Seems pretty repetative to me, but alot of points are made, so I thought I'd post it for discussion sake.


A Letter To Christians
by Dan Barker
http://www.ffrf.org/bybarker.html

Dear Believer,

— You asked me to consider Christianity as the answer for my life. I have done that. I consider it untrue, repugnant, and harmful.

You expect me to believe Jesus was born of a virgin impregnated by a ghost? Do you believe all the crazy tales of ancient religions? Julius Caesar was reportedly born of a virgin; Roman historian Seutonius said Augustus bodily rose to heaven when he died; and Buddha was supposedly born speaking. You don’t believe all that, do you? Why do you expect me to swallow the fables of Christianity?

I find it incredible that you ask me to believe that the earth was created in six literal days;
women come from a man’s rib;
a snake, a donkey, and a burning bush spoke human language;
the entire world was flooded, covering the mountains to drown evil;
all animal species, millions of them, rode on one boat;
language variations stem from the tower of Babel;
Moses had a magic wand;
the Nile turned to blood;
a stick turned into a snake;
witches, wizards, and sorcerers really exist;
food rained from the sky for 40 years;
people were cured by the sight of a brass serpent;
the sun stood still to help Joshua win a battle, and it went backward for King Hezekiah;
men survived unaided in a fiery furnace;
a detached hand floated in the air and wrote on a wall;
men followed a star which directed them to a particular house;
Jesus walked on water unaided;
fish and bread magically multiplied to feed the hungry;
water instantly turned into wine;
mental illness is caused by demons;
a “devil” with wings exists who causes evil;
people were healed by stepping into a pool agitated by angels;
disembodied voiced spoke from the sky;
Jesus vanished and later materialized from thin air;
people were healed by Peter’s shadow;
angels broke people out of jail;
a fiery lake of eternal torment awaits unbelievers under the earth ... while there is life-after-death in a city which is 1,500 miles cubed, with mansions and food, for Christians only.

If you believe these stories, then you are the one with the problem, not me. These myths violate natural law, contradict science, and fail to correspond with reality or logic. If you can’t see that, then you can’t separate truth from fantasy. It doesn’t matter how many people accept delusions inflicted by “holy” men; a widely held lie is still a lie. If you are so gullible, then you are like the child who believes the older brother who says there is a monster in the hallway. But there is nothing to be afraid of; go turn on the light and look for yourself.

If Christianity were simply untrue I would not be too concerned. Santa is untrue, but it is a harmless myth which people outgrow. But Christianity, besides being false, is also abhorrent. It amazes me that you claim to love the god of the bible, a hateful, arrogant, sexist, cruel being who can’t tolerate criticism. I would not want to live in the same neighborhood with such a creature!

The biblical god is a macho male warrior.
Though he said “Thou shalt not kill,” he ordered death for all opposition, wholesale drowning and mass exterminations;
punishes offspring to the fourth generation (Ex. 20:5);
ordered pregnant women and children to be ripped up (Hos. 13:16);
demands animal and human blood to appease his angry vanity;
is partial to one race of people;
judges women to be inferior to men;
is a sadist who created a hell to torture unbelievers;
created evil (Is. 45:7);
discriminated against the handicapped (Lev. 21:18-23);
ordered virgins to be kept as spoils of war (Num. 31:15-18, Deut. 21:11-14);
spread dung on people’s faces (Mal. 2:3);
sent bears to devour 42 children who teased a prophet (II Kings 2:23-24);
punishes people with snakes, dogs, dragons, drunkenness, swords, arrows, axes, fire, famine, and infanticide;
and said fathers should eat their sons (Ez. 5:10).

Is that nice? Would you want to live next door to such a person?

And Jesus is a chip off the old block.
He said, “I and my father are one,” and he upheld “every jot and tittle” of the Old Testament law. Mt. 5:18
He preached the same old judgment: vengeance and death, wrath and distress, hell and torture for all nonconformists.
He believed in demons, angels and spirits.
He never denounced the subjugation of slaves or women. Women were excluded as disciples and as guests at his heavenly table.
Except for hell he introduced nothing new to ethics or philosophy.
He was disrespectful of his mother and brothers;
he said we should hate our parents and desert our families. Mt. 10:35-36, Lk. 14:26 (So much for “Christian family life.”)
He denounced anger, but was often angry himself. Mt. 5:22, Mk. 3:5
He called people “fools” (Mt. 23:17,19), “serpents,” and “white sepulchers,” though he warned that such language puts you in danger of hellfire. Mt. 5:22
He said “Think not that I am come to send peace on earth. I came not to send peace, but a sword." Mt. 10:34 (So much for “Peace on Earth.”)
He irrationally cursed and withered a fig tree for being barren out of season. Mt. 21:19
He mandated burning unbelievers. Jn. 15:6 (The Church has complied with relish.)
He stole a horse. Lk. 19:30-33
He told people to cut off hands, feet, eyes and sexual organs. Mt. 5:29-30, 19:12

You want me to accept Jesus, but I think I’ll pick my own friend, thank you.

One of Jesus’ many contradictions was saying good works should be seen, and not seen. Mt. 5:16, 6:1-4 One of his mistakes was saying that the mustard plant has the smallest seed. Mt. 13:31-32 The writers of Matthew and Luke could not even get his genealogy straight, contradicting the Old Testament, and giving Jesus two discrepant lines through Joseph, his non-father!

I also find Christianity to be morally repugnant. The concepts of original sin, depravity, substitutionary forgiveness, intolerance, eternal punishment, and humble worship are all beneath the dignity of intelligent human beings and conflict with the values of kindness and reason. They are barbaric ideas for primitive cultures cowering in fear and ignorance.

Finally, Christianity is harmful. More people have been killed in the name of a god than for any other reason. The Church has a shameful, bloody history of Crusades, Inquisitions, witch-burnings, heresy trials, American colonial intolerance, disrespect of indigenous traditions (such as American Indians), support of slavery, and oppression of women. Modern “fruits” of religion include the Jonestown massacre, the callous fraud of “faith healers,” recent wars and ethnic cleansing, and fighting in Northern Ireland. Religion also poses a danger to mental health, damaging self-respect, personal responsibility, and clarity of thought.

Do you see why I do not respect the biblical message? It is an insulting bag of nonsense. You have every right to torment yourself with such insanity — but leave me out of it. I have better things to do with my life.

interesting. it really is. well first of all you have to realize the bible uses alot of symbolism (ex. Revelation). but as for all the other stuff. its been said that god dosent peform the "miracles" and all the other crazy myths mentioned. because no matter what people still refused to believe in him. I mean even after the parting of the Red Sea and the freeing of the hebrews people still denied that there was a supreme being. People asked for proof of a God and when they got it they still denied it and made excuses for what they had seen or experienced. im not in the mood to go through the stories but ill post some later. I guess one example off the top of my head would be with moses and pharoah. after he suffered through the plagues he still found ways to justify what he had been through. I think that most of the people bashing the Bible and Religon in general are just way to Proud of themselves. They need a way to feel rebelious so they like to bash others beliefs. If you dont believe in God,the bible, whatever. Great. But you dont need to try and convince everyone else theyre wrong cuz it more than likely wont happen. thats just my 2 cents and a biscut.


"Youre lucky that 100 shot of nos didnt blow the welds on your intake"
-Vin Diesel

Word to dan barker, not all Christians take the Bible as a LITERAL interpetation.

Free will. You choose. God Bless!


Smile, Jesus loves you!!!!! <><
Manchild-ProPain, out now, Sphereofhiphop.com

15 million people were killed in WWI, a war against a spoiled child monarch. Not for God.

9 million people were killed in the Russian revolution. Communist driven. Not for God.

Stalin killed a further 20 million out of pure fear, not for God.

55 million people were killed during WWII (40 million in Europe alone). That was not in the name of God.

2.5 million were killed during the Chinese revolution. Not for God.

Chairman Mao killed a further 40 million. Many were simply starved to death, after all, they might not of liked his form of communism. Once again, not for God.

source

You show me were more people have been killed for God than any other cause.. It seems to me that Facism and Communism have a big lead on the death toll race. Maybe, just maybe, there have been more wars in the name of God than anything else, but no crusade whent into battle with tanks, 3000 lb bombs (and later a couple nukes), or jet aircraft launched from floating cities the Navy calls "carriers".

Your argument is full of half truths, lies, and miscomceptions.

Mary Magdeline was a deciple, as told to me by a Catholic preist. So there's one right there. Women were not excluded from that role.

The Bible does not say that the Earth was created in six calendar days, it says it was created in six periods of light that were seperated by darkness.

Some of your arguement is a mere mockery and does not even take the subject seriously, and the rest is half truth and deception. I can only think that some of it is yours and the rest lifted from somewhere else.

I won't bother arguing with you if you don't take it seriously but I will ask this. Why did you post this? Is something inside you hoping that you CAN be convinced of the valitity of Christianity or was it simply to stir the pot at the expense of some people who are only trying to do what they feel is right and to enjoy life. Do you have a problem with people trying to be good and enjoy life?

Christ tought that we are all sinners, yuppers he did. I have no idea what you mean by "substitutionary forgiveness", but he did teach forgiveness and understanding wich translates to tolerance.

It seems to me that you have never really heard the message of Christianity and are really in no position to argue about it. Besides, like I asked before, what is your real purpose? What do you seek?

PAX

Here's a something that keeps the JW's away most of the time that should have been added to that letter.

If god is infinite, where is there room for evil? By having evil present, that makes god finite, which negates what the bible states. Therefore, god spoke false truth by saying that he is infinite.

Don't believe that statement? If you believe god is omniscient, allow me to direct you to Webster's Dictionary:

Main Entry: omniscient
Part of Speech: adjective
Definition: all-knowing
Synonyms: all-seeing, almighty, infinite, knowledgeable, pansophical, pre-eminent, wise

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--Note: as an Athiest, I do not believe in god or the bible. Therefore I will not treat them with the proper christian grammatics.

Kardain wrote:Here's a something that keeps the JW's away most of the time that should have been added to that letter.

If god is infinite, where is there room for evil? By having evil present, that makes god finite, which negates what the bible states. Therefore, god spoke false truth by saying that he is infinite.

Don't believe that statement? If you believe god is omniscient, allow me to direct you to Webster's Dictionary:

I'm a little confused. Infinite and omniscient are not the same word. For that matter, the existance of one thing doesn't mean another cannot be infinite.



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In order for something to be infinite, there cannot be a termination point. By having such, it creates a finite limit, negating the possibility of infinite.

By definition, infinite is having no boundaries or limits. Where would one place the boundary or limit on the good to make space for the evil?

Therefore, the christian hell cannot exist, as it would negate the infinite presence of the god. Also therefore, god cannot exist. Good must equal evil, evil equals zero since good is infinate, therefore good equals zero, therefore the christian god does not exist.

Christianity has people lead to believe that their god is omniscient. Infinite is one of the definitions of omniscience.

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First off, you are trying to assign human terms (derrived from the human perspective of existance) to a power that is unfathomable to any of us.

Second off, nobody said God is infinately good, only that God is infinite. The teaching also says God is the beginnig and the end, we all assume that refers to our existance, but it's not clear. If you believe in "simultaneous causation" then God has a beginning but it is immesurable because it happened before time. I think the term infinite is assigned because God transends time (as the creator of all things, God also created time itself, and therefore exits outside of time) and pre-exists existance itself.

Do not try to oversimplify the existance of a being that is said to have created absolutely everything. All space, all matter, and time itself. There will be more but as physical beings we can only experience 4 dimentions.

If existance is finite (suggested by the "alpha and Omega" comments), then it is a closed system. It seems to me that life and the physical universe we experience are ordered matter with just a tiny bit of chaos to keep it in motion. The chaos can be considered corruption within the orderly system. It may manifest itself in the collective unconsious as "evil". As time goes on the corruption spreads until it becomes necessary to "reboot" the system. I believe this is the end time that is predicted in the Bible. The time where all things become consumed by "fire" in the process of re-ordering all things.


PAX

Firstly, the correct terminology that should had been used was omnipotent, not omniscient.

Secondly, read on.

Hahahaha wrote:First off, you are trying to assign human terms (derrived from the human perspective of existance) to a power that is unfathomable to any of us.

Second off, nobody said God is infinately good, only that God is infinite.

Human perspective of existance? Since Infinity is the only limitless concept known to us which, by its very nature, fits that which is indescribable and indecipherable, then human perspective applies. Without A there can be no B. Isn't there something in your bible that says something along the lines: without good there can be no evil?
Good, evil. Light, dark. Steam, ice. A god or a demon. All the same comparison. A opposite to B. By your quote, your god is infinite, continuing on...

Hahahaha wrote:
The teaching also says God is the beginnig and the end,

This is a direct contridiction to your original statement. An infinite something cannot be with beginning or end and be infinite at the same time. So, which is it? If it is infinite, then the "teaching" cannot dictate a beginning and end and vice versa. By doing so, that throws a contradictory statement to one of the major seams that holds your religion together.

Look at it this way, if you will.

In its simplest form the problem is this: the christian god is omnipotent; the christian god is the definition of things wholly good; and yet evil exists. There seems to be some contradiction between these three propositions, so that if any two of them were true the third would be false.

However, the contradiction does not arise immediately; to show it we need some additional premises…. These additional principles are that good is opposed to evil, in such a way that a good thing always eliminates evil as far as it can, and that there are no limits to what an omnipotent thing can do. From these it follows that a good omnipotent thing eliminates evil completely, and then the propositions that a good omnipotent thing exists, and that evil exists, are incompatible.

My reconstruction of the argument:

(1) A good thing always eliminates evil as far as it can. (Premise)

(2) There is no limit to what an omnipotent thing can do. (Premise)

(3) If there is no limit to what an omnipotent thing can do, then it can eliminate evil completely. (Implicit Premise)

(4) A good omnipotent thing eliminates evil completely. (By 1 - 3)

(5) The existence of a good omnipotent thing is inconsistent with the existence of evil. (By 4)

(6) The christian god is wholly good. (Premise)

(7) The christian god is omnipotent. (Premise)

(8) Therefore, the existence of God is inconsistent with the existence of evil. (By 5 - 7).

Your first premise is the problem. Good does not always eliminate evil. Both concepts are ours for one thing. Who's to say what we perceive as evil, God also persieves as evil? Second off, if a system is truely infinite then it is also absolute, and without motion. Would God, who is said to love his children, not want us to live. As finite beings we cannot live in an infinite system as is would be infinately old and therefore would have already reached entrophy... If the system was perfect and infinite.

I am suggesting that because those things pecieved as "evil" to us are also creations of God and serve some purpose, therefore they are not necessarily "evil" to God.

God encompasses all things as all things are derrived from God. Demons are not equal and opposite to God, they are angels who by excersising their free will, turned from God and now live in shadow.

The statement that "god is the beginnign and the end", goes along with the idea that our existance itself is not infinite, but something created (genesis) that will be destroyed (revelation). It does not say that God has a beginning and and an ending, it says that our universe and existance as we know it does.

PAX

I found this topic interesting so I figured I'd post.

First, there's a problem with how this debate is set up. Mostly with where the burden of proof is coming from. I understand that since Jive (a non-believer) posted first that the rest of the debate has followed suit with "non-believer" setting up the argument and the "believer" retorting. This is slightly opposite what it should be because of burden of proof. Example:

"This morning I woke up and my toothbrush spoke to me. He proclaimed that he was the almightly ruler of the world and that he was the creator of everything, etc., etc."

Now I say prove to me that this never happened. You're gunna find that kinda hard aren't you? (By the way, I can't take credit for this, I borrowed it from another forum poster from another forum. He just worded it so perfectly) So the believers should be setting up the argument with the non-believers retorting....although Kardain seems to be holding his own quite nicely. And I enjoy the fact that this hasn't turned into a sissy fight over the internet yet.

BUT, that's the inherent problem with religion. The simple fact that believers CAN'T prove their god's existance because religion relys on faith. Without faith in the religion then the religion fails. Which is why you either believe or you don't.

Faith is required because the Bible doesn't have properly documented resources. I mean, who's to say that some guys didn't all sit down and make this up. Yes, yes, yes, I know Jesus's life was documented and he DID in fact exist. But to what extent? I mean, you can't just say that since the guy named Jesus existed then everything the bible says in it is true. I mean, I could write about my dead friend that REALLY did exist and keep the story mostly straight and just pop in there that he performed miracles and was the almightly creator and all I need is either to fake like four guys wrote it or have four co-conspirators (I forget how many guys wrote in the bible so the number is just for arguments sake). You see? Faith.

Now I'm just playing devil's advocate and I also just wanted to fix up the debate a little bit cause it was slightly off track. You can't ask a non-believer to prove that it's false. You have to have believers prove it's true. I really hope this discussion goes alot better than the other one I read in here. Some people take it too personal that someone believes differently than you. That's such a shame. I enjoy debating but more so with people who can level headly do so. Lets just all have a nice debate and keep the mud slinging to a minimum.

"In order for something to be infinite, there cannot be a termination point. By having such, it creates a finite limit, negating the possibility of infinite."

YOUR LOGIC IS HORRIBLY I MEAN HORRIBLY FLAWED...oops sorry was doing a project for work and left caps on...oh well it helps get the point across....


start and zero and count on tell me when you hit infinity? you never will!! what do you do about negative numbers. see positive and negatives can both co-exsist and both be infinite. ie. Good(positive) and evil(negative) can both be infinite and both exsist. in actuality most would argue(and correctly so) that for Good to exsist Evil must also exsist in equalty.

man that was probably the simpliest arguement in the history of the internet to rebuff.

I love when people quote the Bible using a certain passage or verse to make themselves look credible. You cannot pick out parts and pieces of the Bible to make a point. The reason for this is because one verse might make God seem evil or wicked, but if you read before/after the selected verse you find a reason for the action or you at least understand why it occured as it did. I do not force my beliefs on others and I encourage everyone to practice what is right for them, but do not twist parts of the Bible, a very holy thing to many people on JBO, to use out of context to make your point.

Quote:


(3) If there is no limit to what an omnipotent thing can do, then it can eliminate evil completely. (Implicit Premise)

and this is where your arguement falls completely through.

change that word to must-which is impossible cause that would create a limit for the omnipotent being-and your logic would hold true.

however the word CAN means he CAN or CAN NOT by choice of being limitless.