>>>MOD WARNING<<<Part 33 of Post Your Tough Questions Regarding Christianity

Please read this first
GENERAL WARNING AND POSTING GUIDELINESl


Part 33 is a continuation of post your tough questions pertaining to God/Jesus/Holy Bible and I will do my best to clarify and make sense of it to those who are unaware...I still have questions and comments I haven't responded to in Part 9 thru 32.

I don't want my intentions to come across as converting you or whatever lol... but rather clear up things etc... so ask away.

Also I don't want people to feel like I'm ignoring your question/questions/comment/comments, like I said I'm still answering questions on Part 9 and so yes, I'm behind. And so when your question comes up and if it is coherent enough in my view I will then answer it. Sometimes I do answer questions out of order but for the most part I answer them as I'm going through the threads.

And please let's try to be as civil as we can and not resort to flame-baiting and insults. Ok thanks for your understanding & patience!...so again ask away.

 

Yeah, I understand your feelings. Only one being we can all trust in anything and that being is our Creator, Almighty God! After all His ways and thoughts are always higher than any of our ways and thoughts!

 

Go up a rung on the ladder and step into theologic. That suggestion is not to say that you personally have not taken that next rung underfoot.

 

Supposedly it's ONLY "repent your sins and accept Christ as your Lord and Savior"....

but as you will learn reading Mitt's threads, you must also be a Literalist interpreter of the Bible who believes the book is entirely accurate and historically true from Genesis to Revelations.....

otherwise you're not a "real Christian" and sadly....go to Hell.

 

Well said Inc.! Yes indeed! Any person who denies that God is capable of providing necessary knowledge to man either directly or through the angels or the Holy Spirit is the one who denies the Power of God and that person would be one who is under the influence of Satan.

Satan the father of all evil!

 

That would be one Christian version "Sola Fide" Salvation by Faith alone.

This is a relatively new Christian doctrine introduced by Luther (founder of Protestantism/ Lutheran Church).

It would be all good and well if this were the only salvation formulation. Then I could be certain that I had the Golden Key into the pearly gates.

Unfortunately the majority of Christianity (Catholic and Orthodox) do not believe this doctrine. These other formulations have a works based formulation where one needs to do good works (or be lacking in bad ones) to gain entrance.

Since these doctrines contradict each other ... what am I do to ? Who am I to believe.

Clearly only one can be right but how does one know ? Since both claim to be right but, one of the two must be wrong, this puts doubt in my head.

What if both are wrong and neither has the key. Then what ?

 

I have never met a non-believer who comes away understanding the message/lesson behind the story of Job. The perspective coming from a non-believer will always be negative regarding this story, that's no surprise if you're not going to read the entire story from start to finish without any kind of bias to see what's really behind the story.

As you read the story we see that Job and his friends debate God's fairness and it's obviously apparent that all of them basically believe in the doctrine of 'retribution theology'...meaning that one deserves punishment for evil done or sometimes reward for good done. So we should be able to tell who is righteous or wicked by whether they are blessed or cursed as we visibly see it in people's personal lives here on earth.

This is a false doctrine, but Job thought it should be true and went on the offensive to charge God with injustice and as we read Job chapters 29-31, he calls for a trial before God.

To read more and to see what our take-home lesson is in regards to the story of Job click on the link below from my favorite Christian web-site.

Read more: http://www.gotquestions.org/God-Job-Satan.html#ixzz3g1JAxB7D

God does not inflict pain and agony and every kind of suffering on the innocent much less deems it to be moral. Your understanding of God is flawed because you have not understood the message/lesson behind the story of Job. It was the father of all evil Satan who inflicted pain and agony in the life of Job.

No, morality is not arbitrary with respect to God. God's morality is absolute, it is universal, unchanging as He is. God sets the absolute standard for our morality.

In the Christian perspective God is the source of our morality but that morality is not arbitrary but is absolute.

And you probably will never encounter one who would call themselves a moral relativists. In the Christian perspective moral absolutism is true while moral relativism is false. If one were to look closely at the arguments for moral relativism one would clearly see their dubious nature.

 

Mitt is well aware I was referring to the Hebrew interpretation of their own scriptures, the Tanakh - not atheistic. He and I are in conflict over this. His inability to understand them is his problem.

 

The story of Job is merely a discussion of why the 'righteous' suffer. It follows other such discussions in early stories and civilisations.

As to 'Gods morals'. Who knows? Who can understand the mind of 'God'?

Perhaps you should read this. http://www.ted.com/talks/jonathan_haidt_on_the_moral_mind?language=en
I could have quoted passages to support my point but that would be cheating. The article also offers points that could dispute these passages.

Science tells us that simple morals are to be found in the higher primates.

Human Evolution: An Introduction to Mans Adaptations
By Bernard Grant Campbell. 'We cannot tell what is going on within their heads, but it is clear that social groups of primates show what we would call among our own specious an established and recognisable - if limited - moral sense. Without any doubt, the seeds of human ethics and morality exist among the higher primates.'.

 

Boy do I hate to get involved in this thread, but I opened it since it was only a page long.
That said...

Scientists can certainly note behavior of animals but there is no way they can determine the "morals" that animals do or do not possess.

"That ape didn't kill that other ape when it walked near him" does not equate to morals.



And for the record, Campbells writings on race have been a bit wishy-washy also.

 

The moral of the story of Job is that bad things sometimes happen to good people.

 

I see we are not allowed to remind Mitt that his interpretation is only that of Christianity. Therefore anything he says is biased toward Christianity and not necessarily the correct interpretation. Or to ask if the previous behaviour of certain persons is to be allowed to continue and 'liked'.

 

Regardless: Even the "Hebrew interpretation" is an interpretation offered by man... not God or the Holy Spirit. Religious worship is a personal, individual experience... not something that one person can dictate to another.... whether it be Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, or any of the other notable world renown religions.

 

Faith and works goes hand in hand this mean that after a person has received God or born again becoming a Christian he / she needs to cultivate that through good works becoming a Christian does not stop or end in faith alone. Example, we have seen how some individuals use God as an excuse to commit bad things those individuals have faith on God but they are doing bad works.


James 2:26 that faith without works is dead
Proverbs 14:31
Whoever oppresses the poor shows contempt for their Maker, but whoever is kind to the needy honors God.
Matthew 10:42
And if anyone gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones who is my disciple, truly I tell you, that person will certainly not lose their reward."
Matthew 25:40
"And the King will say, 'I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me!'
Matthew 25:45
"He will reply, 'Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.'

 

Christopher Boehm. Elsewhere (Boehm 1981c, 1981d) I have suggested that the origin of morality came
through deliberate interference in conflicts within co-operating groups of primates. Such interference occurs among adults in many extant monkeys which exhibit dominance rankings, and in great apes as well. Because such efforts apparently involve an intention to restore social harmony, I have called them "prot0--moral."
These animals display less cooperation at the group level than is generally assumed for protohominids, yet they are sufficiently sophisticated, socially, to manipulate many exacerbated conflicts. It is assumed that protohominids also recognized the value of social harmony and controlled obvious social problems such as severe fights with still more insight. However, monkeys and apes must not be underrated.
They employ an impressive range of deliberate techniques to interfere in conflicts so as to terminate them (Boehm, 1981d).

Frans de Waal ? Barbara King ?




Q:

http://instituteforscienceandhumanv...man Prospect/interview_with_frans_de_waal.htm



I don't know you're location. Here in the UK we have the largest 'Monkey World' in Europe. This is a rescue centre - not a zoo - which has groups of monkeys etc in as natural conditions as possible.

www.monkeyworld.org/

If you can get the series it's really worthwhile and instructive. previews on UTube www.youtube.com/watch?v=3u9aNAiwLGo

 

Hebrew or Judaism to be more precise interpretation of the Tanakh which is the OT for Christianity were wrong . God himself became human as Jesus Christ to tell the leaders of Judaism they got his words wrong and instead of listening and accepting the direct communication from God they rejected him.

 

Perhaps you should remind Mitt of that. He seems to think that the Christian interpretation is the true - and - only one.
That means of course that your interpretation of God and the Holy Spirit is only your human interpretation.
Interpretation of the spiritual side of the Bible is down to human interpretation, other aspects are not.

 

Perhaps you should do your own foot work. Yes, my interpretation of God and the Holy Spirit are my interpretation. However, that does not mean that there are no others who concur with my interpretation. Why? Because interpretation of scripture is a gift of the Spirit of God.

[TABLE="class: bibleTable"]
[TR]
[TD]"2Pe 1:20

[/TD]
[TD]Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.
[/TD]
[/TR]
[/TABLE]

2Pe 1:21 For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost."

 

Of course. Even Isaiah agrees with you. Isaiah 61.1. 48:16. Gods spirit moved in the Tanakh. But as someone who spent many years in the shadow of these 'gifts of the spirit', particularly the interpretation gift, I am somewhat unimpressed by many of the interpretations I heard. I see no reason why the Holy Spirit cannot be open with people. At Pentecost the 'Jews, devout men' wherever they were from, would have been able to understand either Hebrew or Greek - Lingua Franca of the day.

The end of Acts 2 - 41 is Christian propaganda. 3000 souls converted and baptised on the same day? We'll assume the rest is later.

 

Whether or not you are or were impressed is irrelevant. That thought is an indication that you are leaning on feelings as opposed to being logical.

Apparently you are speaking for yourself and perhaps the spirit that is leading your thoughts, but certainly not speaking for me. I will not agree to such an assumption. As for the propaganda. Do you have positive evidence to support that positive assertion?

 

Logic the use and study of valid reasoning. When 2 perfectly sincere christians give 'spirit led' interpretations it's logical to assume at least one is wrong. When some gives a 'prophecy in tongues' and someone 'interpretes' and it fails, it is logical to assume that the prophet is 'mistaken'. Likewise the interpreter.

On the other hand I can give you examples of things that defy logic and have nothing to do with religion. Like someone telling me they had seen, in a dream, what was going to happen to a particular individual they had never heard of in their waking hours. I knew who they were talking about from my past, but had never spoken of her. That happened twice and the 'prophecies' came true. I've been able to tell several people that have set their minds on a course of action the outcome of their actions. Prophecy? No. Experience of life.

I'm sorry I don't think you need any 'spirit' to interprete scripture. Study, an open mind and understanding of a subject. Anything else is purely a private opinion.

There is no logic in religion. Just faith in something that may or may not exist.

 

Theo-Logic 101, the use and study of valid Godly reasoning.: When one attempts to defeat theologic by using mans logic and in so doing the one makes mistakes in the presentation, it is theo-logical to assume that the one does not know what he is talking about.

The error resides in your first example: You stated "When 2 perfectly sincere christians give 'spirit led' interpretations it's logical to assume at least one is wrong." The premise does not indicate that the two interpretations were in conflict with one another.

 

The OT has nothing to do with Christianity. It came long before and has no mention of any Christian religion or Jesus. If you can find his name in the Tanakh please tell me.

 

Of course I don't use Theo Logic. Why should I. There is no god so it is meaningless.

 

Do you also have positive evidence to support that positive assertion?