Religous debates and questions

Maybe this is just me, but I've always found that it's rather unhealthy to fear and love someone at the same time. Seems rather indicative of an abusive relationship. Although, when you consider that God told Abraham to murder his child, well...

I believe the Abraham and Isaac business was only a test and God never really planned on having Isaac killed, which is why the angel appears before he does it.
Also, the fear I am referring to is not the traditional "scared of" fear,but rather the fear that is most often mentioned in scripture: reverential awe

Lorient Avandi wrote:I believe the Abraham and Isaac business was only a test and God never really planned on having Isaac killed, which is why the angel appears before he does it.

I'm aware of that, but it still strikes me as a very traumatic and abusive thing to do. I'm also not sure what the point of the "test" was, other than to be as manipulative and controlling as possible.

Also, the fear I am referring to is not the traditional "scared of" fear,but rather the fear that is most often mentioned in scripture: reverential awe

Fair point. Perhaps I've spent too much time reading up on evangelicals, who seem quite fond of making people literally scared of God (i.e., the thread of hell and such).

Evidence suggests that the proto Jews, in keeping with other peoples of the time practiced human sacrifice, many sxholars believe the Issac story to symbolically represent the end of that practice. Although there is evidence in the Bible itself that the practice continued as God speaks out against it in more than one passage, so by implication it must still have been an issue.

I get how killing something, taking an actual life could be seen as something fearful to do in a reveretial fear way, but I am moere interested in how it fits theologically with an all loving, compassionate God? How do Chrisitans deal with things like sacrifice, or when God orders the death of every man woman and child in the Caanite cities, or even when he kills His own followers for understandably lapsing back into Egyptian worship when Moses appears to have abandoned them?
How do they reconcile this violent, vicous God with the NT God of Love?

That is a very good question Petty, and I do not know how to answer it. I know that the only time God calls for human sacrifice, was Isaac. Abraham, as a child, had actually been offered as a sacrifice by his father. Before he could be killed though, something (I believe a spirit) killed all the priests and most likely his father.

In answer to the things such as the Noah story, Sodom & Gammorah, and the several times he had Idraelites killed, I d o not know why he did these things. Perhaps so he could keep his followers righteous, maybe to just punish them for disobeying, maybe to just make things easier for everyone else. I do not know the answer Petty, maybe only God knows.

Doesn't that worry you Lorient? That your God is capable of acts of severe violence and retirbution and you have no idea why? It would bother me.

Hell, it does bother me! In fact, Hell itself bothers me: why would a loving god condemn people to eternal torture for thought-crimes like not believing in him, or for "moral crimes" like homosexuality? When people do that we call them depraved dictators or murderous maniacs. Is God held to a lower moral standard when it comes to torture?

Ooh I dunno Eldo- Hell might not be so bad, especially when the alternative is an eternity of dullness finding different ways to tell God how great He is. Besides Paradises are always dreamt up by the religous and therefore morally dull. Go to Paradise you get 12 virgins. Go to Hell you get 12 fiery whores. I know who'd I rather spend eternity in the company of.

72 virgins, IIRC, but I don't think there's much of a choice depending on what kind of virgins they are.

72 seems a bit much, not sure I'd need 72 fiery whores but then again eternity is quite a long time. And just in case of any misunderstandings I'd best stipulate in the contract for my soul that I want female fiery whores.

I'm honestly not sure what anyone would do with 72 virgins or whores. And what would happen when that time of the month comes along and they've all been living together long enough to be in synch?

Thats buckie day.

I would that in heaven, every day is buckie day!

Mormons do not believe in Heaven and Hell in the traditional sense.

And no Petty, it does not bother me at all.

(what does bother me though is that video's bash on MTG, especially since it is usually not played on computers)

MTG?

You must be made of sterner stuff than me Lorient to consort with a God of unknown violent potential!

Magic the Gathering. And I had the same thought, Lorient; perhaps they should have said Runescape instead.

Runescape would have been a much better choice. You must really have no life if you resort to playing that.

Well, if they're in the afterlife...

Good point!

An entertaining critique on organised religion, disguised as a Discworld novel. Enjoy! Its really rather good.

I will probably watch it tomorrow, didn't feel like sitting through a 15 min video.

Its audio only- its a radio play adaption of a book, made by the BBC.

I'd still have to watch, can't just listen with my iPhone.

Was having a debate with a friend earlier about God's moral authority.
Thing is you live your life and apparently you are then judged, lead a good life, believe in God, and go to heaven, if you don't you don't get in.
But surely its reasonable to look at the track record of the judge? Whichincludes ordering the slaughter of men, women and children (during the taking of the Holy Land), seeking retribution on the followers of Moses who temporarly turned from God, wiping out every living thing except Noah his family and a selected menagrie, destroying the city of Soddom and Gomorroh killing everyone within and turnng one women into salt just for looking at it, He also advocates raped women be forced to marry their rapist, not to eat fish on a Friday, that gays are a worse sin than f*!@*ing a donkey, and that if you must have a sh*t to do it one mile from the city walls.
So does such a being if He does exist still have the moral authority to be worthy of human worship? (or sanity?)

In my experience, most religious arguments take God's moral authority for granted, and those that try to explain it rely on "well, he created the world and YOU, didn't he? What have you done?" Or to put it differently, they can quote Romans 9:20-21:

But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? "Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, 'Why did you make me like this?'" Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use?

Which is, of course, a massive non sequitur, not to mention utterly incompatible with the notion of human dignity or the dignity of sentient beings (thus suggesting that God is less moral than many contemporary humans).