Great read todangst. i will bookmark this thread for later reference.

    yup, todangst wrote, "So where's the sacrifice?

There is none. "Jesus" sheds something worthless."

... Yes, No sacrifice at all, ... even a kindergardner could realize this, if given the imfo.

Lets focus more on the kids, they are our legacy .... caring is the essence of being. 

Thanks again, todangst

Excellent. 

Jesus did sacrifice something.  He sacrificed his perfection when he took the sins of all the world upon himself, and god turned his back on him when he did.  Where he apparently was during the three days is not really specified, but I think that in order to fully conquer sin and death he had to come back to life.

God turned his back on himself? Sounds painful.

Or are you saying Jesus wasn't God? 

God the father turned his back on god the son.  As far as explaining the trinity, I'm clueless, but that's the best answer I can give.

Great...well, it was fun playing the antagonist while it lasted, but I guess logic just came in and beat the crap out of me.  I'll try to come up with decent answers, but it may take a while.  Thanks for the response aiia.

Ok, I talked with a friend over this and I think I can answer some of these. Jesus took the sins of everyone upon himself, thus he did not sin but he voluntarily became sinful, which was why God the father turned his back on God the son ("My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" ) while he was on the cross. Because Jesus was a perfect being, he was able to pay for our sins, much like a debt. Once the debt was paid by death on the cross, the sins no longer existed, ergo, the imperfection is gone from both Jesus and those who accept him into their lives. Obviously one who is saved will still sin, but these sins have been paid for by Jesus' death on the cross. One last thing, I don't think you're taking the omnipresence of the Biblical God correctly, it's not that he's everywhere like the pantheistic view of "god is in everything, therefore god is everywhere", but that god is always present, always being able to help you. I don't know if this is a good explanation, but this is kind of fun so I figure I'll keep it up.

But just the same, God created man with the capacity for sin, and then man did sin, and then god (through some kind of divine mitosis, I suppose) divided himself in half (?) and manifested himself on earth so that he could sacrifice himself to himself to pay a debt that he himself imposed in order to "clear man's tab" of the sins that he also created and gave man the capacity to commit.

But even so, how do you take sin on yourself without becoming a sinner? Is it possible for me to take sin on myself without becoming a sinner? I'm a man and Jesus was a man. Doesn't it stand to reason that I could do "take sin onto myself", whatever that means?

If God can't look on sin, how does he know it's there? How does he judge it? How does he know that you're a sinner if he's not looking at the sin that you have? How was he able to "look away" without first looking on sin? Clearly he can look on sin, he just doesn't want to or like to. Furthermore, he created it. How can he not look on his own creation? How do you create something without looking on it?

Omnipresent means present at all places at all times simultaneous. It's implied by the prefix "omni-". If the point was just that he was "always present", then they shouldn't say he's "omnipresent", because that's not what it means.

Unless of course they want to contest the dictionary, which is possible, but good luck. 

   ... we really need some "awake" Buddhists in here. We are definitely still in the the DARK AGE ... as a world community of oneness.

 For me the most universal definition of that word "god" just means why, ... but I never took that question as even meaningful, but only as our human condition of cosmic evolution and consciousness, while none of this is a miracle ... just mysterious ...

Jesus became sinful (thus a sinner) on the cross when the sins of the world were put upon him.

Just because he can't accept it doesn't mean it's there.  I think he can look on it, but he can't accept it, which is why he turned his back on Jesus when he was on the cross.

Does the Bible say he created it?  No.  I don't know how to fully explain the existence of evil, but could "God" necessarily be defined as "good" without evil?  I don't think so.  If sin didn't exist, then there would be nothing to compare God to, thus meaning that he is good-less and bad-less because these two qualities don't exist.  In other words, "the shadow proves the sunshine", and vice versa.  Therefore, I think that evil always existed just as God did.  It's the best explanation I can think of.

Again, I don't think this is the true meaning of the original text, but it was the best meaning we have in the English language.

Why must a being be everywhere at all moments to know all?  He just has to see all things to know all things, he doesn't necessarily have to be there. 

God died but God raised Jesus from the dead?

As Dr. Price said (I'm paraphrasing), "Trinitarianism is what comes about when people want to worship God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit but don't want to be called polytheists"  

Jesus (God's son) died in the flesh but not in the spirit, because everyone's spirit is eternal (i.e. beginning but no ending).  It is thought that he went to hell for the three days he was dead in the flesh, but this is theology's best guess.  I don't know if it says specifically that God the father raised Jesus from the dead, I think it says that it just happened like that.  So either Jesus rose himself from the dead or God the father rose Jesus (God the son) from the dead.  Again, I don't know how to explain the trinity.  I know that people have tried to explain it with the egg analogy (the yolk, the white, and the shell) and the three-leaf clover analogy (three leaves, one clover), but these don't really explain how God can separate into three beings and remain 100% God.  I really don't know how to explain the trinity, if it does exist I'd have to guess that humans aren't capable of explaining it with our limited knowledge.

If Jesus became a true sinner, then it was no longer a perfect sacrifice. So why couldn't a normal man have sufficed? 

+ 

If god didn't create evil, then evil must have always existed. If we accept the Christian proposition that in the beginning there was nothing except God, then evil must be a component of God. Even if it is a latent component, this would mean that god was not, in fact, all good. But according to the explanations you've given, it would also make him a contradiction since he wouldn't be able to accept himself.

If evil always existed eternally and was not a component of God, and if god is opposed to evil, then God is not the only eternal thing in the universe, and furthermore it would mean one of the following: 1) He is opposed to evil but cannot stop it; He is not all powerful (something is more powerful or just as powerful as he), 2) He is opposed to evil and is simply unwilling to stop it, then he is not good.

I also think your wrong to say that we need evil to know what is good. And the analogy to light and shadow doesn't work.

Light and shadow are not opposites. There is actually no such thing as shadow/darkness. There is only different intensities of light. Darkness is just the absence of light. It is not a thing in itself the way that light is.

So is evil just the absence of good? Then it couldn't have always existed if god always existed because god makes goodness present. However it could be likely that god cannot be "good enough" for the universe to be non-evil, but that limits his power.

But if good and evil are just two mutually exclusive but different things, then you can easily have one without the other, just as you can still have the color white without the color black. 

Dang. We almost found our way to god, but his true nature was lost in a translation error, dooming millions of skeptical atheists to hell. Sucks when that happens.

So he's not present at all possible places at all possible times, but he's always present?

*looks around the room*

He's not present right now...?

Oh, but he's always present SOMEWHERE.

Well, so are most people. Of course, most people are not eternal, but, hey! Empty space is!

To be completely honest though, it doesn't really matter. You can't believe in something until you know what it is. Christians tend to only name properties of God.

For example:

Believer: I believe in snarfblatts. 

Skeptic: What are snarfblatts?

Believer: Snarfblatts are blue.

Skeptic: Yeah, but what ARE they?

Believer: They're nice and full of love. They care about you.

Skeptic: Yes, BUT WHAT ARE THEY?

Believer: They are infinite!

Skeptic: So.. they're NOT finite? But what ARE they?

Believer: Omnipotent?

Skeptic: So they have power that does NOT have limits. So they're really powerful. Okay, but WHAT THE HELL ARE THEY?!

Believer: I've told you all kinds of things! Pff.. you just don't get it.

(See how it goes?)

Or we could just say that the reason we don't understand it is because it doesn't make sense and leave it at that.

I'm not obligated to believe anything until it makes sense. The rules are not believe first, question later; the rules are quite the reverse.

The cookie crumbleth. 

From the Bible, I don't think we can know what God is. Remember, according to the Bible no one has ever seen God.  We could theorize that he looks just like a human because the Bible says that God created man in his image, but that's as good as it gets.  I don't really think we can give God a physical description because he's not a physical being.  That's my take on it.

I like your take on the existence of evil.  My parents have been trying to convince me that "free will cannot exist without evil", and they've been sidestepping the question of evil's existence for a while now, but your summary helps a ton, thanks.

So god's not perfect anymore?

Did you even bother to think before you spat that bullshit out on my thread?

I can't take you seriously if you don't take yourself seriously.... there's nothing in your 'bible' that would back up 'jesus' losing his 'perfection', the statement itself is empty and meaningless and in the end, it leads to a contradiction.

Now it should be clear to all why I don't post much anymore....

Well fuck, I'm just trying to have some fun here.  I'm obviously not up to par with most of the people here on logic and such, I'm just trying to get there.  Sorry for being the stupid kid, but whatever.

(double post, my bad)

Can't you think and have fun at the same time? What the fuck do you even think it means to 'lose perfection' and about what biblical or logical grounds can you even make the claim?  Your claim tells me that you just rushed to come up with whatever bullshit you could find to quell your doubts...

I write these essays, and the responses I get always tell me the same thing: the person writing the response has no interest in actually reading what I say... I could respond by reposting the original essay...

In fact:

Christians tell us that "jesus' died for us, and that he was a sacrifice.

I have two simple questions for our christian friends:

The first: What did this 'jesus' sacrifice? Is this jesus dead? Don't you hold that this jesus is now in eternal bliss, in heaven, where he receives the undying love and gratitude from a multitude?

Sacrifice means loss. Sacrificing doesn't involve gain. It certainly doesn't involve no loss and infinite gain. Yet this 'jesus' loses nothing, and gains everything.

Some theists respond by saying that he lost his physical body. But what does paul say about the nature of flesh?

"For I know that in me that is in my flesh dwelleth no good thing...." (Rom 7:18) which contradicts: "I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me...." (Gal. 2:20).

"Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption" (1 Cor. 15:50)

So where's the sacrifice?

There is none. "Jesus" sheds something worthless.

Some theists then announce "But he suffered pain!"

But everyday people suffer far worse pain. A child with Leukemia suffers eggregious amounts of pain, without any purpose, without any guarentee of an eternal reward in a blissful afterlife. They die without the hope of 'giving' their lives (and then getting it right back!) to save countless billions of others, without the pleasure of knowing that they are a 'hero' and without the eternal love and accolades that such an act would bring.

So don't insult yourself and logic itself by holding that this 'pain' is a sacrifice.

Some theists then insist that jesus, as an 'infinite being' suffered infinite pain.

But this is nonsense. Leaving aside the problems with an 'infinite being' for the sake of argument, for an infinite being to suffer 'infinite' pain, the being would need to suffer infinite harm. Infinite loss. But again, there is no loss, and the pain is finite.

So none of these responses work, or even make sense.

For those who still don't get it:

Remember that It makes no sense to state that something is a sacrifice when

1) there was no loss, and

2) the gain for the behavior was infinite.

Here's the ultimate irony: every person in the world suffers more than Jesus!

Jesus could not suffer even as much as a normal person:

Here is why:

1) He knows he's not really going to die in the first place
Mark 8:34 Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: "If
anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and
follow me.
2) He knows that he will be loved and adored for his act
3) He knows he will save billions of souls with his act.
4) He knows his reward is infinitity in bliss.
5) He knows he will not lose anything, ergo, no sacrifice.

This is not a 'sacrifice' therefore, at all. In fact, its the biggest, best deal in the world, and I challenge a theist to respond as to whether they would go on the cross. I've never seen a theist dare respond at all.

So why do theists call this a 'sacrifice'? Because they don't bother to think it through. It takes compartmentalization. You have to forget that millions die every day in doubt, for no reason. That's the real pain in the world. A child dies of starvation, with no reason, no reward, nothing. A cancer patient watches his body whither away, in pain. He's not getting any reward, any recognition, no assurance that he will go to some heaven. He just faces death without any comfort.

How many people in the world have sacrificed real blood for others? A mother or a father dies to save their own child - no reward, no assurances. They just do it.

Every day, every person suffers more pain than this supposed savior could ever have suffered "for us". We all live in doubt, we all suffer pains. We do it because we must. Some of us even give more - we sacrifice our time, our blood, even our lives, for others.

No rewards. No guarentees.

A solidier gives up his life for his country. What reward does he get? A ribbon nailed to a wall somewhere, his name recorded in an unseen history book.

Now for my second question: If you were offered the opportunity to go on the cross, to save billions and also go to heaven in eternal bliss, would you go?

Before you answer:

Don't rush to find a way to sweep the cognitive dissonance away. Instead, think the question through,about it like this: imagine your child is about to be burned alive forever. And someone says to you: you can save him if you agree to go on the cross for three hours. In return, you not only save your own child, you save all children in the world. In addition, you are remembered and loved by billions. Oh, and one more thing: you go directly to heaven, in eternal bliss (after a three day tour of hell, all expenses paid!)

Would you refuse? Would ANYONE refuse? Seriously. There can be no greater gift in the world than to be offered the opportunity.

Again, I challenge a theist to answer the question: Would you go on the cross?

If you are a theist, about to respond to this by arguing that you couldn't go on the cross, please look up the word 'hypothetical' in a dictionary.

I'm on the losing side you know.  All I want to do is make sure that my theist friends have no way out of it, no paths to get out.  By "losing perfection", I mean that Jesus, when he took the sins of the world upon him (however that happened), became sinful, thus he was no longer perfect.  Of course, this does mean that God is no longer perfect, meaning that either way they lose.  I hate to say this, but did you really expect anything better in terms of answers to your post?  There aren't really any ways out of this one.

No, I wouldn't.
I started to read your article, but it was all just unfounded.  You are taking one scripture out of context to defend your argument.  Christ came in flesh, but he did not satisfy it's lusts.  He was all God and all Man.  He emptied himself of his power, but he was still God.  He was separated from the father, (Trinity).  I could go on.  This is all simple doctrine that you aught to know if you're going to try and disprove it.  If you don't argue within the confines of the doctrine, what good is your argument?  How many of you would like for me to rip evolution apart with no evidence?  You've done the same.

So what did he sacrifice?  You still leave the ultimate question unanswered.  So God emptied himself of his power...hmm, so are you a monotheist or a polytheist?  Because from the monotheist view that Christians take, this means that god is no longer omnipotent, meaning that he's not really god anymore.   But even if he somehow did retain his god-ness, he got his power right back three days later, ergo no sacrifice once again.  I fail to see your point, and unfortunately you're starting to look like a troll from the beginning.  If you want to debate evolution, go duke it out with deludedgod, I can assure you that you won't be winning.

 Ways Jesus made sacrifice...

1. He gave up his Deity to become man.

2. He who is the sovereign ruler of the universe became a servant to poor men.

4. He was not rightly received as king of Israel, though that is what he was. 

5. He was killed a brutal death that he did not deserve.

6. He who knew no sin became sin.  If you understand how God feels about sin then you understand that no amount of glory received from the cross is worth knowing sin for God.

 7. He spent three days that way.

Your asking how Jesus made sacrifices and regardless of pragmatics they were all sacrifices.  You could give up a great job to be closer to your family.  Even if you made  the choice that would ultimately make you happier, you did sacrifice the job you wanted, that would have brought you happiness.

The real problem with the question in my view is your definition of what it means for Jesus to sacrifice.  I take it not as he made a sacrifice, but that he literally became a sacrifice.  He offered himself as the sin offering required by the law.  I think C.S. Lewis did a good job illustrating the requirements of the law in "The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe."  Paul said, "[salvation is by grace], not of works, lest anyman should boast." 

I think the very problem with man eating the apple is that he wanted to bring glory to himself (You will be like God).  God wants to save man, but the only way to do it is by offering himself, since the problem to start is man exalting himself, how can man be saved outside of what Jesus did?  There is no other doctrinal explanation.

and again, no i wouldnt choose the cross.  What Jesus did is like you taking off your clothes and giving them to a homeless person who might not thank you at all, then dying out in the cold night.  you cannot really compare it to your own children, because we werent his children, we were his enemies. 

If you had actually bothered to read the whole article, you would realize every issue you're raising is already answered in it. If you're raising objections without having read the whole article, that is ... unfounded.

You previously said jesus "was all God and all Man." If he "gave up his deity", was he still "all God and all Man"? And if he got back "his deity" after 3 days, what is the sacrifice?

And if he became "sovereign ruler of the universe" again after 3 days, what is the sacrifice? If a company CEO puts on a janitor's uniform for 3 days and then goes back to his corporate office, who cares?

But isn't that what was supposed to happen? If he was "rightly received", there couldn't have been a "sacrifice", correct?

And then he was unkilled 3 days later, and given a bonus shot of glory. What is the sacrifice?

So given that you clearly understand "how god feels about sin", would you not go on the cross to save humanity?

And then he spends eternity in glory. To calculate the net sacrifice, subtract 3 from infinity.

And then get your job back after 3 days. How tedious you are.

And then coming back to life 3 days later, and getting decked out with an even better wardrobe than you had before.

You are deliberately ignoring the obvious contradiction here, which todangst clearly laid out. If you intend to respond, please don't bother with any more worthless analogies. Deal simply with the basic, straightforward fact that any loss you incur which is recouped 3 days later is not a sacrifice, particularly when your own happiness and everyone else's happiness is increased in the process.

If you truly wish to refute the OP, provide a game theory model where choosing the cross would not be in the subject's own interest. Forgive me if I don't think you're equal to the task.

And yet... he's still a deity?  Nope, no sacrifice there.

And yet he's still the ruler of the universe? No sacrifice here.

Number 3 has been stolen!

How is that a sacrifice?

People often mistake me for being years younger than I actually am. Am I making a sacrifice every time that happens?

What's the sacrifice? He sacrificed everyone calling him king and giving him slaps on the back and thumbs-up wherever he went?

He still gets those from the Christians, so where's the sacrifice?

Yes, but he's "still alive" so he didn't really die, did he? His heart and brain activity may have stopped (this is to say nothing of the brain and tissue damage that would have resulted) but he is still alive. So he's not dead. So he didn't die. So there was no sacrifice. He basically just got a really severe ass-kicking that he didn't deserve.

But, actually, he was kind of prick to authorities, so whether or not it was justified, he provoked it.

So if Jesus became sin and "died", then how is there still sin? Isn't Jesus still sin? When did he stop becoming sin? Did his "sacrifice" end when he stopped being sin? Isn't it that he didn't get rid of sin altogether, but he only made it so that God could now forgive us for sin, whereas before he apparently couldn't?

Still don't see a sacrifice anywhere. 

He sacrificed three days out of an eternity of immortal existence? Whew... that's gotta be rough. 

Still don't see how they were.

But if you were only giving it up to spend a few weeks with your family, but all the while knew that you would soon be going back, it's not really a sacrifice is it? It's just a vacation.

Not if you didn't actually sacrifice it, as discussed above.

So... all of a sudden you're saying that he wasn't making a sacrifice after all?

What happened to the first half of this post?

Okay, well if Jesus was the sacrifice and wasn't making one (ignoring the fact that you've already argued that he was and now seem to be expressing reservations on that), he would have had to be a sacrifice TO SOMEONE.

So whose sacrifice was Jesus? God's? Jesus is still around isn't he? So he gave him up?

Who required the law? God? Why couldn't he just forgive sin without sacrificing himself to himself?

Unless, of course, the law was above god, in which case god is not absolute.

You can't have this make sense, because it doesn't. Kudos for haning in there though. 

This doesn't solve the problem.

Paul is related to TLTWTW how?

It was a fig.

It was also God's fault. He just didn't bother to admit it. For more on this, see the Adam and Eve topic that already exists on this forum.

Also, Adam and Eve is not an original story. Eden and the man and woman that lived there all exist in the epic of gilgamesh which preceeds the bible and which wasn't about the christian god.

I know! Weird! 

God could say, "Hey, guys, I forgive you." I mean, if he's an all powerful being, that could do just fine.

Making us feel guilty about not being thankful for a "sacrifice" (purposefully quoted) is so much more effective at keeping people in line though.

No, it wouldn't be the same, because Jesus didn't actually die.

As always, this stuff only makes sense if you already believe it. 

Ok, I can see your point here, Jesus didn't sacrifice something, he was the sacrifice, much like the animals in the old testament.  But there is a flaw...he's still alive.  He didn't fully die, he shed his worthless human flesh and still lives.  Ergo, he wasn't really a sacrifice.

But we are all made by God in his image...

You're almost there MJD.  You've got the sacrifice part half-right.  I think I can explain it in more detail though, I've been thinking about this problem for a while now - My conclusion?  Like the post says, Jesus didn’t sacrifice anything.  It’s because he was the sacrifice.  Now, we ask, isn’t Jesus still alive in heaven?  Doesn’t this mean that he wasn’t a sacrifice, I mean, he’s still alive!  But no…the sacrifice required the death of a human being for our sins, not the death of a deity.  But the human had to be perfect, thus invalidating all of us.  So - the solution?  God had to come down and live as a human being.  Therefore, we have a perfect human being.  He was the sacrifice, his human body was the sacrifice, not his spirit.  Perhaps it is that the human being, not the spirit, took the sins of the world upon himself, thus becoming sinful, and retaining the perfection of the deity.  He died and rose again on the third day.  Where he was during this time is not specified, though some speculation holds that he was in hell during this time.  Again, maybe I’m being irrational, if so, tell me.  But this is the best I can do, if anyone else has something to add feel free.

Then who offered jesus as a sacrifice?  And to whom was the sacrifice offered? 

A human being had to die, but the human being had to be perfect.  So the sacrifice had to be a contradiction in terms.  god had to create a 'perfect human being' to satisfy the conditions that he himself made.

 Perhaps it's just a really bad story, and there's no point in trying to make sense of it.

Yes.  Very.

Jesus offered himself as a sacrifice as payment for the sins of the world.  The sacrifice was offered to God, since God needed payment for the sins of the world.

Yes, in essence, God played by His own rules.  I don't know why that is, but that's how He did it.

Perhaps, or perhaps it's a story of redemption for mankind.  It's up to you to choose to believe it or not.

Edison, I think you got a lot of it right.  I haven't done a ton of thinking on it, but we have to realize that the one requirement for Hebraic sacrifice is blood shed.  Albeit, this is undeniably resulting in death, we must consider the scape goat, which symbolically carries the sins of the people off into the wilderness.  This is not unlike Christ who lives on and (I'm not sure if this is hersey), but he continues to carry our sins with him.
My question is this.  The basis for your original question was entirely faulty.  Yet, when corrected, you turned around and used the same circular logic.  Are you guys just trying to play "Stump the Christian?"    
Christians are only here, because we enjoy the debate and want to defend our faith, but if we used tactics like that I think you guys would jump on us for it fast.  I'm sorry if I'm wrong, that's just the vibe I get.

I don't think he still carries on our sins.  He is part of the trinity of God, so if he still carried our sins this would mean that God is imperfect.  When he rose again the burden of sin left him, and thus he is still perfect in heaven today.  That's the way I see it at least, feel free to criticize if you think I'm wrong.

i don’t understand some of the counter arguments that are being given here. it seems as though people are saying that jesus’ “sacrifice” was not a sacrifice in the meaning of suffering an intentional loss or giving up something but instead “sacrifice” means a ritualistic killing to satiate your gods’ blood lust. am i reading this correctly? and if that is correct then doesn’t the second kind of sacrifice involve the first kind?

I don't have all the answers, but consider this: God did not create the universe (and us) for our pleasure. He created it for His own, and to increase His own glory.

1. Everyone deserves Hell (repeated for my point, not to preach

2. God made a way for some to be saved.

So, those who go to Hell glorify God in His justice and reveal His perfect wrath with sin. Those who are saved glorify His mercy (withheld punishment) and grace (unearned goodness).

Amen! Oops, wrong forum

What we are saying is indeed that Jesus was the sacrifice, his human death was the payment for sins, just as the animal death in the Old Testament was the payment for the sins of the Israelites.  And yes, this had to be done to pay for the sins of all people.  Sure he suffered when Jesus was sacrificed, he had his flesh literally ripped off even before he hung on the cross.  But his suffering and pain wasn't a sacrifice by him, he was the sacrifice.

Nope.  I said his human body died.

Nope.  The analogy is between Jesus and the lamb .  Just as lambs were sacrificed in the old testament for sins, Jesus was sacrificed for the sins of everyone on this planet.

Nope.  Jesus suffered in his human body.

I'm talking historically, when he was whipped with the cat of nine tails by the Roman soliders.  It had nine ropes that were attatched to a handle.  The ropes had sharp pieces of rock and bone in them, when whipped with a cat of nine tails one's flesh is literally ripped off the back.

Nope.  I don't take any.  Jesus paid the price for my sins so I don't have to.

ok, so we are talking about the second kind of sacrifice. the ritualistic murder variety. but doesn't that kind of sacrifice have to involve the other kind of sacrifice? the suffering an intentional loss variety. otherwise it's just a sham isn't it?

like in ancient times when people would throw a virgin into a volcano and they would say "oh we're sacrificing this girl". but it was always a girl that nobody really wanted anyway. i mean nobody was lining up to throw the sluts in there. it wasn't an actual sacrifice because they didn't give up anything important.

so it is a pertinent question. what was sacrificed that made the sacrificial ritual an actual sacrifice?  

Good question, I like the line of thought here.  What was sacrificed that made this important was that it was a perfect human being, God the Son in the flesh.  To compare it to your analogy, saying "oh we're sacrificing this girl" would be comparable to sacrificing an imperfect human, even if it was one who gave their time and effort tirelessly to others, like Mother Teresa.  Jesus, though, was the perfect sacrifice, having never sinned and being God.

God, being allegedly omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient (to put it concisely: being "perfect&quot should not require ANYTHING. There is no way to interpret God's "needing" something in any other way than a capricious whim.

Unless of course you want to express some reservation about God's absolute perfection.

Hmmm.... Hmmm.....

Unexplainable god incapable of being understood by feeble man did it in an unexplainable way incapable of being understood by feeble man for unexplainable reasons that cannot be understood by feeble man. By I still know that it was definitely god and he definitely did it!

Do you know or don't you? The quoted text is a faith statement. (And I, unlike theists, don't consider faith a virtue).

I know. That's why I don't.

In that case, I'm not a sinner and never can be, but Jesus is the most sinful being next to Satan! Crazy! o_O

I personally like to play "Hey, look, Christians! Your beliefs are nonsensical and self-contradicting!"

If you try to make sense of it, that's your own game. There's not much point though, since it's an exercise in futility.

First, faith can't be defended. It's completely useless other than functioning as a cop out.

Second, tactics like what? Using logic and pointing out silly fallacies? If you think atheistic reasoning (which is just plain old reasoning itself) is flawed, then feel free to point out what flaws you see.

Oh, okay, so Jesus doesn't have our sins after all, so we can continue to be sinners, so his "sacrifice" didn't really forgive all sins.

Here's some help: According to my Christian upbringing, he didn't die to forgive all sins, he died so that sins could become forgivable.

But like I said, there is no reason why a perfect being would require such a thing other than mere capricious whim.

Oh, so god wasn't infinitely glorious to start with? If he's capable of such "improvement", then how could he have been perfect from the start? Oops!

And if he was perfect from the start, there would have been no reason for him to improve and there would be nothing for him to need, so there would be no good reason for him to create anything. Oops!

No they don't. The reasoning behind this is extremely long to explain. I'll try and be brief and probably won't cover it all. This will be somewhat long, so prepare yourself.

First, what purpose does the punishment of hell serve? When humans employ punishment, they tend to do it for three reasons.

1. To deter others from doing the act (e.g. prisons).

2. To discourage the act from being repeated (i.e. to rehabilitate to the offender).

3. Revenge.

1. Deterrence: Hell cannot be said to deter others from committing the crime since not everyone believes in Hell and not everyone is a Christian. It only deters people who already believe in Christianity (Hell), so it fails miserably as a means to deter people from crimes and immoral behavior. Thus, Hell punishes people for its own shortcomings as a deterrant.

Hell fails even further as a deterrant due to the fact that no one alive who is capable of sin can ever see Hell. Consider this parallel: a murderer is frequently convicted of acts of homocide of which he is unquestionably guilty. He knows it, the prosecutors know it, and the court knows it; but instead of sentencing the man to serve any number of years, the judge simply says "If you don't stop killing people, you're going to go to prison. Court adjurned." The murderer will never stop because he continually finds that it is an empty threat. Even if the judge DOES plan to eventually charge the murderer (let's say, after the 100th person he kills---a sort of celebratory punishment), it is still not an effective deterrent.

2. Rehabilitation

Hell is an eternal punishment. No matter how much you change when you're there, there is no hope of escape. Hell does not offer probation. If hell DID offer probation, I'm sure that Jesus would have (literally!) a hell of a lot more followers.

If we continue with the example of the murderer from before, suppose that God sentenced him to ten million years in Hell---that's ten million years of unfathomable torment, mind you---for his crimes. Once that ten million years was over, since the murderer had received a little taste (little in relation to eternity) of supreme punishment, I'm positive he would be much more well-behaved.

But no. He's there FOREVER.

As the gate reads: "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here."

3. Revenge.

Yes. Revenge. Vengeance. Sheer vindictiveness. If not, then perhaps sheer sadistic bloodlust? If it's clearly not to deter or to rehabilitate, what else could Hell be?

And what about the assertion that Hell is a deserved punishment? A fair punishment? HA!

Supposedly, all sins are equal in the sight of God. Let's look at a popular "sin", such as premarital sex. Some guy--we'll call him "George"---has premarital sex one time. Then he dies of a heart attack while not believing in the Christian God. He is damned to eternity in Hell. Is this fair?

Suppose the punishment for sin was that the righteous are allowed into heaven while the sinners simply die and cease to exist. That seems fair, doesn't it?

Suppose the punishment for sin was simply to separate the righteous from the sinners by putting the righteous over here (in area A) while putting the sinners over here (in area B). This is possible without building unfathomable torment in area B. Much like Dante's Limbo or the Classical Greek Hades, it might just be a really crowded and incredibly boring place! (okay, so Dante's Limbo wasn't crowded, but they were both realms of emptiness, boredom, and meaninglessness).

Nope, neither one of these were viable options for God. Nothing is good enough for his sinners except for ETERNAL TORTURE! MWAHAHAHA! (okay, I added the laugh. But isn't it appropriate by now?)

Is the torture fair? Well, let's see.

Suppose, for his one crime of passion, George is sentenced to 50 years of unfathomable torture. Wow! That sure would get the point across to George, wouldn't it?

No?

Okay, for his one crime of passion, we'll sentence George to 100 years of unfathomable torture! Whew! THAT'LL teach him!

Hmm... no? Okay then...

Let's make it 500 years!

Still not good enough?

1,000 years? Not good enough for God! George's lust must be thoroughly punished! Let's crank it up a notch!

10,000 years of unfathomable torture!

Hm... nope... that's just not cutting it. God must have more.

1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 years of absolutely unfathomable torture for George's one crime of passion.

According to God's plan, that's not even close to good enough! It's not even the minutest fraction of what God has in store for our poor young George.

If we consider the murderer, obviously most people would prefer his punishment be longer, but THAT long? Surely the guy will rehabilitate after so many thousands of years, right? I mean holy crap, man!

Now consider that a person can go to Hell for NO CRIME other than failing to believe in God. Suppose you never hear about him? (some don't). Suppose you were raised by a Muslim family and didn't know any better? (I suppose God would say they were "tricked&quot.

Eternal unfathomable torture without any hope of probation or making up for your mistakes? For that?

And how long is the human life span?

Eternal torment for sins committed with a span of... oh... 75 years tops. TOPS!

WHAT IN THE HELL?!?!

You cannot possibly say that Hell is a just and deserved punishment with a straight face. There is absolutely no way to see it that way.

Why would he need to do that? If he was perfect, he would require no help of any kind. By suggesting that he was incapable of forgiving sin without this "sacrifice" is to concede that he did not have the power to do so. He therefore ceases to be all-powerful and, hence, he is not perfect.

Unless, of course, he just did it because he likes blood. (Given the observations of Hell we've made above, it seems quite likely). But considering that Jesus is apparently one third of the Godhead, isn't that kind of like masochism as well? Doesn't Christianity frown on that? (Okay, so the masochism was a cheap shot, but a fair observation, I think).

Entire statement thoroughly discredited per above responses.

You'll burn on the Zoroastrian judgment day for that. 

But sacrifices in the old testament were made with the hope of achieving earthly rewards (good crops, many sons, protection from danger, etc) while the new testament shifts the focus to transcendent rewards.

So in that sense the two sacrifices are not the same.

And again, Jesus didn't really die, so it wasn't a sacrifice.

"Oh, but his physical body died."

Yeah, but that was like a burden to him anyway, wasn't it? Why would he care? That surely helped him more than it hurt him, if we accept the Christian belief about the differences between God and man. 

Unless, of course, you die before praying for forgiveness. Then you still have to. So I guess Jesus only kind sorta half saved humanity from their sins. Oh well. Good try, Jesus. 

so the thing that was given up was the existence of a perfect person in the world? this still is not a sacrifice by jesus because jesus is still perfect. he didn't lose something.

if i go by your reasoning here neither jesus nor god sacrificed anything. the only people who seem to be losing anything in this situation are the ones that knew jesus and that still isn't a sacrifice because they didn't give him up willingly and even if they had that would mean that god owed them not the other way around.  

so why do we owe jesus a debt of gratitude if he didn't give up anything? why do you want to worship something that requires blood payment? why don't you just say god wants to burn you and jesus wants to protect you (a kind of good cop bad cop scenario because they are actually working in tandem)? isn't worship a form of sacrifice? i mean you are sacrificing your time and energy when you could be doing other things. if you're making a sacrifice and jesus is not then doesn't he owe you a debt of gratitude? and if your god wants to forgive people (i'm not even certain what people need forgiveness for) then why not just do it without someone being brutally killed?

Jesus the human died.  Again, the requirement wasn't for the death of a deity, it was for the death of a perfect human being.

The lamb was symbolic of Jesus, just as lambs were sacrificed for the people's sins Jesus was sacrificed for everyone's sins.

Isaiah 53:7  "He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth."

John 1:29 "The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world."

1 Peter 1:19 "But with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot."

Yes, he felt physical pain.  How hard is it for you to believe that?

Matthew 27:26 "Then released he Barabbas unto them: and when he had scourged Jesus, he delivered him to be crucified."

Mark 15:15 "And so Pilate, willing to content the people, released Barabbas unto them, and delivered Jesus, when he had scourged him, to be crucified."

John 19:1 "Then Pilate therefore took Jesus, and scourged him."

No, I really don't know.  I know you're going to pound this point into me, but I don't know why God did it that way.  I'm a mere mortal, I can't explain it.

His death paid the price for all our sins, past, present, and future.  However, he wants you to accept his free gift of salvation.  He's not giving you a free ride to heaven because then we could just live our lives any way we wanted, we could even then all run around on the streets killing one another all day (and even disbelieve him!) and still go to heaven.  He doesn't want that, he wants you to believe in him and to glorify him with your life.

The sacrifices in the OT were made for forgiveness of sins, not good luck. Again, Jesus the human died, he's no longer around.  And again, he didn't sacrifice anything, he was the sacrifice.

He still died for the sins of all.  See my point above about why you need to accept his free gift of salvation to get to heaven.

Nothing was "given up".  Jesus the human offered himself as a sacrifice to God for the sins of humanity.  Again, he didn't sacrifice something for our sins, he was the perfect flesh sacrifice offered to God.  No one "lost" anything here, Jesus the human had to die to be an offering for our sins.  Remember, the death of a perfect human was required, not the death of a deity.

Well that was long...I feel like I'm repeating myself over and over.  I think we've discussed this through and through, but if anyone has anything to add or criticize me for feel free.

Why make it necessary for something/someone to die at all? Is God just a freak for seeing blood gush out?

Doesn't make him that much better than the god Molech that the Bible considered so abhorrent.

then again, altruistic sacrifice is a great plot device to make a character into a hero. 

Is this god entertaining itself by torturing its creations like an evil demented immature child setting dogs and cats on fire?