Even though I am Christian that is the best argument I have ever heard in why Freedom of Religion is overly abused in todays society. We have the right to worship who we want when we want but do not havethe right to force are beliefs down anyone elses throats. Its sad that this came from a Tv show because this is the best argument I have ever seen. I would love to know the writer who came up with this.. they need to spread this around to every place they can.
I don't believe. I haven't for a year or two now. I've realized that people have been brainwashing me to believe in all this superstition. Its wrong. People shouldn't be forcing religion onto other people, especially religion that has 0% proof!
I dare attempt to deny the world of beliefs that cause harm (The harms caused by the beliefs in question, is of fact, not opinion, and their history is simply repulsive) by fathering a new perspective where what is to be deemed as true morality can not clash with what is truly virtuous. Even defiance is a virtue and, for standing up against the wrong in the world, defiance is much needed.
One of the greatest things about James Spader is that he isn't afraid to do anything that would make his character look bad, which is what made him such an enormous asset to the show and made for some big comical routines as well that more often than not made more than one appearance throughout the series.
1:22 The founding father's of this nation went out to prevent persecution.... MASS GENOCIDE OF NATIVES!! TAKE ALL THY BASES!! I bet this was how Jefferson argued to inact the "Kill the Indian, Save the Man", Hahahaha I'm still here. You didn't kill all of us :D
i agree whole heartedly with tommy dick fingers on the matter, the small harris apparent on the opener is very much retiscent of the 80's and the ramifications of that are incredible!. Will probably stain like bbq sauce on a nice pair of slacks. Like my old dad used to say.
@baxtar1963 as sad as it is where we can't make tv shows more like this everyone will bitch saying its racist but is it no also hampering the right to freedom of speech even though it employs about Religion I mean I may be christian and not agree 100% but I agree their needs to be more shows about freedom of speech that even talks about religion without people angry about it being silly saying its anti semitic
Unfortunately this episode took place around the height of Boston Legals all too brief 5 year run.
I have several theories as to why it was so short, but I believe the biggest reason was that while the show may have been entertaining to watch with the theatrics of Allen Shore and Denny Crane as well as a slew of others in the show, it was picking at the root of some of the most controversial elements of modern society. For example, DADT and Medicare and big pharmaseudical,
mixing in a great mount of truth with it's comedy.
Proving, in my mind, that we no longer have a free televised market and that only what those have the money to pay off the broadcasters want aired is aired and what they dislike is cancelled.
@aden302000 Of course he win the case. He the fucking star of the show. In what lawyer show dose the star doesn't win the Case. I rather watch Matlock anyways.
Off-topic comment: I hate all the cutaway shots to the judge, jurors and others reacting to the speech. Quick-zoom, fast-cut editing gives me whiplash. Good cinema-photography should direct the viewers eyes to what would be most compelling to those involved in the action; i.e., the lawyer making the speech. The chances of you looking at someone the very second they react to something is slim, so I don't know why they do it in TV and movies now. One long shot would have more emotional impact..
I really, truly think religion is finally on it's way out. Some sort of "spirituality" (if you wanna call it that) is innate in all of us to some degree, but I think the dogma and flawed texts are finally being seen for what they are: nonsense. If there's a God, he doesn't care if you work sundays and he sure as hell didn't flood every man, woman, and baby because he'd made a mistake (somehow forgetting to tell China - who got by just fine at the time - about it).
The evangelically "faithful" are, I think, frustrated exhibitionists. They wanna show it off! Their prayers and piety are a little like spiritual spandex.
So, to those who profess "faith": Please, treat your "faith" like you treat your genitalia, and do NOT shove it in the faces of folks who have not explicitly requested to examine it!
There's a slight problem with his argument (Enough of this Freedom of Religion Crap)- It's the law. LOL. He might as well argue; enough of this freedom of the press crap; enough of this right to bear arms crap; or enough of this freedom of speech crap. I do agree with the underlying principle though- the nutjob is setting a bad example for the company and should be fired, because the business owner has a right to fire for any reason. But not because the lawyer disagrees with the Constitution.
@skaggmo every one of those freedoms has it's limit. You can't use the right to bear arms to carry around automatic weapons around like they're accessories to tote around. You can't use the freedom of speech to libel, threaten or slander every person you don't like. You can't use the freedom of press to cite false documents for more interest. And you can't act invade others individual rights, even if it is in the name of 'your religion'. ex. Muslims can't go around the US committing apostasy.
@proprodigySD It's not about that, but if you clear out the alien souls and develop your mind enough you can get some magical powers. It's just a perk, not the raison d'etra.
And I agree that history books don't alwaus tell the whole story. WHich is why I use more than one source and crossreference it with various others to get a better understanding.
For example the civil war. We all know the basics and the biggies. But there are some versions that can be slightly or sometimes completely different than another. Which is why I also try to get as hands on as humanly possible. Not that I can go back in time or anything, but you get the idea.
Oh, so I suppose to you waging war and the slaughter of millions in the name of your deity is considered rational to you?
You are an idiot.
All one needs to do is to pick up any historical text book and you will see all the irrational course man has taken all while claiming riteousness in the name of their deity.
The Salem witch trials is a good example of such actions, as is the Holocaust. Some have even omited the holocaust, or rather, teach it as feel good propoganda
Actually the Salem witch trials, were not solely on religion it was because people needed scapegoats and witches were available and deemed unholy, the same was done hundreds of years before in Europe when children started disappearing only that time they called their scapegoats werewolves. And i know plenty of non religious people who butcher millions of their own people for money, and power, their called dictators, oil companies, and some people kill others just for fun,
the way i see it anything can be justified, all you need to know is how to appeal to peoples basic ideals, i will grant that religion is the biggest get out of jail free card, but without it, they would still find a way to justify what they did because the people like church are about power and wealth, keeping the people in line, showing them why they need church, is part of the job. in my experience only a small few actually are believers, the rest are just power hungry fakes
and actually Hitler and the Nazis didn't really like religion because it interfered with their super human theory. The holocaust was perpetrated by rational people uninfluenced by religion who saw another race as lesser and tried to wipe them out. Non religious people are closer to Hitler than some religious nut as religious fanatics while stupid just follow a book and the other person in sound mind and intent, carries out murder like everyday business. everyone is capable
I'm not going to get into a debate on whether or not Hitler was Christian, Atheist, whatever.
What I do know is that regardless there are still countless of others that have been harmed, maimed and slaughtered in the name of whatever deity whether it be God, Alla, doesn't matter. The point is is that religion leads to an irrational and sometimes violent way of thinking because once you abandon reason nd logic for blind faith, you abandon rationality and sanity.
The thing about religion, especially in the case of Scientology and Christianity in general, is that it leves no room for rational thought and thus robs us of our own free will if you are to take everything the said religion throws at you literally, all at the same time claiming the higher power instilling free will in us even though that free will is stripped by the very institution of religion itself.
@GojyotheFeared "Christianity ... leaves no room for rational thought"? Where does a statement like that even come from? Max Planck, the Lutheran father of quantum physics? The Catholic who developed the Big Bang theory? The Harvard Director of the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics? Ought we simply discard to discard their achievements as the products of "irrational thought"? Christianity as a worldview might not make full sense to those who don't hold it, but what worldviews do?
The religious beliefs of the individuals mentioned still doesn't change that the religion itself promotes the idea of man being created from dust, women being created from the rib of the man and the human, or at least male skeleton having one less rib because of it, the dead rising from the grave, a man walking on water and the world being created only roughly 6000 years ago despite physical evidence of living beings existing millions of years ago.
@GojyotheFeared I believe that some things are impossible. A man cannot walk on water. A man cannot be raised from the dead. Christians and skeptics hold to the same natural laws. You believe that if it is physically impossible, it absolutely does not happen. I disagree. That's because I don't see the universe as a closed system. I believe that the basis of rationality is God, or absolute Being; it constructs the natural world but exists independently of it and can impose itself on it.
@GojyotheFeared Regarding the creation account, do what you want with it. Maybe it happened, maybe not. It can be true either way. True in what it says about the creative nature of God and how we are to relate to him. True in describing humanity's plight, whether man ate of a tree or not.
"It can be true either way" WTF? If it didn't happen then there is no truth to it and is therefore merely a story of ideaology crafted to brainwash and control. (the wbc, case and point.)
"the createive nature" but there is no God, and nothing you say is going to make me believe otherwise.
YOU can belive in him all you like. But I believe in reality and cold hard facts. Not fairy tales.
@GojyotheFeared "If it didn't happen then there is no truth to it"? You know you are better than that. The very power of fictional narrative is that it communicates truth.
"Brainwash and control"? That doesn't make sense. Who's controlling whom? And what's the motive?
You don't have to believe in God. I don't absolutely believe in a god. But there is simply no basis for the claim "there is no God." To say that so decisively is to demonstrate irrational thinking in a pretty extreme way.
That's nonfiction, idiot. A story based or told through actual events, not things that don't exist or never happened.
For example, the movie gettysburg is based on actual events.
Disney movies on the other hand are fantasy. Ideas and characters that don't actually exist, but are crafted to bring entertainment to children and generations that grew up with it.
The people who create them are real, but the characters and events themselves are not.
@GojyotheFeared All you've asserted in this comment is that nonfiction is historical, and fiction is not. Thanks. I'm 18 years old. I knew that.
Entertainment is not the only use of fiction. Historical fact and truth are not equivalent terms. For instance, Aesop's fables are not historical. Yet they are capable of saying more than much of history. Same for The Divine Comedy. And Frankenstein. And The Heart of Darkness. History just doesn't structure itself around complex truth like fiction can.
Say something like "the very power of fiction is that it narrates truth" meaning that there is some truth to fictional charcters which is a blatant contradiction to the word fiction.
is there some semblence of reality in fictional stories? Yes. But to say that they are true is ridiculous.
Which is why I don't follow any religion, particularly christianity. Anything that can say beating a slave to death is okay is not worthy of my time and energy.
@GojyotheFeared If you're going to discuss this, please bear with me and don't make false assumptions. For instance, if something is ridiculous by definition, assume that I don't believe it.
I'm really curious now to know what you mean when you say "truth," "true," and "reality," since it's pretty clear that we don't mean the same things.
Abusing slaves is okay? I don't remember that. Even if it happens somewhere in the Bible, Christianity absolutely does not say that this is okay.
When a man strikes his male or female slave with a rod so hard that the slave dies under his hand, he shall be punished. If, however, the slave survives for a day or two, he is not to be punished, since the slave is his own property. Exodus 20:21:20
Just one of the reasons why I do not consider the bible to be a credible source of morality.
As for what I consder to be truth and reality, truth is something that can be proven, not cherry picked to suit your own personal goals.
I don't need to research the bible as I have one of my own and yes, I have read it and while there may be some things credible and found in areas other than in chritianity that I find to be undeniably decent and moral, there are several points that outweigh the moral with their grotesque and downright hateful ideals.
For example, the slaying of an entire village and taking the virgins home to bed with you simpy because they have differing beliefs.
@GojyotheFeared Having the bible does not mean that you researched it, But I WILL admit there are uncredible things in biblical history, But those things aren't supported by christianity. Neither is your final sentence(But it has happend although not sure if christians did it once, But I am willing to beleive it).
But I DO in fact respect that you for being so calm about this and respecting things all and all. I need to get away from the Athiest Vs Religion online arguement though. Laters.
@Asganoth 1. I said Biblical history, The bible is a history book that tells us about (In this case) christian history, History contains the commandments and the base of christianity, But its not the actual rules. 2. COMPLETE Bibles say everything good and bad, Including slaughters, Sacks, And many other things even including how christians fought pagens that sacreficed children, that is not supported by the christian belief.
@nol50000 I might have spelt pagans wrong and "Rules" is the wrong word, They are morals and codes we should abide by but not inforced, Based on the christian belief, People who die evil go to hell imedietely, But people who did evil things but died good will go to purgatory, Even hitler could die a good person but could spend a million years in purgatory untill he has repent.
Then why is it that I got the bible from my confirmation into the Lutheran faith as a teenager?
It does not matter what Christians claim to support or not support. The very fact that such things are in the book of their religion is proof enough to me that Christianity is not something I will willingly support.
I support everyone's right to go with their own religion and what not, but that doesn't mean I have to agree with everything their religion does or says.
@GojyotheFeared You're forgetting how God summoned worms to eat a man to death. What for you ask? Well, the man was accused by the crowd of not paying enough credit to God and trying to sound divine. So God sent worms to kill him.
As for my comment to smithiank, that was more of a response to his implication that the bible doesn't condone slavery, which I have proven to be be inaccurate.
As for your implication that I am Jewish, um, isn't the Tora also the old testiment of the bible? If I were really Jewish, do you not think that I at least would contemplate at least some things in the bible vs rejecting it completely?
Granted, there are some good things in the bible. Honor
thy father and thy mother (to a certain extent. If they are coked/liquored up deadbeats who would rather get stoned/drunk off their ass than take responsibility for the life they created together or people who simply view children as a hinderance to their lifestyle and beat them on a day to day basis, then some intervention needs to take place. But that's a somewhat seperate issue.
Thou shall not kill, thou shall not kill, love thy neighbor as thyself, so on and so forth.
just so many other things that go against the very fabric of what I believe constitutes as moralistic human behavior.
For example, stoning unruely children, forcing women to marry their rapists provided the rapist pays the father, slaughtering a rival village simply because they have a different belief system and taking the virgin women to bed and so many other things.
You don't have to agree with my beliefs. But you also can't deny my right to have them just as you have the right to your
@smithiank True in the sense that it's meaningful fiction? So can Harry Potter be true in the sense that it tells us about Harry Potter, or describes humanity's plight? Or does the fact that there is no God actually render the Bible false?
@Tatarize Harry Potter couldn't be true in that it accurately relates the story of Harry Potter, since fiction isn't self-referentially true. It may be considered truthful in some ways, but I would hesitate to call it "true." I don't think it does describe humanity's plight.
If it could be demonstrated that there is no God, I would no longer consider the Bible even potentially "true," though it would still contain verifiable truth in some of its claims. But this can't be demonstrated.
@Tatarize Christianity posits that the biblical authors were compelled by God to write in such a way that all their claims would be true, even in spite of the authors' original intent. So a story like that of Adam and Eve, which is unlikely to be historically accurate, might yet fully account for what it was written to explain. Whatever DID happen to bring humanity to its current state happened in a way true to the narrative, even if one man and one woman didn't actually eat from a real tree.
@smithiank Christianity doesn't actually posit that the Bible authors will be magically true. And even if it did, it could be wrong. The Bible says the Bible is True, fails.
In fact, any cursory view of the facts will see that under any definitions of reality what is offered in the Bible, does not line up. The fact that talking serpents, talking donkeys, talking bushes, magical trees, and blood sacrifices of God, by God, for God (so that he could forgive His creations), is rather clearly false.
@Tatarize Yes, almost all Christian denominations say exactly that (though your use of the word "magic" is questionable). If God speaks through a human author, and God cannot lie, than that human author cannot make claims that are truly false.
"Clearly false?" Only if one assumes that 1. humanity is thoroughly familiar with the mechanisms of the universe, both physical and metaphysical, and 2. outside forces have never acted upon the universe. Sure, that's possible. But logic doesn't demand it.
@smithiank The people in various denominations do say that from time to time. But, there's nothing within the core corpus of Christianity that claims that everything must be true in the Bible (it was put together far after the original texts) or that God can't lie. There is a section in Timothy that makes something like that claim, which is somewhat ironic because Timothy is a forgery.
"Clearly false" assumes that the people can tell talking donkeys and snakes from events that actually happen.
@Tatarize Titus 1:2 explicitly says that God cannot lie. The fact that the Bible was assembled a couple hundred years after it was finished doesn't say anything about its veracity. Writing style is the only reason to suspect that Timothy is a forgery, and has been attributed to Paul since the second century. What does happen does not in any way define what can happen. People thousands of years ago knew that donkeys do not usually talk.
@smithiank Titus 1:1 claims that the work is written by Paul. But, that's not true. Titus and Timothy are part of the Pastorals and are well regarded as later forgeries, certainly not written by Paul. It's not just writing style but 2nd century vocabulary, and they give things like how the church should be setup, which isn't something that have happened in Paul's lifetime, and talk about all the fake Paul letters which wasn't common during Paul's time. And makes excuses for why they look wrong.
@Tatarize You're not in good company if you want to absolutely reject the authenticity of Titus. There are indeed discrepancies between Titus and the verified Pauline epistles, but most secular scholars agree that these do not demand we assign the original to another author. There's just not good enough reason to say definitively that this is our only option, or even the best one. Not to mention the fact that a forgery would have been significantly clearer to the early church than it is to us.
@smithiank I'm actually in pretty good company. Most secular scholars and even religious scholars tend to agree that the Pastorals were written by somebody else significantly after Paul's death.
1. Bart D. Ehrman, The New Testament: A Historical Introlduction to the Early Christian Writings, 3rd ed. (2004), chap.23
It's not just that it's wrong, theologically, grammatically, diction-wise, and with treatment of women and perhaps gnosticism opposition. And aren't in many lists of the corpus.
@Tatarize Well, I wouldn't really call Ehrman "good company," though I've only read selections. He tries too hard to find discrepancies that simply aren't there. Plus, his theology of the rest of the New Testament isn't developed to the point where he's able to accurately determine what is (or might be) actually meant in the Pastorals. That being said, I do need to read up more on this subject. I actually just emailed my pastor for material on both sides of the debate (not sure where he lands).
@smithiank There's actually some reasonable evidence that some Early people in the church did exclude them as Pauline corpus, namely Marcion, and others. And a lot of lists didn't include them as part of Paul's corpus. But, as they were exactly what the early church wanted at the time, outlining the setup of the church, opposition to women, opposition to gnosticism, and a lot of pet peeves from the 2nd century, it's not that strange that they would appear and be accepted.
@Tatarize But wouldn't Marcion have every reason to disregard the Pastorals? He was docetist; his pre-gnostic views were those under attack. Also, allusions to the works as canon exist in Polycarp, Iranaeus, and Clement as early as the first century. Wouldn't the early church recognize an obvious forgery, especially if it contained anachronisms less than a century old? Man, I wish 1. that I didn't have to fit all this stuff in YouTube boxes and 2. that I didn't have a bunch of papers to write.
@smithiank Yes. The Pastorals seem to be written, in part, specifically against Marcion which is odd because that and the gnostics and Marcionites only became important after Paul. And generally there were enough phony letters going around that it's odd we didn't include 3rd Corinthians or any of the other rather obvious fakes. But, we do have things like 1 Cor. 14:34-35 or 1 Thes. 2:14-16 being added to otherwise real Paul corpus. And widely agreed as later forgeries.
I don't think they would recognize forgeries that well and I'm not sure they are that obvious. They clearly didn't have proper literary criticism. And a lot of the stuff from this period carried on until modern textual criticism came around. I'm really not at all convinced they could spot anything other than an obvious forgery and as there's still some who still try to cling to the orthodox view. Though the Pastorals are a bit too obvious, some of the others are more debatable.
@Tatarize Just commenting on your Titus & Timothy claims of forgeries. Those people who are claiming that they are forgeries must produce evidence better than personal opinions. Those books are also well regarded as authentic books written by Paul. The church was being setup up by Jesus in His ministries and then by the disciples before Paul. Paul only brought it to the gentiles as we have it recorded.
There is no evidence for forgeries so cannot be defended.
@Surfxeo No. They are not well regarded as authentic. Everybody within Biblical studies finds them to be the forgeries. It's not personal opinion, it's actually the consensus of biblical scholars. See Bart Erhman, et al. The language is wrong. It's like it's written in the language of Jane Austin when it should be Shakespeare (17th vs 16th century). There's substantial evidence that they are not genuine Pauline Corpus, including early lists of the complete Pauline Corpus that don't include them.
@Tatarize That's what happens when you listen to Bart Ehrman you are not told all the facts but only what best suites the point of view he likes to give across.
I bet he didn't mention that Polycarp 69 – 155 AD (St Johns disciple) references 1 & 2 Timothy in his writting. All you have to do is check out what the earliest evidence is.
Plus, Ehrman is actually part of the radical fringe of NT scholarship and only the media promote this view point and not the majority of NT scholars.
@Surfxeo Um. Everybody notes that, including Bart Ehrman in his text book on the subject. Titus is oddly missing there and Polycarp is rather late. The truth is there is a real field of textual criticism which very largely does dismiss those texts. There are still orthodox people within the field and some might even go so far as to insist that Moses wrote the Pentateuch depending on on what you call a scholar. The question really is what's the best evidence and what does that evidence say?
@Tatarize Bart Ehrman is not a reliable source for information on this subject. He is considered part of the minoriry fringe of New Testament scholarship. Everyone of his writtings are intellectually dishonest and when questioned by scholars he always folds, we know 99% of the NT is accurate to its original autograph.
The Jews have always said Moses wrote the first 5 books including Genesis as far back as history goes and recorde long before NT times.
@Tatarize Polycarp is very early. What are you talking about? Polycarp was a pupil of St John, the disciple of Christ. You cannot get closer than that outside what the actual disciples wrote.
Not only that but you have Clement of Rome.
Since Polycarp mentions first Timothy 1 & 2 and they are regarded as Pauline letters, and Titus written with the same hand then there is no reason to doubt they are authentic unless you have an axe to grind.
They are authentic epistles of Paul and so are included.
@Surfxeo Also, calling Bart Ehrman a part of the radical fringe is hugely amusing. What do you consider to be scholarship? Apologists? Josh McDowell or something? Because if Ehrman is fringe I don't know what kind of rabbit hole you're calling NT scholarship or how deep it might go.
@Tatarize Bart Ehrman is a member of the Jesus Seminar, this group is well known for its bad scholarship by distorting the facts to mislead those who are laymen in this field of research.
Harvard Referencing.
Blomberg, C. L. (2007). The Historical Reliability of the Gospels (Second Edition ed.). Nottingham: Apollos.
Wilkins, M. J., Moreland, J.P (2010). Jesus Under Fire: Modern Scholarship Reinvents the Historical Jesus (Grand Rapids: Zondarvan, 1995; Carlisle: Paternoster, 1996).
@Surfxeo So yes, highly conservative people clinging to the orthodox view to outright apologists. I'm not at all amazed that J.P. Moreland might well attest to the absolute authorship of Paul in the NT. But, this doesn't make it the position generally agreed within scholarship. He's an apologist after all. Nor would once appearing at a rather silly seminar of scholars, make you somehow wrong. -- Which ignores the fact that it's false and Bart Ehrman wasn't not involved with the Jesus Seminar.
@Tatarize By definition an apologist is a person whi defends the faith. That goes without saying. But that does nothing to detract from the truth.
You cannot apply one set of rules for some people and another set of rules for another set of people. You need to be consistent.
Why not ask the same question about Ehrman. What are his biases? What he has actually said is actually fraudulent about the manuscripts of the NT. A spin doctor.
He said all we have are copies, of copies, of copies...
@Surfxeo He could be an apologist and a real scholar in textual criticism. He not, he's a philosopher of religion and Christian apologist. These aren't the people out there weighing the best evidence there is for particular claims and against them and trying to come to the best and most appropriate conclusion from the evidence. It's not scholarship, it's defense of the faith. -- And Ehrman's creds are pretty impeccable, and he's right, all we have are copies of copies of copies.
@Surfxeo And ultimately the question should be what the good evidence is for the question. And Titus is weak. It's written wrongly, it's directly seemingly written against late first and early second century heresies. And supports a variety of positions that Paul never endorses anywhere else. That's why the majority in real textual criticism don't believe it to be authentic. Much like 2 Peter is nearly unanimously believed to be pseudoepigraphia. But, you could get an apologist to defend it.
He said there are 400,000 varients and with only 138,162 words in th NT. That's 3 varients per word. So people are left believing he cannot trust the books of the NT.
What they don't tell you is that 99% of varients do not impact the meaning of the words.
The fact we have so many NT manuscripts to reference is why there are so man varients because all texts where hand written. Now we only have 1500-2000 vaiable varients in the NT which are now at 5700+ manuscripts.
@Tatarize With this wealth of manuscript evidence we know what was in the original NT texts. There was no single transmision of the texts because they were all widely distributed thoughout the old world that it made it impossible for any one group to control what was written by other groups. There is no single transmission of the text which makes it easy to find if there are any changes to the over meaning of the New Testaments manuscripts.
@Surfxeo No. The texts and even fragments vary widely from each other. We cannot tell what was in the original versions. And it's not just things like we can tell that that bit at the end of Mark about drinking poison and handling snakes isn't original, or the John story about casting the first stone was added as late as the 4th century. But, that we only have a couple late branches of the texts. Having a few thousand copies of a copy that made it to the 6th century doesn't make it all clear.
@Surfxeo Moreover this argument is rather pointless. It's not true that we know what the autographs looks like, not remotely. But, even if it were. If the process of copying the texts from Mark and from the first person who added the Q material to Matthew is exactly preserved with every jot and tittle it's neat, but not important. -- A flawless copy of a work of fiction is still a work of fiction. I can give a to the letter exact copy of Gone With the Wind, but it doesn't make it true.
@smithiank Evidence generally does demand we not accept the supernatural as an explanation. For every phenomenon throughout human history the supernatural has always been offered as an explanation. Yet, each and every time we've discovered that the natural is responsible. Supernaturalism has never been the answer to any question ever in the history of the world. The choice offered is between something that has thus far been always wrong and one that has been always right.
@Tatarize The Bible doesn't demand that we accept the supernatural as the sole explanation for any natural phenomena whatsoever. Also, I don't believe that the word "supernatural" to apply to acts of God is a misnomer. It doesn't seem possible to me that anything that ever could happen in the physical world uses anything other than natural laws. But that's just my opinion.
@smithiank If Christianity can be wrong, it can be wrong about its magically ability to be right no matter how false the things it says happen to be. If one accepts that Christianity can be wrong then clearly it can be wrong about having magical powers to be right even when what it says is obviously a fable, in the first place.
1) All of these statements are true.
2) 2+2 = 7.
You shouldn't say that since #1 says everything is true, #2 must be true *somehow*. No, both statements are false!
@Tatarize If Christianity said anything like "2+2 = 7," then of course we would have to conclude that it is mistaken. But the Bible was written by individuals who were in fact aware of the basic laws of nature, and would be no more likely than us to believe what is inherently impossible. For instance, it is not inherently impossible that God (or a god) could speak through an animal or plant. It is inherently impossible that a square has five sides; even God could not create such a shape.
@smithiank I said false, not inherently impossible. The universe wasn't created 6,000 years ago and that there weren't originally two people invented made out of clay or body parts. This is a fable and a creation myth. If you also say in the same text that that is "true", the answer is that both the creation myth and the statement that the creation myth is true, are both false.
@Tatarize Look, I'm getting very tired of this argument. It's clear you're not even trying to track with me, so why bother? The universe probably was not created recently. Humanity probably was not formed out of dust. But if it's not intended by God or by the human author to be history, to say it's not strictly historical isn't to say that it's not true. What it wants to communicate, it communicates truthfully. That's why literary criticism is important.
@maths82 Here's a better way of thinking about this. In whatever the Bible intends to communicate as truth, Christians take it to speak truthfully. That's why things like ancient Mediterranean literary genres, figures of speech, and understanding must be considered in providing an accurate interpretation of the text. For instance, if it seems that the author of Genesis understood that he was writing myth, we need not interpret it as history. Yet myth and fiction are not synonymous.
Good, I'm all for literary criticism and acurate translation. Still, if you're saying the bible is all true, but we don't really have a reliable method to interpret which parts are actual history, which bits are allegory, or which parts are myth, then any claim about "this part is literal/this part is figurative" etc, is unfalsifiable. And what am I to do with unfalsifiable claims, other than let different sects debate among themselves and ignore it.
@maths82 That's a really good question. That's where scholarship comes into play, and incidentally I don't consider myself "fundamentalist" because of the anti-academic connotations. Criticism is essential if we are to discover what's actually being said in any given text. Certain books, especially Genesis and Revelation, fit nicely into symbolic, esoteric genres of the day. Most of the Old Testament clearly takes itself to be history where it's not poetry. The New Testament is mostly didactic.
@smithiank Yeah, but most of the Old Testament history didn't happen. The conquest of Israel, the exodus, etc, are historically false. So in what magical sense are they somehow true?
@Tatarize That is tricky, and I admit I'm not really convinced by any of the explanations I've heard. I do think that "historically false" is too strong, however. Many of the accounts have not been verified, but that does not make them unequivocally false. And by now you should know that I'm not sure I think something has to be historically accurate to be truthful. And that most of what I say is merely personal, high school opinion.
Please stop talking about magic. I don't believe it exists.
@smithiank If you must comment again, please don't rehash something that's already been dealt with. I feel like I've given my opinion on the same issue about a dozen times now. If you want to keep talking, just move on. Historical inquiry is not the arbiter of truth. Literary genres are real. God, if he exists, does not lie. That's what I believe. That's what defines my approach to Scripture. That's really all you need to know, and I don't want to say it again.
@smithiank "God, if he exists, does not lie." -- This is the point I've tried to get across. If God doesn't exist than all the proclamations that the Bible is true, are false. Self-referential truth cannot establish truth ever, because that self-reference could be false too.
You can't use the Bible to prove God, and God to prove the Bible. -- The Bible says God doesn't lie. And God inspired the Bible, does not actually work as an argument. They really could both be false.
@Tatarize Have I yet used the self-referential testimony of Scripture to validate God's existence? It is obvious that to use one to confirm the other is cyclical, so that's an argument I don't think I've even implied. Not quite sure why you brought it up.
Since we were at one point taking God's existence for granted in the discussion the Bible, I merely pointed out that in such a state of affairs Scripture is true in some way. If God does not exist, the Bible is false in very many ways.
@smithiank You repeatedly asserted that the Bible must be true, in some sense. And then justified this by saying that God couldn't lie. The problem with this is what it always was. They could both be false. If "2+2=7" and "both of these statements are true" are asserted, both of those statements are false. -- As such, it's entirely possible that the Bible could be false and wrong in a variety of ways. And is not a requirement, unless we use God to prove the Bible and the Bible to prove God.
@Tatarize Oh, I see what the problem is. No, what I meant was not that the Bible must be seen by all people as true because it says that God cannot lie. If I'm defending the veracity of historically questionable parts of Scripture as a Christian operating under a Christian frame of reference, I'm going to need to use the nature of God from the much less questioned didactic sections to explain myself. If I were providing an apologetic, that's not an argument that would (or should) ever come up.
@Tatarize Out of curiosity, what's your background? You're significantly more thoughtful, well-informed, and less militant than most of the Bible-bashers who troll videos like these. Why is that?
@smithiank My background? I'm just well versed and highly intelligent and care a bit about the subject. I'm not any less likely to scoff at religion than your typical atheists, I just will give you better reasons for it.
Militancy involves violence, and I've seen very little of that coming out of the atheist community. And a lot of it is goals, perception, and debate style, I'm actually less wishy-washy than the typical atheist you'd run into, just a bit better at the perception thing.
I don't think that militancy involves violence. Just aggressiveness. That coupled with shoddy thinking and careless research is as obnoxious as it gets, and I'm thinking of both our perspectives here. I didn't realize you're an atheist. Interesting, why not agnostic? That's what I consider myself (I'm the only Christian agnostic I know... go figure).
1. vigorously active and aggressive, especially in support of a cause: militant reformers.
2. engaged in warfare; fighting.
Militant Christians sometimes assassinate abortion doctors, Militant Muslims have been known to fly planes into buildings, and militant atheists wrote books and strongly worded comments. If, for example, the God Delusion is "militant" then the word is being used wrong.
@Tatarize I could say "violence" means leaving a bruise. Or I could say it means slaughtering an entire city. Both are right. Look, I was trying to disassociate you from what even you can't see as a positive representation of atheism. It was a compliment. Maybe I was wrong to give it.
And you're wrong. Militant Christians and atheists kill people. Militant Christianity and atheism write books and strongly worded comments. Christians and atheists can and will do whatever the heck they want.
@smithiank You were wrong that it's a complement. It's actually an insult to the great deal of very ordinary and non-violent or at all mean atheists out there. The assumption is generally that atheism is negative. It's a bit like saying somebody is a nice black person unlike all the mean ones. When you compare a person to the stereotype they seem downright reasonable. -- Atheists don't kill people because they are atheists. Abortion doctors and buildings in Manhattan attest to a difference here.
@Tatarize What I didn't say is, "For an atheist, you seem like a reasonable and well-researched guy." I said, "In comparison to the majority of atheists who interact on YouTube videos, you seem like a reasonable and well-researched guy." See the difference? I'm not at all playing on a stereotype. I'm playing on observation.
@smithiank I've also seen the majority of atheists who comment on such videos. They are often reasonable. They make what is ultimately a valid point: your religion could well be false and you've never given a good reason to suppose otherwise. -- The fact that I'm well versed in creationism, evolution, quantum mechanics, biology, history, science, etc. Doesn't mean that point isn't well made, unlike my points. You don't need a degree in fashion to say the Emperor has no clothes.
@smithiank I don't misunderstand your meaning. I'm making a point that your not grasping. Claiming atheists are generally "militant", "shoddy thinking", "careless research"ers, and "obnoxious". Is actually insulting to me, even if I'm being specifically excluded from those caricatures. It's like saying "I'm surprised that you're both Christian and not-retarded. Why is that?" -- It's insulting! I know you had good intentions, but the road to hell is paved with those.
@Tatarize It's just that I didn't claim that atheists in general are any of those things. And this is not the first time I have made that clear. It's like you're determined to imagine that I think these deeply insulting things that I adamantly do not and have extreme prejudices that have in fact never crossed my mind. And I don't know why that is.
@smithiank It doesn't have to cross your mind to be a stereotype. You generally suggest I'm better than your average atheist who is as you insultingly described. I'm not saying it's extreme or remotely odd. It's better than many Christians suppose of atheists, it's still insulting. For the reasons I've generally given. You're calling atheists militant obnoxious misinformed trolls. I barely have to bend your words at all to make them say that either.
@Tatarize Here's what I was claiming, in bullet points.
1. I have noticed that the majority of the atheists who post on YouTube, and I don't know why this is, appear to be ignorant about what it is they don't believe, are unnecessarily offensive, or both.
2. You, who are an atheist posting on YouTube, are well-read and not particularly offensive at all.
Here's what I was not saying:
1. Atheists are generally uninformed and offensive.
2. The majority of Christians on YouTube don't do this also.
@smithiank If you don't believe it, you need to know that much about it. You could understand that the central story is "God needs blood to fix the universe, only his own blood has enough magic to do it, so he gives himself a body and kills it." -- And the most basic confirmation that that is more or less accurate and never read a scrap of scripture or literary criticism, apologetics, or interpretations on Christianity ever and be well enough informed to dismiss it as rather absurd nonsense.
@smithiank I've learned a great deal about Christianity from apologetics to eschatology, to the early heresies.I can give you a compelling reason to suppose that "who was called Christ" was an inserted margin note in Josephus and how Harold Camping pinpointed the end of the world, and what the Phelps believe about God. -- None of it has given me a reason to suppose that any of it is true. If anything, I'm better versed on why it's false and how bad the arguments saying it's true really are.
@smithiank If somebody said, "There is no God, and you don't have a jot of evidence suggesting that there is one. The universe looks exactly like it should if your religion was false." -- Even if they hadn't done the legwork, it's still all true. It might be rude. It might be from somebody who has never checked the meaning of the original words a concordance, or looked at other Semitic cosmologies, but none of that makes the comments any less true. There's still no evidence that God exists.
@Tatarize You're right, it doesn't make it any less true. We are on exactly the same page here.
Most Christians would agree with you that the universe, so far as we know, looks as it would without a god. That's because most of us agree with most of the rest of the world about such things as natural laws.
You checked the meanings of original words? Any significant findings?
@smithiank Most Christians completely disagree with that. They say that the universe cannot exist without God. Because, God. -- And the rest of the world isn't that keen on it either. I actually know a considerable amount of cosmology and physics, biology, and abiogenesis to show why they should agree with that; It's true. However it's certainly not true that Most Christians would agree with statement.
@Tatarize Neither atheism nor Christianity lend themselves to violence. That's because pure nonbelief carries with it no mandate for action, and because Christianity is prescriptively nonviolent. I won't say the same for Islam - I read the Qur'an, but just don't know how the commands to kill are meant to be interpreted.
People will find justification for nearly anything. Atheism isn't often used as justification since it doesn't carry with it a whole system of ethics.
@smithiank You shall not suffer a witch to live. It is an abomination, their blood is upon them. Cast them into the fire. They shall be yours forever. -- Atheism isn't anything other than a lack of a belief in what appears to be an utterly unproven proposition. Christianity easily tells people to kill people for a variety of reasons. If they make the simple mistake of reading the words in the most direct and obvious fashion.
You are motivated by your beliefs not your lacks of belief.
@Tatarize For someone to read Old Testament law and see it as a mandate to exercise violence against certain kinds of people, something is already very wrong. Namely, that person is psychologically a sociopath and would be a sociopath with or without religiosity. Hint: most of these people cut the corners of their beards, and they don't feel guilty about mixing fabric at all. Motivation and guilt are a more complex mechanisms than you give them credit for.
@smithiank You don't have to be insane to read the Bible. People can be lucid and think that praying for things will grant them to them, because it says so in the Bible and the Bible can't lie. And that homosexuality is wrong, and so one should pray away the gay. This has lead to a clear harm to people and deaths and has been entirely ineffective and patently immoral. It doesn't require sociopathology, you could be hugely concerned with the well being of others, and think the Bible is true.
@smithiank You can believe something that is false, have the very best of intentions, and by your worldview act in a way that causes serious harm. I believe that witch judges, Norman Borlaug, 9/11 hijackers, abortion clinic bombers, thought they were doing good. If your premises are wrong, you can do great harm, even with a heart filled only with love. Motivation is complex and I've actually given it a great deal of thought, I don't just say they're crazy because they did harm.
@Tatarize You may think you're doing good, but that doesn't mean you actually believe you are doing so in ways that align with your religion. Citing religious belief is a desperate attempt to minimize guilt. Attacking an abortion clinic is an emotional reaction, not a religious one. You will not find capital punishment advocated outside Old Testament law. If someone honestly believed these laws were still in effect, they would still be performing cleansing rituals. They aren't.
@smithiank Maybe it's not my place to comment on the actual mental and emotional states of those who haven't expressed them. But it just seems impossible to me that such actions are sincerely attributed to Scriptural interpretation when such interpretations would need to be so hugely isogetic.
@smithiank No. Tthe most straight-forward reading of the Bible, causes great harm. Take slavery for example. The South didn't need seemingly isogetic readings for the Curse of Ham, they could just read the text. It said in no uncertain terms that one person may own another person, forever. You need not adjust the scripture to conclude that as Rev. Warren wrote: "Its chains were forged in heaven, by God himself...", but the opposite claim requires many adjustments and a treatise to explain away.
greatest television character of all time
mshellr 5 days ago
caN i offer as a counterstrike the wonderful terms as president the "west wings martin sheen gave us as a ?christian,
MoorLetoh 1 week ago
Even though I am Christian that is the best argument I have ever heard in why Freedom of Religion is overly abused in todays society. We have the right to worship who we want when we want but do not havethe right to force are beliefs down anyone elses throats. Its sad that this came from a Tv show because this is the best argument I have ever seen. I would love to know the writer who came up with this.. they need to spread this around to every place they can.
Duskrequim 2 weeks ago 2
I don't believe. I haven't for a year or two now. I've realized that people have been brainwashing me to believe in all this superstition. Its wrong. People shouldn't be forcing religion onto other people, especially religion that has 0% proof!
megamovieman101 3 weeks ago
Typical David E. Kelly claptrap -- supporting only the rights that Hollywood likes.
marcd30319 1 month ago
Exelent video. stop al the BS. religion non sense
azucar1242 1 month ago
I dare attempt to deny the world of beliefs that cause harm (The harms caused by the beliefs in question, is of fact, not opinion, and their history is simply repulsive) by fathering a new perspective where what is to be deemed as true morality can not clash with what is truly virtuous. Even defiance is a virtue and, for standing up against the wrong in the world, defiance is much needed.
Vottaro 1 month ago
just like we have the freedom to own a gun not freedom from owning a gun. we should give our children guns.
TheDrewManXD 1 month ago
Denny Crane.
flyboy4361x 1 month ago
why can't I like this more than once damn it
diablossmirk 1 month ago
One of the greatest things about James Spader is that he isn't afraid to do anything that would make his character look bad, which is what made him such an enormous asset to the show and made for some big comical routines as well that more often than not made more than one appearance throughout the series.
GojyotheFeared 1 month ago
great piece xD
banq0o 2 months ago
1:22 The founding father's of this nation went out to prevent persecution.... MASS GENOCIDE OF NATIVES!! TAKE ALL THY BASES!! I bet this was how Jefferson argued to inact the "Kill the Indian, Save the Man", Hahahaha I'm still here. You didn't kill all of us :D
fumoffu758 2 months ago
This has been flagged as spam show
atheist debate will not change the fact that men who controls galaxies are men who have a belief and they believe in Force
Sidious and Vader!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
:p
:p
:p
and atheist like Han Solo can only watch his gun taken by the power of the force and turned to stone.......
dfdtdfdx 2 months ago
i agree whole heartedly with tommy dick fingers on the matter, the small harris apparent on the opener is very much retiscent of the 80's and the ramifications of that are incredible!. Will probably stain like bbq sauce on a nice pair of slacks. Like my old dad used to say.
threckulator 2 months ago
Finally a TV show has the balls to speak freely about religion. We need more television like this.
baxtar1963 2 months ago
@baxtar1963 as sad as it is where we can't make tv shows more like this everyone will bitch saying its racist but is it no also hampering the right to freedom of speech even though it employs about Religion I mean I may be christian and not agree 100% but I agree their needs to be more shows about freedom of speech that even talks about religion without people angry about it being silly saying its anti semitic
Texan2525 2 months ago
@baxtar1963
Unfortunately this episode took place around the height of Boston Legals all too brief 5 year run.
I have several theories as to why it was so short, but I believe the biggest reason was that while the show may have been entertaining to watch with the theatrics of Allen Shore and Denny Crane as well as a slew of others in the show, it was picking at the root of some of the most controversial elements of modern society. For example, DADT and Medicare and big pharmaseudical,
GojyotheFeared 1 month ago
mixing in a great mount of truth with it's comedy.
Proving, in my mind, that we no longer have a free televised market and that only what those have the money to pay off the broadcasters want aired is aired and what they dislike is cancelled.
GojyotheFeared 1 month ago
amen
TheBarackClinton 2 months ago
did he win the case??
aden302000 2 months ago 6
@aden302000 Yes, and the girl. ^^
fiddleknows 2 months ago 23
@fiddleknows
Well, he didn't necessarily get the girl. But even had he lost the case there still would have been a night of passion between them.
GojyotheFeared 1 month ago
@aden302000 Of course he win the case. He the fucking star of the show. In what lawyer show dose the star doesn't win the Case. I rather watch Matlock anyways.
Lone432345 1 month ago
@Lone432345 Matlock? Are they still airing those? Probably on the History Channel lol.
aden302000 1 month ago
Off-topic comment: I hate all the cutaway shots to the judge, jurors and others reacting to the speech. Quick-zoom, fast-cut editing gives me whiplash. Good cinema-photography should direct the viewers eyes to what would be most compelling to those involved in the action; i.e., the lawyer making the speech. The chances of you looking at someone the very second they react to something is slim, so I don't know why they do it in TV and movies now. One long shot would have more emotional impact..
mistermellow001 2 months ago
I really, truly think religion is finally on it's way out. Some sort of "spirituality" (if you wanna call it that) is innate in all of us to some degree, but I think the dogma and flawed texts are finally being seen for what they are: nonsense. If there's a God, he doesn't care if you work sundays and he sure as hell didn't flood every man, woman, and baby because he'd made a mistake (somehow forgetting to tell China - who got by just fine at the time - about it).
BeforeWorldGoesBoom 2 months ago
SHIT.
rugport 2 months ago
The evangelically "faithful" are, I think, frustrated exhibitionists. They wanna show it off! Their prayers and piety are a little like spiritual spandex.
So, to those who profess "faith": Please, treat your "faith" like you treat your genitalia, and do NOT shove it in the faces of folks who have not explicitly requested to examine it!
konopelli 2 months ago
I am a follower of the George Carlin church: KEEP RELIGION TO YOURSELF !! Behind the door of your toilet.
Tralgit 2 months ago
Brilliant!
Nevermindstudios 2 months ago
Bravo! I want to buy the writer of this show dinner.
deanosumo 2 months ago 18
Yuck!
Nejitheultimate 3 months ago
Omfg chill with the looong comments, and just enjoy this epic clip.
Porsing 3 months ago 3
@99butterflykisses99 what's stoping you? go right ahead.
hardinmichael1981 3 months ago
i love this show, great clip thanks
flumberg 4 months ago
Fuck everyone who still believes in god
123e3 4 months ago
@123e3 Fuck you.
slyfox3333 4 months ago
godamn I want to become a speaker like him.
esesolox3 5 months ago
This counts for politics these days? A fake show, with a poorly drawn out speech on the constitution?
What a sad excuse for the adults of today who've inherited a constitution they know nothing about.
aaronscrewme 5 months ago
There's a slight problem with his argument (Enough of this Freedom of Religion Crap)- It's the law. LOL. He might as well argue; enough of this freedom of the press crap; enough of this right to bear arms crap; or enough of this freedom of speech crap. I do agree with the underlying principle though- the nutjob is setting a bad example for the company and should be fired, because the business owner has a right to fire for any reason. But not because the lawyer disagrees with the Constitution.
skaggmo 5 months ago
@skaggmo You misunderstood. He's perfectly ok with freedom of religion, he says that it's misapplied.
doloreg 5 months ago
@skaggmo every one of those freedoms has it's limit. You can't use the right to bear arms to carry around automatic weapons around like they're accessories to tote around. You can't use the freedom of speech to libel, threaten or slander every person you don't like. You can't use the freedom of press to cite false documents for more interest. And you can't act invade others individual rights, even if it is in the name of 'your religion'. ex. Muslims can't go around the US committing apostasy.
Gatzlocke 3 months ago
Best lawyer show ever!
davidls11 5 months ago
Talking to zeebras? That's what scientology's about? Fuck, that's so sweet! Not that i'd ever join. Those people are insane.
proprodigySD 5 months ago
@proprodigySD It's not about that, but if you clear out the alien souls and develop your mind enough you can get some magical powers. It's just a perk, not the raison d'etra.
Tatarize 3 months ago
Yuck!
Electrode46 5 months ago
Very Good sir
TheDemonofthenite 5 months ago
After seeing 'The Secretary' I can't take this guy seriously lol
chickenisafoolofatoo 5 months ago
And the final and most important rule, NEVER, NEVER expose it to children.
jokr8790 6 months ago
@techepix
And I agree that history books don't alwaus tell the whole story. WHich is why I use more than one source and crossreference it with various others to get a better understanding.
For example the civil war. We all know the basics and the biggies. But there are some versions that can be slightly or sometimes completely different than another. Which is why I also try to get as hands on as humanly possible. Not that I can go back in time or anything, but you get the idea.
GojyotheFeared 6 months ago
@techepix
Oh, so I suppose to you waging war and the slaughter of millions in the name of your deity is considered rational to you?
You are an idiot.
All one needs to do is to pick up any historical text book and you will see all the irrational course man has taken all while claiming riteousness in the name of their deity.
The Salem witch trials is a good example of such actions, as is the Holocaust. Some have even omited the holocaust, or rather, teach it as feel good propoganda
GojyotheFeared 6 months ago
@GojyotheFeared
Actually the Salem witch trials, were not solely on religion it was because people needed scapegoats and witches were available and deemed unholy, the same was done hundreds of years before in Europe when children started disappearing only that time they called their scapegoats werewolves. And i know plenty of non religious people who butcher millions of their own people for money, and power, their called dictators, oil companies, and some people kill others just for fun,
MAnnaconduit1 5 months ago
@MAnnaconduit1
It doesn't matter whether they needed a scapegoat or not. they still used religion to justify the irrational torture and death of human beings.
GojyotheFeared 5 months ago
@GojyotheFeared
the way i see it anything can be justified, all you need to know is how to appeal to peoples basic ideals, i will grant that religion is the biggest get out of jail free card, but without it, they would still find a way to justify what they did because the people like church are about power and wealth, keeping the people in line, showing them why they need church, is part of the job. in my experience only a small few actually are believers, the rest are just power hungry fakes
MAnnaconduit1 5 months ago
@GojyotheFeared
and actually Hitler and the Nazis didn't really like religion because it interfered with their super human theory. The holocaust was perpetrated by rational people uninfluenced by religion who saw another race as lesser and tried to wipe them out. Non religious people are closer to Hitler than some religious nut as religious fanatics while stupid just follow a book and the other person in sound mind and intent, carries out murder like everyday business. everyone is capable
MAnnaconduit1 5 months ago
@MAnnaconduit1
I'm not going to get into a debate on whether or not Hitler was Christian, Atheist, whatever.
What I do know is that regardless there are still countless of others that have been harmed, maimed and slaughtered in the name of whatever deity whether it be God, Alla, doesn't matter. The point is is that religion leads to an irrational and sometimes violent way of thinking because once you abandon reason nd logic for blind faith, you abandon rationality and sanity.
GojyotheFeared 5 months ago
@techepix
The thing about religion, especially in the case of Scientology and Christianity in general, is that it leves no room for rational thought and thus robs us of our own free will if you are to take everything the said religion throws at you literally, all at the same time claiming the higher power instilling free will in us even though that free will is stripped by the very institution of religion itself.
Denny Crane!
GojyotheFeared 6 months ago
@GojyotheFeared "Christianity ... leaves no room for rational thought"? Where does a statement like that even come from? Max Planck, the Lutheran father of quantum physics? The Catholic who developed the Big Bang theory? The Harvard Director of the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics? Ought we simply discard to discard their achievements as the products of "irrational thought"? Christianity as a worldview might not make full sense to those who don't hold it, but what worldviews do?
smithiank 4 months ago
@smithiank
The religious beliefs of the individuals mentioned still doesn't change that the religion itself promotes the idea of man being created from dust, women being created from the rib of the man and the human, or at least male skeleton having one less rib because of it, the dead rising from the grave, a man walking on water and the world being created only roughly 6000 years ago despite physical evidence of living beings existing millions of years ago.
Ration thought is nonexistent.
GojyotheFeared 4 months ago
@GojyotheFeared I believe that some things are impossible. A man cannot walk on water. A man cannot be raised from the dead. Christians and skeptics hold to the same natural laws. You believe that if it is physically impossible, it absolutely does not happen. I disagree. That's because I don't see the universe as a closed system. I believe that the basis of rationality is God, or absolute Being; it constructs the natural world but exists independently of it and can impose itself on it.
smithiank 4 months ago
@GojyotheFeared Regarding the creation account, do what you want with it. Maybe it happened, maybe not. It can be true either way. True in what it says about the creative nature of God and how we are to relate to him. True in describing humanity's plight, whether man ate of a tree or not.
smithiank 4 months ago
@smithiank
"It can be true either way" WTF? If it didn't happen then there is no truth to it and is therefore merely a story of ideaology crafted to brainwash and control. (the wbc, case and point.)
"the createive nature" but there is no God, and nothing you say is going to make me believe otherwise.
YOU can belive in him all you like. But I believe in reality and cold hard facts. Not fairy tales.
GojyotheFeared 3 months ago
@GojyotheFeared "If it didn't happen then there is no truth to it"? You know you are better than that. The very power of fictional narrative is that it communicates truth.
"Brainwash and control"? That doesn't make sense. Who's controlling whom? And what's the motive?
You don't have to believe in God. I don't absolutely believe in a god. But there is simply no basis for the claim "there is no God." To say that so decisively is to demonstrate irrational thinking in a pretty extreme way.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank
That's nonfiction, idiot. A story based or told through actual events, not things that don't exist or never happened.
For example, the movie gettysburg is based on actual events.
Disney movies on the other hand are fantasy. Ideas and characters that don't actually exist, but are crafted to bring entertainment to children and generations that grew up with it.
The people who create them are real, but the characters and events themselves are not.
See the difference?
GojyotheFeared 3 months ago
@GojyotheFeared All you've asserted in this comment is that nonfiction is historical, and fiction is not. Thanks. I'm 18 years old. I knew that.
Entertainment is not the only use of fiction. Historical fact and truth are not equivalent terms. For instance, Aesop's fables are not historical. Yet they are capable of saying more than much of history. Same for The Divine Comedy. And Frankenstein. And The Heart of Darkness. History just doesn't structure itself around complex truth like fiction can.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank
Say something like "the very power of fiction is that it narrates truth" meaning that there is some truth to fictional charcters which is a blatant contradiction to the word fiction.
is there some semblence of reality in fictional stories? Yes. But to say that they are true is ridiculous.
Which is why I don't follow any religion, particularly christianity. Anything that can say beating a slave to death is okay is not worthy of my time and energy.
GojyotheFeared 3 months ago
@GojyotheFeared If you're going to discuss this, please bear with me and don't make false assumptions. For instance, if something is ridiculous by definition, assume that I don't believe it.
I'm really curious now to know what you mean when you say "truth," "true," and "reality," since it's pretty clear that we don't mean the same things.
Abusing slaves is okay? I don't remember that. Even if it happens somewhere in the Bible, Christianity absolutely does not say that this is okay.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank
When a man strikes his male or female slave with a rod so hard that the slave dies under his hand, he shall be punished. If, however, the slave survives for a day or two, he is not to be punished, since the slave is his own property. Exodus 20:21:20
Just one of the reasons why I do not consider the bible to be a credible source of morality.
As for what I consder to be truth and reality, truth is something that can be proven, not cherry picked to suit your own personal goals.
GojyotheFeared 3 months ago 39
@GojyotheFeared Please research biblical history. answers(.)yahoo(.)com/question/index?qid=20100424203108AAU1Vca
nol50000 1 month ago
@nol50000
I don't need to research the bible as I have one of my own and yes, I have read it and while there may be some things credible and found in areas other than in chritianity that I find to be undeniably decent and moral, there are several points that outweigh the moral with their grotesque and downright hateful ideals.
For example, the slaying of an entire village and taking the virgins home to bed with you simpy because they have differing beliefs.
GojyotheFeared 1 month ago
@GojyotheFeared Having the bible does not mean that you researched it, But I WILL admit there are uncredible things in biblical history, But those things aren't supported by christianity. Neither is your final sentence(But it has happend although not sure if christians did it once, But I am willing to beleive it).
But I DO in fact respect that you for being so calm about this and respecting things all and all. I need to get away from the Athiest Vs Religion online arguement though. Laters.
nol50000 1 month ago
@nol50000 How can something in the Bible not be supported by Christianity? The Bible IS Christianity.
Asganoth 1 month ago
@Asganoth 1. I said Biblical history, The bible is a history book that tells us about (In this case) christian history, History contains the commandments and the base of christianity, But its not the actual rules. 2. COMPLETE Bibles say everything good and bad, Including slaughters, Sacks, And many other things even including how christians fought pagens that sacreficed children, that is not supported by the christian belief.
nol50000 1 month ago
Comment removed
nol50000 1 month ago
@nol50000 I might have spelt pagans wrong and "Rules" is the wrong word, They are morals and codes we should abide by but not inforced, Based on the christian belief, People who die evil go to hell imedietely, But people who did evil things but died good will go to purgatory, Even hitler could die a good person but could spend a million years in purgatory untill he has repent.
nol50000 1 month ago
@nol50000
Then why is it that I got the bible from my confirmation into the Lutheran faith as a teenager?
It does not matter what Christians claim to support or not support. The very fact that such things are in the book of their religion is proof enough to me that Christianity is not something I will willingly support.
I support everyone's right to go with their own religion and what not, but that doesn't mean I have to agree with everything their religion does or says.
GojyotheFeared 1 month ago
@GojyotheFeared Im not trying to convert you, Im just trying to clear u mis-understanding from you or onlookers.
Once again I respect that
nol50000 1 month ago
@GojyotheFeared You're forgetting how God summoned worms to eat a man to death. What for you ask? Well, the man was accused by the crowd of not paying enough credit to God and trying to sound divine. So God sent worms to kill him.
Makes perfect sense... -_-
Asganoth 1 month ago
@GojyotheFeared Filthy jew bastard.
lomertamahon1 1 month ago
@lomertamahon1
Sorry, I'm Atheist.
As for my comment to smithiank, that was more of a response to his implication that the bible doesn't condone slavery, which I have proven to be be inaccurate.
As for your implication that I am Jewish, um, isn't the Tora also the old testiment of the bible? If I were really Jewish, do you not think that I at least would contemplate at least some things in the bible vs rejecting it completely?
Granted, there are some good things in the bible. Honor
GojyotheFeared 1 month ago
thy father and thy mother (to a certain extent. If they are coked/liquored up deadbeats who would rather get stoned/drunk off their ass than take responsibility for the life they created together or people who simply view children as a hinderance to their lifestyle and beat them on a day to day basis, then some intervention needs to take place. But that's a somewhat seperate issue.
Thou shall not kill, thou shall not kill, love thy neighbor as thyself, so on and so forth.
But there are
GojyotheFeared 1 month ago
just so many other things that go against the very fabric of what I believe constitutes as moralistic human behavior.
For example, stoning unruely children, forcing women to marry their rapists provided the rapist pays the father, slaughtering a rival village simply because they have a different belief system and taking the virgin women to bed and so many other things.
You don't have to agree with my beliefs. But you also can't deny my right to have them just as you have the right to your
GojyotheFeared 1 month ago
own beliefs.
GojyotheFeared 1 month ago
@smithiank True in the sense that it's meaningful fiction? So can Harry Potter be true in the sense that it tells us about Harry Potter, or describes humanity's plight? Or does the fact that there is no God actually render the Bible false?
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize Harry Potter couldn't be true in that it accurately relates the story of Harry Potter, since fiction isn't self-referentially true. It may be considered truthful in some ways, but I would hesitate to call it "true." I don't think it does describe humanity's plight.
If it could be demonstrated that there is no God, I would no longer consider the Bible even potentially "true," though it would still contain verifiable truth in some of its claims. But this can't be demonstrated.
smithiank 3 months ago
@Tatarize Christianity posits that the biblical authors were compelled by God to write in such a way that all their claims would be true, even in spite of the authors' original intent. So a story like that of Adam and Eve, which is unlikely to be historically accurate, might yet fully account for what it was written to explain. Whatever DID happen to bring humanity to its current state happened in a way true to the narrative, even if one man and one woman didn't actually eat from a real tree.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank Christianity doesn't actually posit that the Bible authors will be magically true. And even if it did, it could be wrong. The Bible says the Bible is True, fails.
In fact, any cursory view of the facts will see that under any definitions of reality what is offered in the Bible, does not line up. The fact that talking serpents, talking donkeys, talking bushes, magical trees, and blood sacrifices of God, by God, for God (so that he could forgive His creations), is rather clearly false.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize Yes, almost all Christian denominations say exactly that (though your use of the word "magic" is questionable). If God speaks through a human author, and God cannot lie, than that human author cannot make claims that are truly false.
"Clearly false?" Only if one assumes that 1. humanity is thoroughly familiar with the mechanisms of the universe, both physical and metaphysical, and 2. outside forces have never acted upon the universe. Sure, that's possible. But logic doesn't demand it.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank The people in various denominations do say that from time to time. But, there's nothing within the core corpus of Christianity that claims that everything must be true in the Bible (it was put together far after the original texts) or that God can't lie. There is a section in Timothy that makes something like that claim, which is somewhat ironic because Timothy is a forgery.
"Clearly false" assumes that the people can tell talking donkeys and snakes from events that actually happen.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize Titus 1:2 explicitly says that God cannot lie. The fact that the Bible was assembled a couple hundred years after it was finished doesn't say anything about its veracity. Writing style is the only reason to suspect that Timothy is a forgery, and has been attributed to Paul since the second century. What does happen does not in any way define what can happen. People thousands of years ago knew that donkeys do not usually talk.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank Titus 1:1 claims that the work is written by Paul. But, that's not true. Titus and Timothy are part of the Pastorals and are well regarded as later forgeries, certainly not written by Paul. It's not just writing style but 2nd century vocabulary, and they give things like how the church should be setup, which isn't something that have happened in Paul's lifetime, and talk about all the fake Paul letters which wasn't common during Paul's time. And makes excuses for why they look wrong.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize You're not in good company if you want to absolutely reject the authenticity of Titus. There are indeed discrepancies between Titus and the verified Pauline epistles, but most secular scholars agree that these do not demand we assign the original to another author. There's just not good enough reason to say definitively that this is our only option, or even the best one. Not to mention the fact that a forgery would have been significantly clearer to the early church than it is to us.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank I'm actually in pretty good company. Most secular scholars and even religious scholars tend to agree that the Pastorals were written by somebody else significantly after Paul's death.
1. Bart D. Ehrman, The New Testament: A Historical Introlduction to the Early Christian Writings, 3rd ed. (2004), chap.23
It's not just that it's wrong, theologically, grammatically, diction-wise, and with treatment of women and perhaps gnosticism opposition. And aren't in many lists of the corpus.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize Well, I wouldn't really call Ehrman "good company," though I've only read selections. He tries too hard to find discrepancies that simply aren't there. Plus, his theology of the rest of the New Testament isn't developed to the point where he's able to accurately determine what is (or might be) actually meant in the Pastorals. That being said, I do need to read up more on this subject. I actually just emailed my pastor for material on both sides of the debate (not sure where he lands).
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank There's actually some reasonable evidence that some Early people in the church did exclude them as Pauline corpus, namely Marcion, and others. And a lot of lists didn't include them as part of Paul's corpus. But, as they were exactly what the early church wanted at the time, outlining the setup of the church, opposition to women, opposition to gnosticism, and a lot of pet peeves from the 2nd century, it's not that strange that they would appear and be accepted.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize But wouldn't Marcion have every reason to disregard the Pastorals? He was docetist; his pre-gnostic views were those under attack. Also, allusions to the works as canon exist in Polycarp, Iranaeus, and Clement as early as the first century. Wouldn't the early church recognize an obvious forgery, especially if it contained anachronisms less than a century old? Man, I wish 1. that I didn't have to fit all this stuff in YouTube boxes and 2. that I didn't have a bunch of papers to write.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank Yes. The Pastorals seem to be written, in part, specifically against Marcion which is odd because that and the gnostics and Marcionites only became important after Paul. And generally there were enough phony letters going around that it's odd we didn't include 3rd Corinthians or any of the other rather obvious fakes. But, we do have things like 1 Cor. 14:34-35 or 1 Thes. 2:14-16 being added to otherwise real Paul corpus. And widely agreed as later forgeries.
Tatarize 3 months ago
I don't think they would recognize forgeries that well and I'm not sure they are that obvious. They clearly didn't have proper literary criticism. And a lot of the stuff from this period carried on until modern textual criticism came around. I'm really not at all convinced they could spot anything other than an obvious forgery and as there's still some who still try to cling to the orthodox view. Though the Pastorals are a bit too obvious, some of the others are more debatable.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize Just commenting on your Titus & Timothy claims of forgeries. Those people who are claiming that they are forgeries must produce evidence better than personal opinions. Those books are also well regarded as authentic books written by Paul. The church was being setup up by Jesus in His ministries and then by the disciples before Paul. Paul only brought it to the gentiles as we have it recorded.
There is no evidence for forgeries so cannot be defended.
Surfxeo 3 months ago
@Surfxeo No. They are not well regarded as authentic. Everybody within Biblical studies finds them to be the forgeries. It's not personal opinion, it's actually the consensus of biblical scholars. See Bart Erhman, et al. The language is wrong. It's like it's written in the language of Jane Austin when it should be Shakespeare (17th vs 16th century). There's substantial evidence that they are not genuine Pauline Corpus, including early lists of the complete Pauline Corpus that don't include them.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize That's what happens when you listen to Bart Ehrman you are not told all the facts but only what best suites the point of view he likes to give across.
I bet he didn't mention that Polycarp 69 – 155 AD (St Johns disciple) references 1 & 2 Timothy in his writting. All you have to do is check out what the earliest evidence is.
Plus, Ehrman is actually part of the radical fringe of NT scholarship and only the media promote this view point and not the majority of NT scholars.
Surfxeo 3 months ago
@Surfxeo Um. Everybody notes that, including Bart Ehrman in his text book on the subject. Titus is oddly missing there and Polycarp is rather late. The truth is there is a real field of textual criticism which very largely does dismiss those texts. There are still orthodox people within the field and some might even go so far as to insist that Moses wrote the Pentateuch depending on on what you call a scholar. The question really is what's the best evidence and what does that evidence say?
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize Bart Ehrman is not a reliable source for information on this subject. He is considered part of the minoriry fringe of New Testament scholarship. Everyone of his writtings are intellectually dishonest and when questioned by scholars he always folds, we know 99% of the NT is accurate to its original autograph.
The Jews have always said Moses wrote the first 5 books including Genesis as far back as history goes and recorde long before NT times.
Surfxeo 3 months ago
@Tatarize Polycarp is very early. What are you talking about? Polycarp was a pupil of St John, the disciple of Christ. You cannot get closer than that outside what the actual disciples wrote.
Not only that but you have Clement of Rome.
Since Polycarp mentions first Timothy 1 & 2 and they are regarded as Pauline letters, and Titus written with the same hand then there is no reason to doubt they are authentic unless you have an axe to grind.
They are authentic epistles of Paul and so are included.
Surfxeo 3 months ago
@Surfxeo Also, calling Bart Ehrman a part of the radical fringe is hugely amusing. What do you consider to be scholarship? Apologists? Josh McDowell or something? Because if Ehrman is fringe I don't know what kind of rabbit hole you're calling NT scholarship or how deep it might go.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize Bart Ehrman is a member of the Jesus Seminar, this group is well known for its bad scholarship by distorting the facts to mislead those who are laymen in this field of research.
Harvard Referencing.
Blomberg, C. L. (2007). The Historical Reliability of the Gospels (Second Edition ed.). Nottingham: Apollos.
Wilkins, M. J., Moreland, J.P (2010). Jesus Under Fire: Modern Scholarship Reinvents the Historical Jesus (Grand Rapids: Zondarvan, 1995; Carlisle: Paternoster, 1996).
Surfxeo 3 months ago
@Surfxeo So yes, highly conservative people clinging to the orthodox view to outright apologists. I'm not at all amazed that J.P. Moreland might well attest to the absolute authorship of Paul in the NT. But, this doesn't make it the position generally agreed within scholarship. He's an apologist after all. Nor would once appearing at a rather silly seminar of scholars, make you somehow wrong. -- Which ignores the fact that it's false and Bart Ehrman wasn't not involved with the Jesus Seminar.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize By definition an apologist is a person whi defends the faith. That goes without saying. But that does nothing to detract from the truth.
You cannot apply one set of rules for some people and another set of rules for another set of people. You need to be consistent.
Why not ask the same question about Ehrman. What are his biases? What he has actually said is actually fraudulent about the manuscripts of the NT. A spin doctor.
He said all we have are copies, of copies, of copies...
Surfxeo 3 months ago
@Surfxeo He could be an apologist and a real scholar in textual criticism. He not, he's a philosopher of religion and Christian apologist. These aren't the people out there weighing the best evidence there is for particular claims and against them and trying to come to the best and most appropriate conclusion from the evidence. It's not scholarship, it's defense of the faith. -- And Ehrman's creds are pretty impeccable, and he's right, all we have are copies of copies of copies.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Surfxeo And ultimately the question should be what the good evidence is for the question. And Titus is weak. It's written wrongly, it's directly seemingly written against late first and early second century heresies. And supports a variety of positions that Paul never endorses anywhere else. That's why the majority in real textual criticism don't believe it to be authentic. Much like 2 Peter is nearly unanimously believed to be pseudoepigraphia. But, you could get an apologist to defend it.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize Continued...
He said there are 400,000 varients and with only 138,162 words in th NT. That's 3 varients per word. So people are left believing he cannot trust the books of the NT.
What they don't tell you is that 99% of varients do not impact the meaning of the words.
The fact we have so many NT manuscripts to reference is why there are so man varients because all texts where hand written. Now we only have 1500-2000 vaiable varients in the NT which are now at 5700+ manuscripts.
Surfxeo 3 months ago
@Tatarize With this wealth of manuscript evidence we know what was in the original NT texts. There was no single transmision of the texts because they were all widely distributed thoughout the old world that it made it impossible for any one group to control what was written by other groups. There is no single transmission of the text which makes it easy to find if there are any changes to the over meaning of the New Testaments manuscripts.
Surfxeo 3 months ago
@Surfxeo No. The texts and even fragments vary widely from each other. We cannot tell what was in the original versions. And it's not just things like we can tell that that bit at the end of Mark about drinking poison and handling snakes isn't original, or the John story about casting the first stone was added as late as the 4th century. But, that we only have a couple late branches of the texts. Having a few thousand copies of a copy that made it to the 6th century doesn't make it all clear.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Surfxeo Moreover this argument is rather pointless. It's not true that we know what the autographs looks like, not remotely. But, even if it were. If the process of copying the texts from Mark and from the first person who added the Q material to Matthew is exactly preserved with every jot and tittle it's neat, but not important. -- A flawless copy of a work of fiction is still a work of fiction. I can give a to the letter exact copy of Gone With the Wind, but it doesn't make it true.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@smithiank Evidence generally does demand we not accept the supernatural as an explanation. For every phenomenon throughout human history the supernatural has always been offered as an explanation. Yet, each and every time we've discovered that the natural is responsible. Supernaturalism has never been the answer to any question ever in the history of the world. The choice offered is between something that has thus far been always wrong and one that has been always right.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize The Bible doesn't demand that we accept the supernatural as the sole explanation for any natural phenomena whatsoever. Also, I don't believe that the word "supernatural" to apply to acts of God is a misnomer. It doesn't seem possible to me that anything that ever could happen in the physical world uses anything other than natural laws. But that's just my opinion.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank If Christianity can be wrong, it can be wrong about its magically ability to be right no matter how false the things it says happen to be. If one accepts that Christianity can be wrong then clearly it can be wrong about having magical powers to be right even when what it says is obviously a fable, in the first place.
1) All of these statements are true.
2) 2+2 = 7.
You shouldn't say that since #1 says everything is true, #2 must be true *somehow*. No, both statements are false!
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize If Christianity said anything like "2+2 = 7," then of course we would have to conclude that it is mistaken. But the Bible was written by individuals who were in fact aware of the basic laws of nature, and would be no more likely than us to believe what is inherently impossible. For instance, it is not inherently impossible that God (or a god) could speak through an animal or plant. It is inherently impossible that a square has five sides; even God could not create such a shape.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank I said false, not inherently impossible. The universe wasn't created 6,000 years ago and that there weren't originally two people invented made out of clay or body parts. This is a fable and a creation myth. If you also say in the same text that that is "true", the answer is that both the creation myth and the statement that the creation myth is true, are both false.
1) All of these statements are true.
2) The sky is strong and well built.
Both 1 and 2 are false.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize Look, I'm getting very tired of this argument. It's clear you're not even trying to track with me, so why bother? The universe probably was not created recently. Humanity probably was not formed out of dust. But if it's not intended by God or by the human author to be history, to say it's not strictly historical isn't to say that it's not true. What it wants to communicate, it communicates truthfully. That's why literary criticism is important.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank So the bible is true, even if it's not true. This is purest nonsense.
maths82 3 months ago
@maths82 Yeah, it is. Good thing no one's saying that, right?
smithiank 3 months ago
@maths82 Here's a better way of thinking about this. In whatever the Bible intends to communicate as truth, Christians take it to speak truthfully. That's why things like ancient Mediterranean literary genres, figures of speech, and understanding must be considered in providing an accurate interpretation of the text. For instance, if it seems that the author of Genesis understood that he was writing myth, we need not interpret it as history. Yet myth and fiction are not synonymous.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank @smithiank
Good, I'm all for literary criticism and acurate translation. Still, if you're saying the bible is all true, but we don't really have a reliable method to interpret which parts are actual history, which bits are allegory, or which parts are myth, then any claim about "this part is literal/this part is figurative" etc, is unfalsifiable. And what am I to do with unfalsifiable claims, other than let different sects debate among themselves and ignore it.
maths82 3 months ago
@maths82 That's a really good question. That's where scholarship comes into play, and incidentally I don't consider myself "fundamentalist" because of the anti-academic connotations. Criticism is essential if we are to discover what's actually being said in any given text. Certain books, especially Genesis and Revelation, fit nicely into symbolic, esoteric genres of the day. Most of the Old Testament clearly takes itself to be history where it's not poetry. The New Testament is mostly didactic.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank Yeah, but most of the Old Testament history didn't happen. The conquest of Israel, the exodus, etc, are historically false. So in what magical sense are they somehow true?
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize That is tricky, and I admit I'm not really convinced by any of the explanations I've heard. I do think that "historically false" is too strong, however. Many of the accounts have not been verified, but that does not make them unequivocally false. And by now you should know that I'm not sure I think something has to be historically accurate to be truthful. And that most of what I say is merely personal, high school opinion.
Please stop talking about magic. I don't believe it exists.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank If you must comment again, please don't rehash something that's already been dealt with. I feel like I've given my opinion on the same issue about a dozen times now. If you want to keep talking, just move on. Historical inquiry is not the arbiter of truth. Literary genres are real. God, if he exists, does not lie. That's what I believe. That's what defines my approach to Scripture. That's really all you need to know, and I don't want to say it again.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank "God, if he exists, does not lie." -- This is the point I've tried to get across. If God doesn't exist than all the proclamations that the Bible is true, are false. Self-referential truth cannot establish truth ever, because that self-reference could be false too.
You can't use the Bible to prove God, and God to prove the Bible. -- The Bible says God doesn't lie. And God inspired the Bible, does not actually work as an argument. They really could both be false.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize Have I yet used the self-referential testimony of Scripture to validate God's existence? It is obvious that to use one to confirm the other is cyclical, so that's an argument I don't think I've even implied. Not quite sure why you brought it up.
Since we were at one point taking God's existence for granted in the discussion the Bible, I merely pointed out that in such a state of affairs Scripture is true in some way. If God does not exist, the Bible is false in very many ways.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank You repeatedly asserted that the Bible must be true, in some sense. And then justified this by saying that God couldn't lie. The problem with this is what it always was. They could both be false. If "2+2=7" and "both of these statements are true" are asserted, both of those statements are false. -- As such, it's entirely possible that the Bible could be false and wrong in a variety of ways. And is not a requirement, unless we use God to prove the Bible and the Bible to prove God.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize Oh, I see what the problem is. No, what I meant was not that the Bible must be seen by all people as true because it says that God cannot lie. If I'm defending the veracity of historically questionable parts of Scripture as a Christian operating under a Christian frame of reference, I'm going to need to use the nature of God from the much less questioned didactic sections to explain myself. If I were providing an apologetic, that's not an argument that would (or should) ever come up.
smithiank 3 months ago
@Tatarize Out of curiosity, what's your background? You're significantly more thoughtful, well-informed, and less militant than most of the Bible-bashers who troll videos like these. Why is that?
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank My background? I'm just well versed and highly intelligent and care a bit about the subject. I'm not any less likely to scoff at religion than your typical atheists, I just will give you better reasons for it.
Militancy involves violence, and I've seen very little of that coming out of the atheist community. And a lot of it is goals, perception, and debate style, I'm actually less wishy-washy than the typical atheist you'd run into, just a bit better at the perception thing.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize Yeah, it shows on all counts.
I don't think that militancy involves violence. Just aggressiveness. That coupled with shoddy thinking and careless research is as obnoxious as it gets, and I'm thinking of both our perspectives here. I didn't realize you're an atheist. Interesting, why not agnostic? That's what I consider myself (I'm the only Christian agnostic I know... go figure).
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank mil·i·tant
1. vigorously active and aggressive, especially in support of a cause: militant reformers.
2. engaged in warfare; fighting.
Militant Christians sometimes assassinate abortion doctors, Militant Muslims have been known to fly planes into buildings, and militant atheists wrote books and strongly worded comments. If, for example, the God Delusion is "militant" then the word is being used wrong.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize I could say "violence" means leaving a bruise. Or I could say it means slaughtering an entire city. Both are right. Look, I was trying to disassociate you from what even you can't see as a positive representation of atheism. It was a compliment. Maybe I was wrong to give it.
And you're wrong. Militant Christians and atheists kill people. Militant Christianity and atheism write books and strongly worded comments. Christians and atheists can and will do whatever the heck they want.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank You were wrong that it's a complement. It's actually an insult to the great deal of very ordinary and non-violent or at all mean atheists out there. The assumption is generally that atheism is negative. It's a bit like saying somebody is a nice black person unlike all the mean ones. When you compare a person to the stereotype they seem downright reasonable. -- Atheists don't kill people because they are atheists. Abortion doctors and buildings in Manhattan attest to a difference here.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize What I didn't say is, "For an atheist, you seem like a reasonable and well-researched guy." I said, "In comparison to the majority of atheists who interact on YouTube videos, you seem like a reasonable and well-researched guy." See the difference? I'm not at all playing on a stereotype. I'm playing on observation.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank I've also seen the majority of atheists who comment on such videos. They are often reasonable. They make what is ultimately a valid point: your religion could well be false and you've never given a good reason to suppose otherwise. -- The fact that I'm well versed in creationism, evolution, quantum mechanics, biology, history, science, etc. Doesn't mean that point isn't well made, unlike my points. You don't need a degree in fashion to say the Emperor has no clothes.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize Your continued misunderstanding of my meaning is, frankly, bizzare. That's really all I can say about this.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank I don't misunderstand your meaning. I'm making a point that your not grasping. Claiming atheists are generally "militant", "shoddy thinking", "careless research"ers, and "obnoxious". Is actually insulting to me, even if I'm being specifically excluded from those caricatures. It's like saying "I'm surprised that you're both Christian and not-retarded. Why is that?" -- It's insulting! I know you had good intentions, but the road to hell is paved with those.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize It's just that I didn't claim that atheists in general are any of those things. And this is not the first time I have made that clear. It's like you're determined to imagine that I think these deeply insulting things that I adamantly do not and have extreme prejudices that have in fact never crossed my mind. And I don't know why that is.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank It doesn't have to cross your mind to be a stereotype. You generally suggest I'm better than your average atheist who is as you insultingly described. I'm not saying it's extreme or remotely odd. It's better than many Christians suppose of atheists, it's still insulting. For the reasons I've generally given. You're calling atheists militant obnoxious misinformed trolls. I barely have to bend your words at all to make them say that either.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize Here's what I was claiming, in bullet points.
1. I have noticed that the majority of the atheists who post on YouTube, and I don't know why this is, appear to be ignorant about what it is they don't believe, are unnecessarily offensive, or both.
2. You, who are an atheist posting on YouTube, are well-read and not particularly offensive at all.
Here's what I was not saying:
1. Atheists are generally uninformed and offensive.
2. The majority of Christians on YouTube don't do this also.
smithiank 3 months ago
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@smithiank If you don't believe it, you need to know that much about it. You could understand that the central story is "God needs blood to fix the universe, only his own blood has enough magic to do it, so he gives himself a body and kills it." -- And the most basic confirmation that that is more or less accurate and never read a scrap of scripture or literary criticism, apologetics, or interpretations on Christianity ever and be well enough informed to dismiss it as rather absurd nonsense.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@smithiank I've learned a great deal about Christianity from apologetics to eschatology, to the early heresies.I can give you a compelling reason to suppose that "who was called Christ" was an inserted margin note in Josephus and how Harold Camping pinpointed the end of the world, and what the Phelps believe about God. -- None of it has given me a reason to suppose that any of it is true. If anything, I'm better versed on why it's false and how bad the arguments saying it's true really are.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@smithiank If somebody said, "There is no God, and you don't have a jot of evidence suggesting that there is one. The universe looks exactly like it should if your religion was false." -- Even if they hadn't done the legwork, it's still all true. It might be rude. It might be from somebody who has never checked the meaning of the original words a concordance, or looked at other Semitic cosmologies, but none of that makes the comments any less true. There's still no evidence that God exists.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize You're right, it doesn't make it any less true. We are on exactly the same page here.
Most Christians would agree with you that the universe, so far as we know, looks as it would without a god. That's because most of us agree with most of the rest of the world about such things as natural laws.
You checked the meanings of original words? Any significant findings?
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank Most Christians completely disagree with that. They say that the universe cannot exist without God. Because, God. -- And the rest of the world isn't that keen on it either. I actually know a considerable amount of cosmology and physics, biology, and abiogenesis to show why they should agree with that; It's true. However it's certainly not true that Most Christians would agree with statement.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize Neither atheism nor Christianity lend themselves to violence. That's because pure nonbelief carries with it no mandate for action, and because Christianity is prescriptively nonviolent. I won't say the same for Islam - I read the Qur'an, but just don't know how the commands to kill are meant to be interpreted.
People will find justification for nearly anything. Atheism isn't often used as justification since it doesn't carry with it a whole system of ethics.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank You shall not suffer a witch to live. It is an abomination, their blood is upon them. Cast them into the fire. They shall be yours forever. -- Atheism isn't anything other than a lack of a belief in what appears to be an utterly unproven proposition. Christianity easily tells people to kill people for a variety of reasons. If they make the simple mistake of reading the words in the most direct and obvious fashion.
You are motivated by your beliefs not your lacks of belief.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize For someone to read Old Testament law and see it as a mandate to exercise violence against certain kinds of people, something is already very wrong. Namely, that person is psychologically a sociopath and would be a sociopath with or without religiosity. Hint: most of these people cut the corners of their beards, and they don't feel guilty about mixing fabric at all. Motivation and guilt are a more complex mechanisms than you give them credit for.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank You don't have to be insane to read the Bible. People can be lucid and think that praying for things will grant them to them, because it says so in the Bible and the Bible can't lie. And that homosexuality is wrong, and so one should pray away the gay. This has lead to a clear harm to people and deaths and has been entirely ineffective and patently immoral. It doesn't require sociopathology, you could be hugely concerned with the well being of others, and think the Bible is true.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@smithiank You can believe something that is false, have the very best of intentions, and by your worldview act in a way that causes serious harm. I believe that witch judges, Norman Borlaug, 9/11 hijackers, abortion clinic bombers, thought they were doing good. If your premises are wrong, you can do great harm, even with a heart filled only with love. Motivation is complex and I've actually given it a great deal of thought, I don't just say they're crazy because they did harm.
Tatarize 3 months ago
@Tatarize You may think you're doing good, but that doesn't mean you actually believe you are doing so in ways that align with your religion. Citing religious belief is a desperate attempt to minimize guilt. Attacking an abortion clinic is an emotional reaction, not a religious one. You will not find capital punishment advocated outside Old Testament law. If someone honestly believed these laws were still in effect, they would still be performing cleansing rituals. They aren't.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank Maybe it's not my place to comment on the actual mental and emotional states of those who haven't expressed them. But it just seems impossible to me that such actions are sincerely attributed to Scriptural interpretation when such interpretations would need to be so hugely isogetic.
smithiank 3 months ago
@smithiank No. Tthe most straight-forward reading of the Bible, causes great harm. Take slavery for example. The South didn't need seemingly isogetic readings for the Curse of Ham, they could just read the text. It said in no uncertain terms that one person may own another person, forever. You need not adjust the scripture to conclude that as Rev. Warren wrote: "Its chains were forged in heaven, by God himself...", but the opposite claim requires many adjustments and a treatise to explain away.
Tatarize 3 months ago