Why I am not a Christian

[RichDellaValle]

 

 

A comment by AIK that I had stinkin' thinkin', moved me to explain why I abandoned the fundamentalist Christian Church so here goes. The Old Testament (OT), also known as the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh, is a collection of ancient religious Hebrew writings by sages and prophets depicting the history of God, Israel, and its people. First, God laid out his rules and regulations, demanding his chosen ones to obey. Then, he laid out specific sacrifices and other means of atonement for when they chose to disobey. Next, the authors asserted that God was adamant about being the ONLY God to be worshipped, and worshipping others was the worst thing any human could do. The writers make this very clear at least 25 times.

 

 

If you read the OT, you will find that the Hebrews were hard-core sinners rejecting God repeatedly. God took many brutal actions against them and eventually destroyed them in an epic flood, except for Noah and his family (as an ancient Sumerian God did many years prior). But, in this version, God promises a new covenant in which all of God’s laws will be imprinted upon all humans, and they will live in peace without strife or sin. Why he couldn’t do that in the first place is a mystery.

 

Many years later, Gentiles came along and fabricated an entirely different interpretation of the Old Testament promise of a new covenant claiming a savior would die for the sins of the people, so when they died, they would go to a beautiful place called Heaven and live forever. They claimed that Adam’s sin affected all humans and called this dogma Original Sin. They did this despite clear OT scripture that says, “The fathers shall not be put to death for the children, neither shall the children be put to death for the fathers: every man shall be put to death for his sin. (Deut 24:16). See also: Ex 20:5-6, Ex 34:6-7, 2Kings 14:6, Ez 18:20, Lev 26:40-42. It can’t get clearer that at the center of the Mosaic Law, God forgives the sins of those who repent, negating a need for a Savior.

 

If that isn’t bad enough, the Roman Church (who issued the New Testament) claims that this savior, Jesus, is God himself in human form despite God’s first commandment. Since they realized that only God could forgive sins, they fabricated a doctrine called the “Holy Trinity,” meaning a three-in-one God: Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. But hold on, this Jesus always existed as God from the beginning and is represented in the OT – but in secret! Search as hard as you like; you will never find that God screened or veiled his divine nature throughout the Jewish Scriptures. Isaiah unequivocally proclaimed that the Almighty did not reveal Himself in darkness or in a hidden or veiled fashion. The prophet declares in the Almighty’s name, “I have not spoken in SECRET, from somewhere in a land of darkness; I have not said to Jacob’s descendants, “Seek Me in vain.” I, the Lord speak the truth; I declare what is right. (Isaiah 45:19). Let’s not forget Mark 7:8-9 – “You have disregarded the commandment of God to keep the tradition of men.” He went on to say, “You neatly set aside the command of God to maintain your own tradition.” (I wonder how that truth snuck in there? I took it out of context as an apologist would declare.)

 

Repeatedly the Old Testament declared with careful clarity in its most honored creeds that the Almighty alone is God, and there is no other. Neither is there a mention or hint of a possible Trinity. Moreover, the Trinity doctrine cannot be found anywhere in the New Testament because primitive Christianity was still monotheistic in its earliest stages. The authors of the New Testament were unaware that the corrupt Roman Church would eventually embrace a pagan deification of a triune deity and sneak in a fabricated verse (1Jn 5:7) in the fourth century.

 

It is generally, although erroneously, supposed that the doctrine of the Trinity is of Christian origin. Nearly every nation of antiquity possessed a similar doctrine. The early Catholic theologian St. Jerome testifies unequivocally, ‘All the ancient nations believed in the Trinity.’” https://sacred-texts.com/bib/cv/wscs/wscs29.htm

 

 Further confusing the issue, God can’t die. So who died on the cross? If it was Jesus, the man, there could be no salvation. Anyone can see that the New Testament is a sloppily contrived farce, and rational people should reject it. Admittedly it took me 24 years to figure it all out. But, assuming for the sake of clarity that there is legitimacy to the Jewish Bible, I am not a Christian today because that account tells us not to be. Even though I conceded legitimacy regarding the OT, I only claim that because the old is the basis for the new meaning, Christians should trust both. I don’t. However, I admit I enjoy much of the writings attributed to Solomon. “What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun” is one of the keenest observations about life. It certainly explains why all religions are based partly or wholly on earlier beliefs and those before them. I recall when I was a youth enrolled in Catechism classes, the priest warned us that Solomon was an outlier and really didn’t belong in the Bible. It’s been over 50 years since I last read his three books, and I forget a lot, but perhaps I’ll revisit Solomon now that I know he is not biblical. Oh, by the way, speaking of Solomon, God did promise that from the seed of Solomon would come the Moshiach to deliver the Jews from their TEMPORAL problems related to their earthly life. If that Messiah was Jesus, as Christians believe, he really screwed up by getting killed before taking out the Romans!

 

I might also add that Gen 1:26  states, “And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness,” proving that there are more Gods out there, but “the” God ordered that he was the top God and not to honor the others. Christians believe those other Gods were Jesus and the Holy Ghost and fabricated the “Trinity” doctrine based on this verse. So the logical question is why Christians worship Jesus – the other God – when clearly ordered not to?

 

In summary, I can’t find a single passage where the OT God wants to start a new religion. On the contrary, the Old Testament is explicit in the commandment to honor only Him (the Jewish God). He admits there are other Gods but maintains that he is the true God. There is no talk (overt or covert) of him having different personas: a son and a Holy Spirit. I suspect deception of the gravest nature by the forgers of the New Testament. I could get along with the final goal if it were true, I can stand the BS, but I cannot stand all the lying! Therefore I am no longer a Christian.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[◊ Weezer ◊]

17 hours ago, RichDellaValle said:

 

I might also add that Gen 1:26  states, “And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness,” proving that there are more Gods out there, but “the” God ordered that he was the top God and not to honor the others. Christians believe those other Gods were Jesus and the Holy Ghost and fabricated the “Trinity” doctrine based on this verse. So the logical question is why Christians worship Jesus – the other God – when clearly ordered not to?

 

 

Excellent point!

Have you read the interpretations of ancient Sumerian cuneiform writings about their "gods" making man in their image for slaves?  Hebrew writers seem to have borrowed heavily from them (much older than Hebrew writings) for the Genesis story.

 

Edit:  Ignore this if I have addressed it elsewhere in discussion with you.  My memory is getting poor.

[RichDellaValle]

6 hours ago, Weezer said:

 

Hebrew writers seem to have borrowed heavily from them (much older than Hebrew writings) for the Genesis story.

 

 

The similarities between Sumerian, Akkadian, and Babylonian texts with the Hebrew bible are too similar to be ignored—Ditto for gentile religions with ancient myths.

[TABA]

On 5/10/2023 at 8:23 AM, RichDellaValle said:

Many years later, Gentiles came along and fabricated an entirely different interpretation of the Old Testament promise of a new covenant claiming a savior would die for the sins of the people, so when they died, they would go to a beautiful place called Heaven and live forever. They claimed that Adam’s sin affected all humans and called this dogma Original Sin. They did this despite clear OT scripture that says, “The fathers shall not be put to death for the children, neither shall the children be put to death for the fathers: every man shall be put to death for his sin.

 

It is worth noting the early Christian belief system of Marcionism.  According to Wikipedia, "Marcion preached that the benevolent God of the Gospel who sent Jesus Christ into the world as the savior was the true Supreme Being, different and opposed to the malevolent Demiurge or creator god, identified with the Hebrew God of the Old Testament."  Such was the disconnect between the Old Testament and the Jesus story.  

[◊ Weezer ◊]

7 hours ago, TABA said:

 

It is worth noting the early Christian belief system of Marcionism.  According to Wikipedia, "Marcion preached that the benevolent God of the Gospel who sent Jesus Christ into the world as the savior was the true Supreme Being, different and opposed to the malevolent Demiurge or creator god, identified with the Hebrew God of the Old Testament."  Such was the disconnect between the Old Testament and the Jesus story.  

 

A question for all of you, do you think it would have made a diference in the world of religion (and in the overall world) if Marcion's group had won the argument?   Would the Romans have made it their official religion?

[TABA]

11 hours ago, Weezer said:

A question for all of you, do you think it would have made a diference in the world of religion (and in the overall world) if Marcion's group had won the argument?   Would the Romans have made it their official religion?

It’s an intriguing question!  
 

Yes, I think it would have made a very big difference.  Marcionite Christians rejected the Old Testament and its god entirely.  This separated them completely from Judaism.  A Mariconite Roman Empire would probably not have tolerated the existence of Judaism and might have extinguished it by force, rather than merely subjugating the Jews and their land.  
 

But then again, would some Roman emperor have embraced a Marcionite Christianity that embraced Jesus’s teachings and rejected the warlike god YHWH?  The Old Testament was - and sometimes still is - used by Christians to justify all kinds of aggression, slavery, misogyny etc. A Marcionite theology might not have been a good fit for an expansionist empire.  Those of us who abhor so much of the Old Testament theology might wish Marcionism had triumphed, but its very nature might have made it unlikely to win out.  

 

 

[◊ Weezer ◊]

12 hours ago, TABA said:

 

But then again, would some Roman emperor have embraced a Marcionite Christianity that embraced Jesus’s teachings and rejected the warlike god YHWH?  The Old Testament was - and sometimes still is - used by Christians to justify all kinds of aggression, slavery, misogyny etc. A Marcionite theology might not have been a good fit for an expansionist empire.  Those of us who abhor so much of the Old Testament theology might wish Marcionism had triumphed, but its very nature might have made it unlikely to win out.  

 

That's along the lines of what I am thinking.  Human ego seems to win out in society over time.  Moral evolution (if it is happening) seems extremely slow.