Forums → WEPR → [nec]Christianity vs Atheism

How can God commit an act that he has called a sin and still be good?

He can't. That would be contrary to His nature. Do you have an example in mind?

Very good advice. Yes, we will definitely have to talk more tomorrow, and flesh out this argument. I've heard it all the time, but it'd be nice to go through it and think it out.

I love it, all the Christians in this thread bending and altering their story along the way, digging bits out of the Bible, and using them to argue a completely invalid point, then directing the subject towards prayers, morality etc, all things which have no relation to the validity of God's existence, therefore the whole basis of the Christian religion.

As God isn't real, and the Bible is full of man written crap by delusional theists before science could help humans out and explain the unknown things which occurred at the time, they needed an explanation, "OH NO, NOBODY KNOWS"
Man comes along, creates God, writes few pages of book, passes book along to more theists, more pages get written etc.
So now whenever something strange happens 'God did it'.
But guess what, now they can be explained, and have been, the fictional character named God is no longer needed

Sure some of the verses may make sense, mainly because they are so vague, and there's bound to be a few, within the 1000+ pages of the Bible.

As you can clearly see within many of the pages of this thread, all the main stories which God's existence, and all his 'doings' are based upon, have no reality behind it at all, he dropped water from the sky and flooded the world, then made it all magically disappear after?
WOW, yet you have such trouble believing the simple concept of Evolution?

Scientists have dis-proven so many of the 'stories' told within the Bible, acts created by this so called God, the sole reason they can't totally disprove the existence of God altogether is because he doesn't exist, and never has, therefore making it impossible, and even if it were possible, I would bet most Christians would STILL go up against it, just face it.. we are absolutely random, a creation of the universe expanding and not with any purpose in mind by some magical being up in the skies, no heaven, no hell, no purgatory, no miracles, everything is absolutely random.

We just live, then we die.

^ Another fact that can't be dis-proven, or proven, kinda like God..
Nobody can die then come back to life to tell us what happens (yet)
So we don't know what happens for sure, but I think I can safely say that we don't appear in front of golden gates in the sky, or fiery ones inside the centre of the Earth. < LOL, weird Christians

Anyway, I'd love to join the argument, but I myself haven't studied the Bible, or even read it all for that matter, for the same reason I wouldn't study my own a**hole in a mirror.
They're both full of *beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep*

Please, I beg you, prove me wrong, for thou art...erm... *End*

What about the third option I said? That there is no difference between what is moral and what is God's nature. That leaves no room for subjectivity.

I'm saying that God should be able to, in his infinite wisdom, create a way for freewill to exist without causing all that is wrong with the world.

Something along the lines of creating a child even though you know one day it's have sex in your bed. Well maybe not, but all the same would you rather be alive in this world of death or non-existent?

That he should be able to does not mean that he should choose to. I don't think it's a necessarily safe assumption to assume that things would simply be better that way.

And further, God has a very different perspective on the universe, and may have reasons we can't even imagine for allowing the universe to function as it does. So long as the possibility exists that he has a reason for what he does, I can't assume that he's wrong for doing so.

Murdering people just for the sake of jealousy is a sin for us, yes. But even before guessing as to what His reasons could be for doing so, it's fair to ask why you expect God to be held by the same moral commandments he passed on to us? He could have very good reasons why we are forbidden to do something ourselves, on our own, but He is within his rights to command it.

From a Christian Apologetics organization called Stand To Reason.

I suppose you could say that, if you could also say that the Bible is just a history book. But morality isn't the only thing that comes from God, so why do you think that's all he is?

And God didn't choose what people would do. He made the choice to create humanity, and it is up to us to make our own choices. Just like a parent raising a child, like Samy brought up.

This is slippery ground. It begs the question, What is our own morality?

Subjective to the individual, but at the same time believe that there is an absolute moral code. Perhaps God is a way for humans to define this code?

The only way we can call something right or wrong is if we have an objective standard, outside of ourselves, to measure up against. This is a position that God fills.

I won't say that the Bible is never unclear on anything, that's certainly not true. But I won't admit that it's an ambiguous and contradictory mess. If there are specific contradictions that I can help make sense of for you, I'd be glad to help.

You make a good point. Questioning is always a good thing. But please don't assume that because you don't like the way things are, there isn't a reason that that's the way it is.

What is freewill in a world without consequences?

How so? If God is the standard for morality, and the Bible is His word to us, then hasn't he given us an understanding of true morality?

In what way is morality separate from God?

What I would suggest is a third option. That morality is a part of His character. That His character is inherently good, He can't be evil.

Then everything He commands is good, not because He wills it to be so, but because it's a part of who He is, and He can't command differently.

But I believe that morality does lead to God. You seem to be saying that if morality comes from God, and we can sense morality, then we would have a tendency to believe in God. Can you say that we don't?

I love it, all the Christians in this thread bending and altering their story along the way, digging bits out of the Bible, and using them to argue a completely invalid point, then directing the subject towards prayers, morality etc, all things which have no relation to the validity of God's existence, therefore the whole basis of the Christian religion.

we are absolutely random, a creation of the universe expanding and not with any purpose in mind by some magical being up in the skies, no heaven, no hell, no purgatory, no miracles, everything is absolutely random.

There are part of evolution that are not random at all, so i wouldn't say we are totally random

As God isn't real, and the Bible is full of man written crap by delusional theists before science could help humans out and explain the unknown things which occurred at the time, they needed an explanation, "OH NO, NOBODY KNOWS"

You made a whole lot of claims and told a lot of stories, but you haven't backed it up at all. It's easy enough for you to say, but can you prove it?

We are still left with all the examples of where morality is subjective. In fact the argument on slavery in the Bible and how it was acceptable back then and reprehensible now is a clear example of such subjectivity.

You mean it wouldn't be better if say a baby wasn't born with a severe congenital deformity and just lived a short painful life?

As you can see depending on the situation and persons perspective on that situation what's moral can change, thus subjective.

What's it say about kill/murder?

Why do you make the assumption God is real when no empirical evidence is presented?

There are plenty who do bad things and have good things happen to them while there are plenty who do good things and have bad things happen to them. it almost seems as if the consequences are arbitrary.

Apologetic? About as bad as creation sites.

Many Christian claim these morals as absolutes. As such they would apply to everyone, including God.

You've said yourself you claim that an objective moral code governing us doesn't have to apply to God. This would mean he is separate from it.

That's pretty much Christian apologetics in a nut shell.

You know what? That perfectly sums up the Bible!

I've stated my reasons - perhaps you didn't read them. They're underneath that sentence.

-It makes a lot of claims and tells a lot of stories
-Most of them it doesn't back up at all
-It's all said so easily but yet none of it is proven

It makes claims about the existence of God, Jesus, Holy Spirit, Earth and everything else Created in 6 days, rising from the dead, walking on water, etc... And the Bible is composed of stories supposedly chronicling the life and times of God and Jeebus.

Many of these claims aren't backed up by any real evidence at all - they're just put forth (said so easily) and not proven in any way shape or form.

is god the all-knowing?
or does predestination apply?

if either of those apply, then in creating the angel Lucifer, later renamed Satan, then did God not know, from the beginning, that Lucifer would rebel against god and try to overthrow him? did he not just create evil, knowing full well about it, and not do a thing? did he not create the deaths of millions of people, when god created evil?

no answers?

hmm that could be a sign....