testimony of a sincere Muslim, a sincere Scientologist, a sincere Mormon, a sincere Jehovah's Witness, a sincere anythingist? Do you see how your responses do not reflect an outsider's approach? Are you treating your religion the way you treat other religions? WW, do you mean to tell me you subject the Bible to the same critical scrutiny that you would subject other "holy" books? Do you mean to tell me that you would accept another religion's tortured explanations for why a blatant contradiction really isn't a contradiction if you understand this and that and the other thing, so really, the cock crowed six times and not three? [if I read earlier threads correctly, I haven't seen you seriously consider the notion that the Bible can contain actual errors or contradictions until recently, and I have yet to see you accept that notion]. The book of Mormon contains numerous claims about North and South American history that are historically false. How do you dismiss the Mormon's faith in the historicity of those debunked claims while maintaining that the Exodus, which never happened, is historically true? Seriously, it didn't. Look it up. Moses has as much historical documentation as the prophet Moroni. Name the Pharoah in Exodus. If you answered "I can't," you win a prize for honesty. People have tried to figure it out for centuries. Would have saved a lot of time if the Bible had just named him, but the (very human and very late) writer of Exodus didn't bother to tell you who he was. Why not? [Coming soon, Actual Errors in Exodus]. If I can reject the Book of Mormon on the basis that it presents a fictional account that is passed off as history, why shouls anyone protest if I reject the Book of Exodus on precisely the same grounds? THAT is the outsider test for faith. Subject YOUR religion to the same scrutiny, the same healthy skepticism, the same intolerance for weak, apologetic nonsense to which you would subject ANY OTHER religious claim. Is that what you've done? If so, congratulations! Your faith passes the outsider test! Really! Really?

Speaking only for myself, no other religion EVER had a chance with me. The Bible was true, period. The only issue was, who was right about what it says? What is the correct Biblical doctrine? That there WAS a correct Biblical doctrine, that the Bible WAS the ultimate source of truth, was something I never denied or even seriously questioned. If you were to ask me, "on what grounds do you accept the Bible as truth?" I would not be able to give you an answer that was any different from the way a Muslim would answer about the Q'uran, a Mormon about the Book of Mormon, a Scientologist about Dianetics, etc. As an outsider, it was easy for me to reject the ridiculous claims of those other books. But I never subjected the Bible to the same critical thinking that I subjected those books to. And now, as an outsider to Christianity, when I subject the Bible to the same critical thinking, it fails. Spectacularly. Its history is not history. Its morality is not moral. Its laws are not just. If the Bible were the claim of ANY other faith, I would reject it wholesale. That's my feeling, anyway.

I want you to stop and think for a moment about why you are not a Muslim. Or a Hindu. Or a Jehovah's Witness. Or a Buddhist. Or a Mormon. Or a Scientologist. What is it about those religions that you reject? What standard are you holding those religions to, and how/why do they fail to meet your standards of acceptance? If you're like most Christians, your standard is The Bible, but there's a problem there. You may reject Islam because it is in conflict with the Bible, but what of the Muslim, for whom the Bible is not sacred? Isn't a Muslim who rejects Christianity because Christianity is in conflict with the Q'uran on preceisely the same logical ground as a Christian who rejects Islam because Islam is in conflict with the Bible? *** Karl Kahler, in his book on The Way International titled "The Cult That Snapped," made an interesting observation about PFAL. He noted, accurately, that Wierwille declared "the Bible is the revealed Word and will of God" without doing a single thing to prove it. PFAL takes for granted that the Bible is true. Nothing wrong with that, but there it is. PFAL offers the critical thinker no reason to accept the Bible as true. It is not an apologetic work. It doesn't really claim to be. *** The former evangelical turned atheist John Loftus developed what he calls "the outsider test for faith" as a way to get people to understand why he is no longer a Christian. The idea is simple: Approach your faith/religion the same way an outsider to your faith/religion would approach it (and please, let's not get into a semantic war over faith/religion/whatever word you want there. You know full well what I mean). Why should the outsider accept your faith? Remember, NO aspect of your faith can be taken for granted. Otherwise, you're not an outsider. "I would accept my faith because it is consistent with the Bible" assumes that being consistent with the Bible is a value. An outsider would not think that. An outsider would think there are no holy books, or that some other book is holy. If you approached Christianity the same way you approach every other religion, would it win you over?

What do you mean "y'all"? I did not address you, John Maybe he meant "y'all without distinction." Or is that "y'all with a distinction"? Tough to keep track.

"I see you like to chew. Maybe you should chew ON MY FIST!"

Cape Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas Vacation

Running Scared

Oh no no NO!. :)

Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. I actually knew the first time.

Nice.

Anyone who gives out of free will, whether it's one percent or 50 percent or more or less, is Biblically justified in doing so. The standard for giving in the New Testament for Christians is not a percentage, but a personal consideration based on faith, speech, knowledge, diligence and love. (Read ii Corinthians 8 for the build up to and follow through on this instruction). Using someone's level of giving as a basis for criticizing him or her for not believing enough or not loving enough is an intrusion on that person's privacy. The Bible never instructs Christians to evaluate someone else's practice of giving. Only your own.

More

Jim Carrey was not in Love at First Bite. Replay last turn.

I don't think Jim Carrey was in that movie.

Who said you're doing what Cornelius and his household did? They spoke languages. You don't. They did something you're not doing. They didn't fake it. You are faking it. I have no reason to believe the counterfeit you practice produces the same result as the Biblical genuine. Again, I have to ask, if you don't care what I think of what you (pretend to) do, why do you care so much about what I think of what you (pretend to) do? The people who don't care.... don't care. You clearly do. The only thing you can do by quoting the Bible is establish that the Bible makes a claim. So what? We already knew that. You haven't established that what you do is Biblical SIT, which ALWAYS produced human languages. Until you establish you're producing languages, anyone is justified in suspending belief in your claim. I'm just calling your bluff. What you do is indistinguishable from faking it and produces the same result as faking it. So what's the evidence that you're doing anything beyond faking it? BIble verses aren't evidence. They are the claim. What you're doing is not Biblical. If it were, it would produce Biblical results. If t h e results you produce are Biblical results, then you're speaking in languages. Fantastic. Identify the language. Pass go. Collect $1 million. You won't. You can't. Because you're faking it. You won't even try to identify the language, not because you don't want to tempt God. That's an excuse. You won't even try to identify the language because you know full well that I'm right and you're faking it. I'm wrong? Prove it. Or shut up.

Was he?

To clarify, there is nothing in I Corinthians to support the notion that SIT will result in something undetectable as a language. The Bible is clear in every instance of SIT that a language is produced. While it was common for no one to understand the language uttered (hence the need for interpretation) nothing in the verses indicate that God works supernaturally to have speakers produce utterances that will defy human attempts to verify that languages are, in fact, being produced. It is not something Paul would have anticipated or addressed. Frankly, it's an excuse for why linguistics never picks up a language. Want to talk about K.I.S.S.? Ok, let's. The simple reason linguistics never picks up a language is that languages are not being produced. No supernatural explanation required. Simple, stupid. Occam's Razor 1, Apologetic Excuse Making 0.

You can lie to yourself about what you do all you want. But you can't lie about what the Bible says. Your interpretation was analyzed, dissected and debunked pages and pages ago. Go on and continue lying about what it says. But you're fooling no one. Not even yourself.