Well, I'm not very knowledgeable about religious scriptures, but it sounds good to me. There's not much point in mentioning that your beliefs are unjustified now, so I'll just check that they're coherent and consistent.

You might have a hard time with this one.

I don't see why we can't understand him just because we're not him. It looks like you just defined him as incomprehensible in certain ways. 

Okay, but note that you're redefining Christians as people that follow your interpretation of the Bible, whether or not that's the correct interpretation.

I would not label science, reason, and logic as gods, but that is a digression.

It's fine, but similar to the last statement, note that you're redefining atheists as all people that don't believe in the Christian "God" as opposed to people that don't believe in any god concepts.

That is inconsistent. One cannot hate an entity that they don't believe exists.

You can only claim that we hate the character God or that we actually believe that God exists. The latter certainly does not "reflect accurately" on what we see in the world.

If committing any sin mentioned by the Bible at all equals rebelling against God, then I guess you could say that we are inherently "evil." I would say that we are actually predisposed to anthropomorphize and project though, so although we are technically atheists when we are born, we have some tendency to attribute blind natural processes to intelligences.

Morally disgusting, but consistent by itself.

Lol, nice.

Again, internally consistent, but not consistent with reality.

Stating that we are can't see the Bible as anything other than a foolishness is a bit of an oversimplification. Some of the history is accurate and there are some halfway decent moral lessons.

Sure.

Doesn't make any sense at all, but it's not internally inconsistent, I think.

Okay. He created the world so he could feel awesome. Sure.

What a nice guy.

Well yeah, and narcissistic, malevolent, petty, genocidal, sexist, racist, sociopath, etc.

True, it doesn't affect his existence. I don't believe he exists because there's no good evidence and the entire belief system is nonsense, not because God is morally repugnant. However, morally, I can say that if the God you've described does exist, I would fight him to the bitter end. Since he doesn't exist, the only thing to fight is your pre-medieval dogma, Christianity.

 

 

Mr Fry. We could pass off almost all your points as being delivered by any one of the hundreds of wee christian cults all of whom think they are the only ones who are right, all who see themselves as the ones victimised by the evil world. No doubt you a decent fellow Phillip, maybe with a family of your own. Be assured, your finest qualities are those that make you human, not these meaningless, dogmatic labels that you think make you a christian.

> I have not revealed myself to you completely. I have only revealed what you NEED to know, NOT everything you would like to know. You can't understand everything about me - as you are not me. 

> Not all professing Beyond Saving lovers are Beyond Saving lovers – There are many false Beyond Saving lovers. You will only know who the true Beyond Saving lovers are after I have judged them. (Cash donations may help your cause)

> All Non-Beyond Saving Lovers are Non-believers (whether they recognise it or not) All other ‘Beyond Savings’ are fake. People worship all other kinds of created things (Allah, Ra, Spaghetti Monsters, Science, Reason, Logic … etc) rather than the only real Beyond Saving. Therefore they reject a belief in the only Beyond Saving.

> All Non-believers/Non Beyond Saving Lovers are Haters – whether they think I exist or not. Non-lovers are unable to do anything else but Hate Me, they cannot freely choose to do good things (I define what Good is not you) – No-one has ‘free will’ (Ability to choose between right and wrong) – you can only choose wrong-  only do evil things all the time. People are inherently evil from conception and are born with a selfish nature which is against Me. This does not remove your personal responsibility for the evil actions they carry out as they do what they want to do – which is evil. Every adult, child, baby and foetus rightly deserves My continual rejection as judgement for our continual rejection of Me by living in opposition to Me. I remain fair and merciful in my judgement – Judging people based on what they DO with what they are able to KNOW.

> Being a ‘good’ person will get you a first class ticket to My Dungeon. Nobody is good everyone is evil so deceiving yourselves into thinking you do good when you actually do evil is a gross evil. No-one deserves to come to my house nor can they earn their way there by earning brownie points for Me. The only way is to trust I will continue to keep my promise to save those who trust me (and attractive females). 

> I do NOT reveal myself clearly - So that people will NOT be able to understand Me. I have intentionally made the message of posts in such a way so that it will sound completely ridiculous, absurd and foolish to some people – Specifically so that these people will NOT be able to understand Me. Why do I do this? Because I like to fuck with you- Primarily because I have a “No one without a sense of humor” Policy (My house – My Rules). Beyond Saving is a jealous Beyond, and hates people who think they know better than him when clearly they don’t (nor can they). So he makes his message seem foolish to these people so that in their pride and great ‘knowledge’  they will fail to understand Him and be further hardened against Beyond Saving – and later they will be rightly judged for that - and their ‘knowledge’ will result in EPIC fail – All of this will bring great glory to Me. So the main reason why I am not trying to logically prove to you why my I exist is because it would be a complete waste of time – I purposefully go against Occam's razor. I like to have my dungeon extra full of people to torture. So I trick you into giving Me an excuse to send you there. 

> All Unbelievers/Non-Lovers CANNOT understand the my posts or ME. They are completely unable to see the my posts as anything other than foolishness, because I allows their minds to stay hardened against Me. They are unable to choose to believe in Me or think anything. Only I can allow you to understand me.  

> Beyond Saving is Supremely Powerful - He has, and always will be, far more powerful than the entire universe, although he is not infinitely powerful in the sense that there are things he cannot do. He cannot deny his own unchanging character which is just, merciful, loving, faithful, creative, relational, ordered, truthful  etc...  He cannot lie; he cannot fail at fulfilling his promises, etc….

> Beyond Saving is everywhere at once - both inside and outside of space/time

> Beyond Saving created and is in control of everything that exists. All the laws of physics, the movement of every electron and atom, every breath we take, every earthquake, every time the earth spins, every transfer of energy only occurs because I allow it to occur. The only reason you are able to develop scientific laws is because Beyond Saving is a Beyond Saving of order and have decided to keep the laws of physics relatively consistent (Although this doesn’t and hasn’t prevented me from being able to suspend these laws in order to achieve my purposes). Ok, so I suffer from a little OCD...

> Beyond Saving didn’t need to create the Universe – I did it for My own Glory. I wasn’t lonely and needing some toys to play with in my sandbox – I was in a perfectly content and satisfying Trinitarian relationship with myself. I created the universe because it is in my nature to create. I created the universe knowing and planning that Adam and Eve would sin and that ultimately this would bring Epic Glory to Me the Son (BS Jr) and in turn to Beyond Saving the Father – The universe is merely the result of a grand divine gift/birthday present to myself.  I created the universe for  Myself so I am not your personal genie wanting to grant you all your wishes – I do whatever I want to do – whatever is for my own benefit. So kneel down and kiss my feet slave.

> The world is Screwed up because you all Hate Beyond Saving – You the human race has united in opposition to Beyond Saving and I have and continues to fairly judge you for this, in several ways.
- I allow you to live in rebellion to me and in effect screw up your own lives and the lives of those around you throughout selfishness.
- I have cursed all of the once perfect creation to decay, be hostile and cause destruction. All natural disasters, death, and violence is a result of My punishment, and it is all your fault because your great great great great......great great grandmother ate my apple. 
- I allow my judgement to be carried out by many different created entities which all remain under my control and who’s judgement I am ultimately responsible for. I permit Sapient to have a small degree of supernatural powers to cause destruction on the board (moving around posts and such), I use the laws of physics to cause bushfires, earthquakes and floods (because they are so pretty). I use world leaders and powers (both good and bad) to administer My justice (which changes with my mood swings).  

> Its not Beyond Saving's Plan to save everyone – I decide to allow some to be fairly Judged for their sin so that the grandness of my mercy would be more clearly displayed and I would be Glorified even more, kind of like Duck, Duck, Goose!

__________________

Now, if this was what you knew about the all loving, all caring Beyond Saving, would you say Beyond Saving is 

A. A really great guy you want to be friends with

B. A being worthy of worship and praise

C. A complete asshole

D. A psychopath obsessed with himself and willing to hurt anyone for his own sick twisted purposes

E. A being that couldn't possibly exist. 

 

See the problem with your "logic" now?

Oh Great Beyond Saving, perform a miracle for us and look into the future to see if you can divine the answer to this question before it is given!

I'll bet you can do it, what with your Omni-Powers and such.

The Bible account itself is definitely not logically consistent, certainly on any kind of literal reading, so it cannot serve as the basis of a consistent belief system.

Then, even a logically consistent argument can only produce conclusions which are dependent on the starting assumptions for truth.

Your beliefs are, at best, assumptions, with no warrant for truth without some kind of verification independent of the Bible/

IOW, you have nothing but faith, ie wishful thinking.

________________

That said, many of your 'inferences' are invalid in themselves.

All people who belief in a Christ figure are Christians, by definition.

There is no logically consistent way to 'prove' that any one set of associated doctrines or beliefs are more 'valid' than another, especially when their is any significant supernatural content. Once you accept any element of teh supernatural, logic either does not apply, or can be used to 'prove' anything.

It is impossible to hate an entity that one does not accept as real, only the associated ideas.

Atheists are those who do not believe in any kind of supernatural entity. That applies whether the God actually happened to exist or not.

If God deceives us in any way, then he is a liar, and if he 'deliberately' makes it difficult to believe AND punishes us in any way for not believing, let alone with anything like Hell, he is deeply immoral.

To create such an imperfect universe, with so much unavoidable suffering, for his own glory is also both illogical and immoral, delusionally narcissistic.

I could go on, but you get the picture. You are torturing logic from the beginning, and end up believing in an evil monster.

Starting from an inconsistent set of writings like the Bible, you are required to make all sorts of naked assumptions in a futile attempt to 'make sense' of it, and that is the sort of nonsense you arrive at, demonstrating why Atheism and rejection of the Bible is a vastly more logically consistent stance.

You have supported our position, ie rejection of your assumptions, by the process of Reductio Ad Absurdum, by listing the absurdities and contradictory conclusions they have lead you to.

Thank you.

BTW, there are Christians who do have far more subtle and supportable positions, although they are still based on naked assumptions, such as a God/Jesus being of some supernatural kind exists. But you seem to have little understanding of what makes a logical argument.

 

We don't care if you were claiming pink unicorns or the existence of Thor making lighting.

If you do not have an empirical way of DEMONSTRATING your claim, ON ANY ISSUE, it is nothing but a claim.

We have much better data now than an ancient book of myth, BY ANY NAME.

Your deity claim is not testable or falsifiable. As such it is NOT worthy of consideration, anymore than claiming pink unicorns.

 

 

 

We certainly can understand Him partially – just not fully. Our brain are limited in capacity and therefore cannot grasp God entirely.

That’s exactly what I am doing

Fair enough – I am just telling you what my God sees as worshiping false Gods (Idolotry) – eg – Holding any created entity – Logic, science, money, family, Made up Deities etc... above God

Assuming Premise 1 (That my God exists) Then anyone who denies that my God exists, when he does in fact exist, is hating him by ignoring his existence.

Correct

The bible comes as a single package – you can’t cherry pick the bits you like and ignore the bits you don’t – that leads to liberalism which is a false sect of Christianity. Clearly you find some parts of the bible absurd and ridiculous and don’t believe in my God because of that fact. Therefore even though you may appreciate some parts of the bible You reject it as a whole as being foolish/false.

As I said before we have already agreed that no amount of evidence would be sufficient to prove my God exists.


Very true – It would be very wrong to transpose my own personal bias onto God’s revelation. While it is difficult to separate yourself from your own bias, all the points of doctrine I have said so far I can back up multiple times in the bible. I make sure of this, to ensure I am being as objective as possible in presenting the doctrine of Christianity.

Correct, it is certainly not my place to judge who is a Christian and who is not a Christian individually – That is God’s job. I already said is impossible for me to do this anyway as I can’t read people’s minds like God can. However the bible teaches to judge/discern all Christian teachings you hear to ensure you are not being deceived by false teaching. This is the sort of judgement I am making when I say some Christian sects are false – this is a corporate statement based on the doctrine of the denomination – it is not an individual judgement on people in those churches – which may well contain many christians.


 My initial premises are clearly assertions as I have already said, however the proceeding “turgid babble of doctrine” are all just inferences from these premises
Sure there are many many Christian cults – I don’t really care, That doesn’t invalidate my claim, it actually supports it. I am just giving you an opportunity to invalidate my doctrine through pointing out internal logical inconsistencies.

If you believe the bible has fraudulent origins then surely it will have logical inconsistencies within itself. Show me these from the doctrine points provided.
 
If I was not a Christian and I was reading this I would definitely pick C and D, and possibly come to the conclusion of picking E because such a concept is so evil and absurd.
I would not at all surprised that this might be your answer too – the bible tells me to expect this from non-Christians. Sure you hate the concept of my God – So what?  Do you reject it because you think it it a completely evil idea (emotional response) or do you reject it because it sounds completely absurd (rational response). My question is still this: Explain your rational response – In what ways do you find this position logically absurd/inconsistent




Can you please explain this more

By your definition Yes, By God’s definition No. I speak of God’s definition not yours.

I do not agree. Logic is applicable to supernatural entities, although it does become more complex. If my God claims to never change and claims to never lie and we find my God lying then my God is logically inconsistent. I may have not represented my position clearly so I will try again what I mean is this: God does not deceive us, we already deceive ourselves – God simply decides to allow some people to stay deceiving themselves by not revealing himself to them. Withholding information is very different from lying.

God created a perfect universe with no flaws, problems or suffering. We rebelled against God and God damaged/messed up the universe as a punishment – he did not create it this way though.

I have made no further naked assumptions other than my initial 2 premises everything else flows from this directly. I am not making up further theories to ‘make sense of it’ all I say is comes in the bible (Premise 2). 


 
This is a common misunderstanding made by most atheists and some ‘christians’ – when Adam and Eve chose to eat from the tree of knowledge of evil they became ‘like’ God – in the sense that they became self-determining of what good and evil is. Before they sinned they still knew what good and evil was - because God told them (they were brainless idiots as some seem to think). When they ate the fruit they started to decide what they thought was good and evil for themselves. But because they were rejecting God who is the definition of good, they ended up only doing evil in their rejection – even though they deceived themselves into thinking they had some sort of free will – which they didn’t. 
 
As I already said we are in agreement that this cannot be done absolutely - as my God goes beyond our ability to measure within space and time.
I am claiming to present an internally consistent theory. Yes this is unsupported by empirical evidence. I am seeing if you can find fault in my theory and invalidate it – If you can’t it will continue remain a valid but unproven theory – Just like many current theory’s being developed in the area of theoretical physics.
If you don’t want to participate in such a discussion > No Worries, You can pass on reading this thread then


 

Look, dipshit. Talking past people isn't going to fly, around here.

The underlined part is what you choose to remain blissful about, so you can listen to the sound of your own voice.

You people somehow think that we aren't wise to your 'political' and 'social' agendas, masquerading under the 'no fly zone' of 'religion'.

 

The jig is up.

You people (all religions) are under the microscope now. It doesn't matter what smiley faces you have painted on your dumb ass faces, you're all wolves in sheep's clothing.

You're not 'all about' the love, so STFU with your 'spin doctoring'.

You clowns don't know how the fuck the universe was formed, anymore than scientists do, so quit your racist, bigoted, sexually repressed bullshit , based on myths and legends, as any grounds to castigate others for their civil rights to choose their lifestlye.

Your cults have no powers to govern in America. The 1st amendment will not be overturned, and America will never be a theocracy.

That's the salient point that you hoped you could detour with your bullshit tactics.

Stop wasting your time, and ours, dipshit.

 

Why don't you tell us what your real problem is, with 'non religious' people?

Don't be a pussy. Don't be a 'messenger'.

Man up, and tell us what your personal problem is.

I do not think my god is a Bastard/Evil – I do think he is loving and forgiving as you say. The bible is clear that everyone who is not a Christian thinks God is a bastard. Of course you don’t think my God’s behaviour is loving – this is because according to the bible you are biased towards hating my God and will see anything he does as evil. Only God is able to remove this bias.
 
This is a very reasonable position to come to. I too reject the existence of unicorns etc.. due to lack of evidence. While we are in agreement that there could never be sufficient evidence to ABSOLUTLY prove that my god exists, That is not to say there is no evidence that supports my claim. There is evidence - God has made sure that there is sufficient evidence for us to know of his existence. Otherwise his judgement would be unfair – which is incongruous with His character. The primary evidence for the truth of the entire bible, which God has provided is the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. Disprove this, and I will become an atheist immediately. This is the event in which all hope of the Christian belief rests on.     

 

Wow! Firstly all I can say is you need take a chill pill – Why so serious?

Secondly I am not from America as you seem to assume. I am from the good ol’ convict colony of Australia – like our friends BobSpence and AtheistExtremist. And as far as our government is concerned we have an Atheist Prime Minister.
You seem to think I have some great political agenda to push when I do not. It seems that you might have more of an agenda than me. If you want to know my position on politics it is this:

Democracy works as the best form of government in the world only because we are all selfish people, and when humans are involved - absolute power corrupts absolutely. I vote AGAINST political parties, not FOR them. I vote to keep out the worst people from ruling us. I don’t vote for any party because honestly they all suck (including the supposed Christian parties). The party that gets my number 1 vote is the one that sucks the least. Our terms/periods of government are purposefully kept short (only a few years) so that it can be continually changed – in effect having a controlled civil revolution. All this being said I don’t think democracy is the best form of government because it is very weak and powerless – which mean it fails to achieve very much at all. A monarchy/dictatorship is far more effective in achieving its purposes – but ONLY if the leader is a good leader – which is why I think God is a king/dictator and that is a good thing. And long as people are selfish and evil any form of monarchy or dictatorship is going to fail badly and have horrible consequences for the people under that form of rule – as we see in history.

Therefore I would never desire or support any form of Theocracy in our governments as you seem to think I want.

In terms of what my REAL problem with atheists is? I don’t have any problem. I actually respect most atheist more than the Apathetic Agnostics that populate most of Australia. At least you are willing to think about stuff - rather than the "Don't Know Don't Care" attitude. And You are bruatlly honest in expressing what you think rantehr than pretending to be nice about everthing which i also respect. If I were not a Christian I would be an atheist. 
 

Fuck you.

Preaching people are going to go to hell is seriously disturbed, motherfucker.

That's my problem with you fucks.

And as we see in the bible.

Have you read the OT?

Explain to me how the Christian god would not be despicable?

You didn't seem too impressed based on your first response.

Listen Dipshit,

The 3 biggest pet peeves I have are:

1- Cowards

2- Hypocrites

3-  2 faced liars

In that order.

Don't feed me the line of BS that it's 'God' who has a personal problem, and you're not doing any personal 'judging'. Because that's a steaming hot pile of shit.

You want to run your mouth? Tell people what you think about them.

Don't be a pussy and play messenger boy.

Man up, motherfucker.

 

Get in my face, like I'm getting into yours.

Let's not beat around the bush.

You've read the bible, no?

What parts really resonate with you?

What is 'immoral' about the way others live?

Have you got the balls to lay your cards out on the table?

 

Mr. Fry,

 

As many stated, these arguments have been answered time and time again. But, you ask if your worldview makes sense, and want us to take shots at it. Take no mind that any constructed worldview can make sense and harbour itself perfectly away from outside criticism. And never mind I did not see even one statement in your argument that I could not use to construct a similiar worldview for one of the many disparate sects of Hinduism. Just as your theology tells you to advance, presuming the Bible is true and the unbelievers cannot inherently understand it, I could do the same as a Muslim, which was my previous faith.

 

But, that won't be my point. So, to that, I ask, does anyone's worldview make sense? With the limitation of individual consciousness can one ever reach a satisfactory reality? How many thousands of presumptions will you make just to reach what you define as a truth? Is this really, not just a dream? Why that leap of faith at all? Let's go back to the basics.

 

In the hopes of being excessively adorable, I'd like to do a postmodern deconstruction of what you've just said, dressed in red and lavished in curls. Every set of questions will end with a statement, in order to save a good many from unnecessary migraines.

 

I am not aware of your beliefs in particular, although you listed a group of adjectives in the beginning of your post. However, I am going to take the Westminster Confession of Faith and presume you lean towards it, or at the very least, some of it, since I realize you are from the Reformed tradition.

 

 

 

For those interested in the scriptural backgrounding of this particular confession, please refer yourself to here:

http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/creeds3.iv.xvii.ii.html

 

 

Note, I'm not representing the entire atheist community, or even a significant minority. I'm speaking as myself. My stupidity is representative of no one but me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Proven in what sense? That the good LORD exists? Existing, in what sense? Existing as you or I? Or, existing differently than you or I? How does he or she or [gender-neutral pronoun here] exist differently, if the good LORD does exist differently? What is the fine line delineating the difference between our existence, and the existence of the Father? What is the fine line delineating existence and nonexistence? Agreeing, like the scientific method, that if it is reproducible logically or materially, it must be true? What if everyone reproducing it sees (or constructs) the same illusion? Existence is a social construct that creates a framework for understanding phenomena, and you will not be able to define it as an objective value,. You, and your community of believers, believe in the subjective existence of God, and presume you share with one another a common reality for delineation. There is no concrete evidence of an existence outside of your single consciousness, let alone the existence of deities.

 

 

 

 

And, most importantly, a Father in what cultural sense? In the Hebraic literary sense, with its added cultural attributes to the already presumed biological? If so, is the good LORD our Father in the Anglo-Saxon literary sense as well? 'Father' in Aramaic or Hebrew is not completely analogous to what it is in English, so, it strikes me one could erroneously call him Father, if Father in one's culture included the definition of child molestation, for example, or even for the smaller distinctions such a word would have between languages. Across languages then, Christianity can never have a consistent definition.

You go on to speak of the Trinity. The First Council of Nicea describes Christ within the Trinity as such, “God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance (homoousios) with the Father.” What is a substance? Could a substance be temporal in value, and change? Could a substance be made of several substances, none of which resembles the other? The Trinity is composed of a single substance, but a substance cannot even be agreeably defined.

 

 

 

What does it mean to reveal truthfully? Later, you admit this revelation, due to the nature of the LORD, is incomplete. What defines completion? Are their attributes of God we are not aware of? Do they influence the attributes we are aware of? If we know certain attributes of God, could things we not know potentially change our definition of God? If we know all the attributes of God that He would use to define himself in our dictum, then how do those attributes relate to man? God reveals himself in a way which his Elect (see: reformed theology) can understand him, in a certain context. 2000 years later, the contemporary Elect cannot possibly view things exactly the same as the earlier Elect, since there is a historical divorce, and not all context can possibly be transmitted through one literary work. At a single point, presuming your worldview of objective definitions, there must be such a divorce in context that finally breaks from the definition, making the contemporary Elect so dissimilar from the historical Elect that they are no longer one entity. What if, for example, we find out today that in early Judaic culture, as preached by the Old Testament prophets, that it was widely believed and symbolic that when one was raised from the dead, it was a work of Satan? There can never be a complete transmission of context in order to satisfy Sola Scriptura.

 

 

I have the rest of your points in a document, and I have segments of the Westminster Confession to go along with them, but I need to take a break and work on other stuff now. Will await your responses.

 

As we've not met before, hi and welcome. Look forward to reading more of your thoughts.

A very warm welcome to you, as well.

I look forward to learning more about the Muslim faith, from an apostate...

Does it seem to you that the God of the OT is 'egalitarian' and not bigoted?

I disagree.

I gave you either/or dichotomies.

You're equivocating, and preaching just like an apologist.

I wasn't looking for a sermon.

Is that compatible with how it's written in the OT, that he feels towards everyone?

That's contradictory to your previous description, which leads to a logical fallacy.

I disagree.

I see women as peers. As a matter of fact, I employ women in certain places over men, because they're better than men in those roles.

I disagree.

I disagree.

I disagree.

1- That's a philosophically bankrupt statement.

2- There are places in New York City, Florida, Los Angeles, Montreal, Toronto, that have 'unisex' bathrooms in nightclubs.

They both put their pants on 1 leg at a time.

That's emotionally dysfunctional.

Do you mean to say that he is not going to be vengeful and spiteful towards them for not following his commands?

 

Yes

Things can be equal in one sense but not equal in another sense. Apples and oranges are both equally fruit but Apples arn't oranges. This is not a logical fallacy.

I see women as peers and equals too. But i don't see women as men - or men as women simply because they are not - they are different physically and cognitivly.

Why do you find women more useful to work in certain roles if you think they are exatly the same as men - either gender should be equally useful for the role shouldn't they? 

Why do you treat women differently to men in how you employ them if you think this is disrespect ful and discriminating.

How?

No, Of course he will judge them fairly for their disobediance, in the mean time he tolerates them.

yeah, not the best choice of words i think you got my point though 

 

 

But you yourself stated that it was evil and absurd when the same description was applied to Beyond Saving. What makes god different? And no, I am not biased towards hating a god. I don't believe in his existence and I am not in the habit of hating things that don't exist. If the god you describe did exist I would call him evil because of the things that he has done. For example, sending good people to burn in hell for not believing is evil. Whether that action is performed by your god, Beyond Saving or Santa Clause, I would term all three as evil (and I love BS and Santa Clause- ask the others). No bias.

 

You on the other hand freely admit that if it was me doing those things I would be evil or at least an asshole. Why don't you apply those same standards to your god? How do you reconcile believing that your god is all loving and forgiving while admitting that your god does evil things? 

Here is a good list of inconsistencies and contradictions, one of many"

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/jim_meritt/bible-contradictions.html

Just a couple of examples:

=========

And you can't get away with ignoring the clear simple meanings of words like 'atheist' and claim consistency.

If you are going to insist on defining what the terms you use mean, against their actual usage, you are being very dishonest.

I realize such twisting of the meanings of words and phrases is totally necessary to read the Bible as being consistent. You do it because you start from the conviction that the Bible is true, and are trying to justify it, rather than honestly trying to decide whether it justifies such 'faith', which to almost anyone who has honestly studied it, it manifestly does not.

Presenting this stuff to people on this board is just making yourself look pathetic and foolish.

EDIT: Basing your worldview on a set of naked assumptions, which are against all the evidence, and only 'supported' by a book riddled with that sort of confusion, just because you like it, is being extremely self-centered and intellectually dishonest.

YOU don't get to define reality and truth.

 

All I can say is that the more complicated it is the more likely it is to be a religion.

 You know, when I first started coming to this site someone said that it was child abuse for a kid to be raised in a family of "true" Christians. I thought it was hyperbole at the time. Now, after seeing Christian after Christian describe their convoluted ideas of "love" and "justice" as they apply to their imaginary god, I think the claim might be accurate. I honestly don't get it, especially when it comes from the Christians that don't seem like complete nuts. With love like that, you certainly don't need any hate. You literally could love someone to death......

 

YES SIR. I can testify to that. Being told that I was the reason Satan was destroying my mother's heath because I didn't join the church really fucked up my mind. But if you met me you would have thought I was as normal as the day is long. Christianity teaches you to put on a happy face, to ignore reality. Layers of facades. You need to sacrifice all that you are to be for Jesus. Throw your will out the door, throw your brain out the door, but remember as Fry quotes the best you can do is still *totally vile*. I am never enough, but to illustrate I am saved I better give and give and give and take abuse. That is Jesus love. 

I still have Christian friends, even a minister friend. I see how this religion destroys their marriages, families and lives and how they their minds torment them continuously. And being stressed out all the time you are dying slowly within. Stress kills. Religion kills. It does affect your health. My mother is a prime example. It wasn't me or Satan but her imagination that torments her.  I know she would be happier and have less health issues if she had never met this Jesus. Yet this imaginary Jesus watches this pain she is bringing upon herself and he grins with love in his heart.

 

while it's true that a god could not be proven or disproven, it's another thing saying that the biblical god cannot be disproven. i mean, proof is a very demanding word, but evidence could be brought that shows that the bible (and consequent god) is a fake.
so i want to point these 2 things: one, simply "a" god is not the biblical god. the biblical god comes from the bible, and evidence suggests it's human made; two, proof is pretty impossible, evidence is weaker but actually present. simply search for lexical analysis of the bible on internet.
but any god could not be proven also because of this: if a god presented in front of you, would that be a proof that this god exists? NO! because it's supernatural, may not be proven in any way! this is very important! so every experience you have of supernatural is potentially fake (and it probably is).

this is not sufficient and not univocal. the above two proposition does not explain completely why you believe in christianity and not other religions, so could you tell us why you believe?
could i ask you a little question? it's this: if you were to not believe, it would hurt more you or the relationships you have with other people?

i do not believe that the problem are the inconsistencies, but what you believe good and evil are.
on the other way, you really need to be more coherent with yourself: to say that the world is screwed because we hate god is (probably, just saying, you know...) excessive: are you implying that man cannot better himself? arguing about all the things you say would be very big, but i think it isn't necessary. just in this case, however, you are justifying this affermation (humanity is fucked) with this 'evidence': societies and governments in history always fail (well, i thought you hold this position, i dont remember now exactly everything). well first, this is false, and second it's a non sequitur.

now that it comes to my mind, i don't even understand why you are arguing with us, being that we "cannot grasp" your religion...

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you really do not submit yourself to the rules you apply to others, im sorry to say (not that they are consistent, but this is alredy being discussed).
also, jesus "the savior" ben joseph could absolutely have not existed.
last, i contest the goodness of the biblical god (punishing, hardening hearts, "the challenge" and so on). it would be useful if you submitted the verses you interpret to affirm what you believe.
and as a my jehova's witness friend says, when the time comes you heretic trinitarians will go into non-existance, for god is one, fool!

He even lets the rain sometimes keep pouring into excess, so that much harm, distress, and even death occurs - my house was well above the peak flood level here in Brisbane, Australia, during the floods in January this year, but many were not. Thank you God....

Are you as dumb as Bill O'Reilly - "sun goes up, sun goes down, you can't explain it" - except that the fact that the sun keeps rising requires no divine intervention at all... IOW no thanks to God. 

But apart from that nonsense, the second quote is utterly inconsistent with any meaning of 'tender mercy'. There is no justice in punishing anyone, let alone their whole family, merely for 'rejecting him'. That is the action of a vile, spiteful, and self-obsessed psychopath, not the being being described in the first quote.

It does not make that distinction. That is an invention of people like you trying to explain away such contradictions.

To make things deliberately unclear and confusing, and then punish those who apply logic and reason which then leads then to the logical conclusion that a God as described in the Bible does not and cannot exist is the act of an evil prankster, not of a 'good' God.

Except that a more insightful, honest reading of the Bible does indeed support the idea that the God portrayed does not deserve worship, but may require blind obedience because of his vindictive and hateful nature.

God himself is more wicked than the Babylonians, it is NOT just to punish anyone for the 'sins' of their fathers, let alone slaughter them. 

No matter how many generations some population has offended him, it is still not just to punish anyone for someone else's crime. That is entirely inconsistent with a divine, eternal being who should possess infinite patience, and never be susceptible to fits of temper. If one group has actually 'benefited' from another's actions, that brings into question why are those actions called 'wicked'? That term, in real morality, can only be based on harm being caused to others. If the whole population is involved here, who is being sinned against?

Whatever, even if someone has benefited from the actions of their fathers, which have been assisted by exploiting a third party, that does not justify punishing the son, unless they had the realistic option to consciously refuse such benefit.

Our legal system, despite its faults, is vastly more just than the God of the second quote.

It is not surprising that a collection of writings from multiple writers, recorded over centuries, based on various older myths and stories passed on largely by word of mouth, would, when read together, be quite confusing. This is the nature of such things, the nature of man in his desire for a narrative, an explanation, no matter how contrived.

Your responses to those three examples shows that you will have a way to argue away, to your personal satisfaction, any plain contradictions or inconsistencies by re-interpreting words and referring to 'context', so it would be futile to present any more to you.

Your 'morality' is based on 'might makes right', whatever God does is 'good' by definition, and is not to be questioned. Jawohl, mein Fuhrer! 

As has already been pointed out to you, many different 'Gods' could fit your initial assumptions.

When your basis, the Bible, requires as much interpretation as you resorts to, it can no longer be regarded as a source of knowledge, since there are many ways a text can be interpreted, once you go beyond or below the surface reading, and you have little or no way to justify choosing any particular one, least of all basing your choice on the one that best fits your presuppositions. The 'knowledge' you come away with is as much the product of your fallible human desires and misunderstandings as what is in the words.

 

That's the 'rabbit hole'.

If they can get you in the 'rabbit hole' past the equivocation(s), you can go around in circles endlessly, because it's a circular argument.

 

The 1st equivocation is, that gods are 'necessary'. That our universe couldn't form by any other means.

There is nothing scientific or 'logically', that supports that assumption. Arguments from incredulity and from ignorance are merely playing into a confirmation bias.

The 2nd equivocation is, that life on earth could not have emerged by natural causes, when it's well understood how it can happen purely by natural means.

There is nothing scientific or 'logically', that supports an assumption that life could not form naturally. Arguments from incredulity and from ignorance are merely playing into a confirmation bias.

 

They really don't have any grounds to debate. They never did. Flat earth, sun revolving around the earth, what goes up must come down, etc, etc...

They never had any grounds except arguments from ignorance or incredulity, and 'logic', based on blind assumptions.

They were always ignorant fools, and remain so.

Science and technology will not stop, and are growing in leaps and bounds, in ability, and in sheer number of practitioners of science and technology.

Information is spreading, and the archives are getting larger and larger, and the accessibility is getting faster and faster, and censorship is lessening and lessening.

In order for societies and countries to remain competitive, science and technology must be at the forefront in education.

 

Religions are doomed. They will become an indulgence, like Astrology and Horoscopes.

Theists can still keep trying to breed the next generations of theists, but there's less and less vacuum from reality for their children.

Atheism is at an exponential advantage.

 

I love the rhetoric and hyperbole quote : "When future intellectual historians..."