Everything Wrong with Genesis....

[Joshpantera]

 

 

[Joshpantera]

 

 

 

[TheRedneckProfessor]

Also;

 

 

[florduh]

Most of my discussions with my former pastor revolved around the mess that Genesis is. Turns out I just needed more faith. 

 

[Joshpantera]

I always have the apologists stopped at Genesis 1. They can't reconcile it, and then there's no use going any further. And plus, by then they usually get mad and storm off. Or in the case of christforums, shut down dialogue on their own forums and stop the questioning from going any further. So, going forward into Genesis 2 and beyond while pointing out every nonsensical thing that follows, doesn't often get aired out. 

 

But every nonsensical thing does follow. It just bumbles along down the path of the bibles introductory chapter........

 

 

 

[Hierophant]

41 minutes ago, florduh said:

Most of my discussions with my former pastor revolved around the mess that Genesis is. Turns out I just needed more faith. 

 

 

@Joshpantera  I love how apologist try to twist that word to make it mean "confidence, trust," as if that stands on a better foundation than just believing.

[TABA]

Yes at some point you’re expected to disengage your critical thinking and just accept it.  I did that: for a while both before and after my baptism I did ask difficult questions, but before too long I succumbed to the groupthink.  I’m embarrassed that it took me more than twenty more years before I re-engaged my brain...

[Tsathoggua9]

I caught a lot of the Genesis nonsense pretty early on, as an inquisitive child. It read like "just another mythology / creation story" to me!

But I stayed in church anyway (physical presence, while disengaged intellectually); for longer than I should.

I'm just grateful for the internet, nowadays, so that people can get good accurate information if they search for it!

Fewer people will remain "churched up" when they have such access. At least that's what I'ma hopin'........

[Joshpantera]

I saw a Rabbi trying to excuse the nonsensical structure of Genesis on youtube. He was basically saying that it's poetic writing and such, and the problem is with people who insist that it's written literally. Well yes, exactly! 

 

And the conclusion is what? 

 

This is not live coverage of the creation of the universe and earth. This is not science, not symbolic of science, nor metaphorical for the actual science of how the universe and earth came to be. It should be obvious, then, that if a god did create the universe and earth, it didn't do so according to Genesis 1 or 2, and therefore the bible can not be used as such a platform. Poetic writing doesn't = credible, objective, and factual based content. This is what scares the apolgist's. The conclusion is that the bible is not a divine revelation of objective reality. And as a subjective context, well, it can step into line along with every other subjective, non-objective religious work. Any of which could be used as a metaphor just as well as any other. None of which are metaphorical of objective, physical reality. They are only metaphors for the mystery of it all. Which isn't an objective issue. 

 

And I have to ask myself what value the poetic reading has. If you're Jewish, sure, then I get it. It's cultural. It's your mythology. It has relevance in that way. But to gentile christians? What relevance does it have over our own European, Asian, African, South Pacific Islander, or North and South American cultural myths? When you really think about it, it doesn't have a lot of relevance. Why not take poetic value from myths of Thor, or Zeus, or some other regional and cultural mythology? These are questions that should began to come into view when it becomes obvious that Genesis is neither (1) literally true, nor (2) representative of the whole world and all cultures in the way that it's presented as literally true in the myth. No flood. No tower of Babel. No lineage linking everyone to Noah's family, let alone Adam and Eve. 

 

The whole thing folds like a sack of potatoes....

[Tsathoggua9]

On 5/28/2020 at 3:04 PM, Joshpantera said:

I saw a Rabbi trying to excuse the nonsensical structure of Genesis on youtube. He was basically saying that it's poetic writing and such, and the problem is with people who insist that it's written literally. Well yes, exactly! 

 

And the conclusion is what? 

 

This is not live coverage of the creation of the universe and earth. This is not science, not symbolic of science, nor metaphorical for the actual science of how the universe and earth came to be. It should be obvious, then, that if a god did create the universe and earth, it didn't do so according to Genesis 1 or 2, and therefore the bible can not be used as such a platform. Poetic writing doesn't = credible, objective, and factual based content. This is what scares the apolgist's. The conclusion is that the bible is not a divine revelation of objective reality. And as a subjective context, well, it can step into line along with every other subjective, non-objective religious work. Any of which could be used as a metaphor just as well as any other. None of which are metaphorical of objective, physical reality. They are only metaphors for the mystery of it all. Which isn't an objective issue. 

 

And I have to ask myself what value the poetic reading has. If you're Jewish, sure, then I get it. It's cultural. It's your mythology. It has relevance in that way. But to gentile christians? What relevance does it have over our own European, Asian, African, South Pacific Islander, or North and South American cultural myths? When you really think about it, it doesn't have a lot of relevance. Why not take poetic value from myths of Thor, or Zeus, or some other regional and cultural mythology? These are questions that should began to come in to view when it becomes obvious that Genesis is neither (1) literally true, nor (2) representative of the whole world and all cultures in the way that it's presented as literally true in the myth. No flood. No tower of Babel. No lineage linking everyone to Noah's family, let alone Adam and Eve. 

 

The whole thing folds like a sack of potatoes....

 

Excellent points! My sentiments, exactly.

[SilentVoice]

Is this a good time to mention unironically that the heliocentric model is nonsense and that the earth is flat?

[Hierophant]

52 minutes ago, SilentVoice said:

Is this a good time to mention unironically that the heliocentric model is nonsense and that the earth is flat?

 

Like this?:

[SilentVoice]

1 minute ago, Hierophant said:

 

Like this?:

Yeah but there are things on that picture I've not seen before. Good picture, thanks.

[midniterider]

14 hours ago, SilentVoice said:

Is this a good time to mention unironically that the heliocentric model is nonsense and that the earth is flat?

 

 

[Hierophant]

@SilentVoice

 

I would like to hear your reasoning as to why you think the video of the earth is a manipulation, a scheme of NASA to fool the masses, but that the Bible, also a product of humans, is nothing but the literal portrayal of the past and history. If you are suspicious of human meddling, is it not very possible the Bible, written by fallible human beings, is not suspect to tampering, falsehoods, legends, folktales, and embellishments?

[Bhim]

@SilentVoice...can you have your pastor send us a mentally healthy Christian? Not even saying you have to leave. I just want to have someone interesting to debate with.

[Bhim]

8 minutes ago, SilentVoice said:

How's your Hinduism working out? I ate beef for dinner.

 

Good for you, but you just violated 1 Corinthians 10:32-33 by telling me that. Furthermore, that wasn't beef you had for dinner. You've got a demon, and he just made you eat human flesh.

[Bhim]

8 minutes ago, SilentVoice said:

Nope. Cows were made food by God to be received with thanksgiving. Why revere or worship anything that walks on 4 legs when you could worship God.

 

OK I give up. Are you overcompensating due to being a heterosexual fornicator or being gay?

[Bhim]

3 minutes ago, SilentVoice said:

what

 

Do you even troll bro?

 

Anyway I'm bored. Send in a real Christian please.

[Bhim]

21 minutes ago, SilentVoice said:

Since you spend a lot of time whining about how people can't provide simple definitions (even though they do), can you define "real Christian"?

 

I decline to do so. But you can feel free to go ahead!

[Hierophant]

1 hour ago, SilentVoice said:

It requires the premise that Satan is God's enemy and trying to rob God of glory by deceiving people so that they will not worship the Lord of creation. If you follow the logic, it will make sense. It's difficult to explain without being accused of being a conspiracy theorist, but it's essentially what we're talking about.

 

Wernher von Braun (the 'father of rocket science') had on his gravestone Psalm 19:1 The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork.

You could argue that he was just 'interested in space' but it's an odd quote for somebody to be remembered by since the heliocentric model is completely opposed to the creation story. If he was going to leave a monument to atheistic science he could have left a multitude of things on his gravestone regarding space, so why something biblical?

 

You included a lot of information there and it would be too much to respond to in one chunk. I just whittled it down to what I think is a manageable size:

 

I cannot agree to your premise of Satan as God's enemy. I know what I am about to say is not going to resonate with you, but I am going to state my reasons why I find the idea of Satan, as understood in modern Christianity, unwarranted.

 

First and foremost, "the satan" as we see in the Old Testament is not an adversary of God, he acts as God's agent. "The satan" literally means accuser or adversary, in that, he was an agent of God who would test people and see if they measured up. This is what we see in the book of Job. Hell, especially as Satan's domain, is never mentioned in the Old Testament. The idea of a life after death was a progression of theology that grew over the centuries. The oldest idea of the Hebrews was that this life is all there was and if you followed God's commandments, then he would bless you with a good life and bounty. This is also known as the prophetic view ~ follow God's laws and you will be okay, disobey him, and he will bring evil upon you. This idea changed over time because there were times where the Jews were doing the right thing and they were still getting attacked, overran, and destitute. The religious leaders of the day could not figure out what was happening and the theology started to morph. Over time they developed the apocalyptic view, which meant that if God is just, then he will hand out punishment and rewards in the next life. In that same vein, the idea of Satan started to develop more to the character he is today. Religious leaders were having a difficult time piecing together how there was so much injustice in a world controlled by a good God. Eventually they figured there must be evil forces at work, i.e., the evil cosmic forces which God temporarily placed in control of earth. This idea is fairly pronounced in the New Testament. The apocalyptic view was of the mindset that God was coming back very soon to overthrow the evil principalities and establish his kingdom on earth.

 

Another thought on that is if God is all-knowing, all-powerful, and the other omni-like attributes, then Satan is just a puppet. Ultimately God has control of him and Satan is unable to act without God's explicit or implicit go ahead, so why even consider him. He is still God's agent. What, is he running covert operations under God's nose? No. Then God knows exactly what he is doing and is letting it go on for some reason. Which, if you ask me, is really screwed up. How could you say you want someone to know the truth and then do everything to undermine that? What sense does that make? If God is there, he could make it super easy for everyone to know who he is and what he wants if he was so inclined to do so. He could easily have stopped every competing religion from getting off the ground, he could have done a lot of things to ensure that people living far into the future of Biblical events would have no problem establishing them as historical and true.

 

My conclusion is that if Satan is running around doing anything and misleading people, then he is only doing so with God's permission. At the end of the day, if God created everything, this is his story, what is he so pissed off about? He didn't have to create Satan; he didn't have to create sin; he didn't have to do anything. If he is the all-in-all, then he only has himself to blame for how all of this turned out. He knew what was going to happen. Point being, I find the idea of Satan to be nonsense and not worth my time entertaining in light of a multi-omni God.

 

To the point of the Mr. Von Braun, just because some can appreciate the literary construct of the Bible does not mean they take it literally. Perhaps he just liked the words and resonated with the poetry. Moreover, there are plenty of scientist, physicist, astronauts, and the like who are believers, they just interpret the Bible differently.

 

One last note, nothing about the heliocentric model, Big Bang, or evolution equals atheism. Atheism says nothing about the universe or biological diversity. Atheism, as you probably already know, just means a lack of belief in a God or Gods. Much like you do not believe in Allah, the god's of Hinduism, Buddha, Attis, Dionysus, Zeus, Apollo, and the like, atheists go one step further and say they find the evidence for the God of the Bible to be lacking, and therefore do not exercise a belief in that God.

 

Nothing about our understanding of the universe means a god does not exist. Plenty of Christians believe in the heliocentric model and evolution based on the facts and evidence. I get where you are coming from. I used to be a young earth creationist until I really looked at the evidence for myself. It is quite overwhelming. That does not mean the Christian God does not exist, but I would say it undermines a literal interpretation of the Bible. To that point, who said a literal interpretation was the proper hermeneutic? There is no index in the Bible saying what is objectively real, what is a metaphor that speaks to a great spiritual truth, etc. Someone taught you to read it literally, just like someone, well multiple people, told me to how I was "supposed" to interpret the Bible.

[TABA]

14 minutes ago, Hierophant said:

This idea changed over time because there were times where the Jews were doing the right thing and they were still getting attacked, overran, and destitute. The religious leaders of the day could not figure out what was happening and the theology started to morph. Over time they developed the apocalyptic view, which meant that if God is just, then he will hand out punishment and rewards in the next life. In that same vein, the idea of Satan started to develop more to the character he is today. Religious leaders were having a difficult time piecing together how there was so much injustice in a world controlled by a good God. Eventually they figured there must be evil forces at work, i.e., the evil cosmic forces which God temporarily placed in control of earth. This idea is fairly pronounced in the New Testament. The apocalyptic view was of the mindset that God was coming back very soon to overthrow the evil principalities and establish his kingdom on earth.

 

Good summary of the changes that were underway in Judaism in the couple of centuries BC.  I would like to elaborate a bit...

 

It appears, from the earliest Gospels like Mark, that Jesus saw himself as the herald of God’s Kingdom, whereby the powers of evil (both the supernatural power that came to be known as Satan and the earthly power of Rome that was occupying the land of Israel) would be routed once and for all and God’s just kingdom would be established here on Earth.  But when instead, after the death of Jesus, Rome destroyed Jerusalem and the Jewish rebels, and Jesus did not return as promised in the lifetime of his disciples, the story had to evolve to reflect this.  In John and later writings, the Kingdom of God was re-launched as something in the hereafter. That became the Christian doctrine that prevailed.  

[midniterider]

1 hour ago, SilentVoice said:

You seem like the only ex-Christian on this site who I've seen that has any integrity at all. Not that I'm trying to bribe you into following the logic in my examples, I just want to thank you in the name of Jesus for not attacking me or joining in with the other people.

 

It requires the premise that Satan is God's enemy and trying to rob God of glory by deceiving people so that they will not worship the Lord of creation. If you follow the logic, it will make sense. It's difficult to explain without being accused of being a conspiracy theorist, but it's essentially what we're talking about.

 

Wernher von Braun (the 'father of rocket science') had on his gravestone Psalm 19:1 The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork.

You could argue that he was just 'interested in space' but it's an odd quote for somebody to be remembered by since the heliocentric model is completely opposed to the creation story. If he was going to leave a monument to atheistic science he could have left a multitude of things on his gravestone regarding space, so why something biblical?

 

Why was NASA able to send people to the moon using vehicles made out of tissue paper rolls and gold foil (through supposedly deadly radiation belts) but then 40 years later admit that they forgot how to do it? Are any of you paying attention? Also forgive me if I'm taking for granted the evidence that I'm talking about, countless pictures of NASA vehicles that look like they are made by first grade children as art projects, documentaries of prototype landing vehicles crashing by Neil Armstrong literally days before they were scheduled to be shot at the moon, the moon footage of someone holding a camera (standing on the moon) watching the landing vehicle blast off in to orbit again (uh oh... somebody got left behind?). Oh and the best part is how it looked like it was being pulled up by a string. Do you ever wonder why NASA has a red fork serpent tongue in its logo? Or why NASA keep releasing literal artistic drawings of 'Earth' from 'orbit' and they are completely laughable and obviously fake yet countless millions of people think they are real. When was the last time you watched a cartoon and believed it was real life?

 

I keep getting ahead of myself arguing points while assuming that you know what I'm talking about. For example, by the heliocentric model being completely opposed to the creation story, if you take the word of God literally, the book of Genesis starts out with light being created before the Sun, etc. A scientist of today will dismiss it. They believe the big bang sent matter out into emptiness and that light is a product of the energy of stars. A constantly moving Earth, spinning at 1000mph, hurtling through space at incomprehensible speeds is not the same thing  as God setting up the pillars of the Earth, an unmovable foundation.

 

Big bang theory supports the heliocentric model which is demonstrably false (though I'd love to post the evidence, I can't upload the attachments). Big bang theory also supports the possibility of abiogenesis and by extension atheism. Essentially, you are alive but you are nothing, you evolved from a rock and you are worthless and won't be remembered, you should just do whatever feels good. This is the environment that people grow up in and the message they are being given. It's so far removed from the goodness of God that only a cursed liar could think it up out of malice.

 

If the big bang was true, and the heliocentric model was real, why would NASA have to fake pictures? Why couldn't they just take a really impressive picture? If it doesn't look interesting, so what? At least it would be true, right? Scientists would still enjoy the pictures, 'nerds' would still print that stuff on lunch boxes and t-shirts. So why make stupid-looking fakes?

 

Look at this picture.

In the bottom right you see North America, approx 20% the size of the sphere.

To the left of it you see North America so big that it almost covers the Northern hemisphere.

 

So what, did a continent grow 50% in 10 years? Or was this a stupid insult from Satan that was eagerly eaten up and taken to heart?

 

Look at 2007. Are the North waters turquoise now? If it wasn't so tragic and malicious I'd laugh. You are being deceived. Tell me honestly, looking at that picture. Did you ever marvel at them and believe they were real? Do you look at it now and think they are literal photographs?

 

Just when I think I've made my point, I realize no, some atheist will say something completely stupid like "yeah but North America looks bigger because the camera was closer" and miss the point about how the sphere would need to be much bigger if that was the case.

 

For those who might be interested, this is related to fake news too. Do you know when you hear about police scheduling an anti-terror exercise and then they spend a few hours in the street doing a roleplay, and then there follows news footage of an actual terror attack (i.e. not telling you that police were shutting down a few streets to practice a response scenario) and then news teams show up to showing leftist protestors trying to ban guns and calling white people terrorists, etc.

 

I read once that in black magic, one of the things that make the practitioner feel better about themselves is that they expect their victims to be aware of the attacks, or pick up small clues, so instead the fault becomes the victims' and not their own. That may be the reason why the evidence remains around for people to look at, but the sportsball watching masses aren't interested in such things, so it's their own fault for being taken advantage of.

 

 

 

I was thinking you were just a Poe or a troll. But your post above has cleared up that misconception. 

[midniterider]

1 hour ago, SilentVoice said:

It requires the premise that Satan is God's enemy and trying to rob God of glory by deceiving people so that they will not worship the Lord of creation. If you follow the logic, it will make sense. It's difficult to explain without being accused of being a conspiracy theorist, but it's essentially what we're talking about.

 

 

Jesus lets Satan rob him of his glory? Satan must be as powerful or even more powerful than Jesus for that to occur. Or else Jesus just doesnt care that Satan is robbing him? Why does Jesus need glory, anyway? Does he have self-esteem issues?

[Bhim]

4 hours ago, SilentVoice said:

 

For those who might be interested, this is related to fake news too. Do you know when you hear about police scheduling an anti-terror exercise and then they spend a few hours in the street doing a roleplay, and then there follows news footage of an actual terror attack (i.e. not telling you that police were shutting down a few streets to practice a response scenario) and then news teams show up to showing leftist protestors trying to ban guns and calling white people terrorists, etc.

 

Um...I'm a pretty avid fan of conservative politics (not trolling here, anyone on ex-C will tell you that I support Trump). This is not a conspiracy hypothesis that I have heard. SV...you're nuts. But you should still go to the polls and vote Trump. I hope I didn't just commit a felony by encouraging the mentally ill to vote.

 

4 hours ago, SilentVoice said:

I read once that in black magic, one of the things that make the practitioner feel better about themselves is that they expect their victims to be aware of the attacks, or pick up small clues, so instead the fault becomes the victims' and not their own. That may be the reason why the evidence remains around for people to look at, but the sportsball watching masses aren't interested in such things, so it's their own fault for being taken advantage of.

 

Hold on, you also mock spectator sports as "sportsball?" Hey, we may finally have something in common!