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The Forum > General Discussion > The Paris atrocities are a display of faith

The Paris atrocities are a display of faith

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The Paris atrocities are a display of faith. The murderers had faith in the righteousness and justice of their acts. If we want to explain the acts of ISIS we need look no further than the story of the binding of Isaac in the Bible. In any civilised society it is a crime to kill one’s child. However, the willingness of Abraham to murder Isaac is regarded as a test of faith by many believers. With his absolute faith in God Abraham was willing to commit this great crime. One of the recent murderers in Paris was heard to say, “Allahu Akbar” which means “God is great” He worshipped the same kind of God that is in the Bible. His faith, like the faith of Abraham, justified murder. A man without such a faith might have questioned. He might have asked, “Am I doing right?” He might have doubted.

Faith is the enemy of reason. One can justify one’s faith by committing what action is necessary to prove one’s faith. I prefer doubt and reason to faith.

What is the lesson in the binding of Isaac? Some say it is obedience. To me it is a bad thing to obey when an authority figure commands atrocity even if the authority figure is a deity. Abraham should have said, “No.” All terrorists motivated by God should say, “No.”

Faith can promote and justify atrocity
Posted by david f, Friday, 20 November 2015 10:53:31 AM
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where you get your moral base to call something right or wrong is an act of faith david f. Most secularist who want to jusify their bigotry and lack of morals use pseudo science ( you know like murdering babies in wombs). Usually their attack on the God of Abraham, Issac and Israel is a cover to hide their bigotry because they know from this source is where every good thing comes. Next you will be telling me the faith of secular humanism has a good track record. I suppose secularism shares lying for the cause as ok just like Islam does.
Posted by runner, Friday, 20 November 2015 5:31:35 PM
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Dear davidf,

Only last week I had a thoroughly enjoyable time debating the Akedah as the two of us have done before. I've a different view of Abraham's actions but let's not divert from your point, that faith is somehow the central theme in the Paris killings.

Reports are emerging of just how little formal faith a number of the suicide attackers had.

“The pot-smoking Paris suicide bomber: Ex-wife reveals 'blood brother' terrorist was a jobless layabout who spent his time taking drugs and sleeping... and never went to the mosque”

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3322385/Ex-wife-Comptoir-Voltaire-caf-bomber-reveals-jobless-layabout-spent-day-bed-smoking-pot-French-say-blew-mistake-fiddling-suicide-vest.html#ixzz3s14cywtV

and

Extraordinary selfie of Europe's first female suicide bomber shows the jihadi who never read the Koran, liked to drink and smoke and had a reputation for having lots of boyfriends

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3325180/Two-fingers-world-Pictured-Europe-s-female-suicide-bomber-booze-loving-extrovert-nicknamed-Cowgirl-love-big-hats.html#ixzz3s154zCHb

This a recent, quite popular joke on Reddit which illustrates the point;

Quote

ISIS guy stopped the car of Christian couple. ISIS guy: Are you moslem?

Christian: Yes I am.

ISIS guy: Recite a verse from Quran.

Christian man recited a verse from Bible.

ISIS guys: Yallah-ho-snackbar, you can go.

Later Christian guy's wife: I can't believe you took that risk. If he knew you recited a verse from Bible he would have killed us.

Christian guy: Don't worry, if he knew Quran he wouldn't be member of ISIS.

End quote.

Rather than religion what seems to me to be a more pervasive theme is how disaffected many of the youth who get sucked into this sort of activity really are.

The case could be made that it is the lack of an ideal that these young men and women can believe in that make them vulnerable in the first place. It is not difficult to lead a pretty empty life in a consumer driven society. High unemployment, low education and rejection can exacerbate the perception of an aimless, meaningless existence.

Unfortunately in Western cultures youth contemplating or succeeding in suicide is quite prevalent.

Perhaps for some of these late converts the path has already been set before a twisted version of a faith is seen able to wrap it in a perceived meaning.
Posted by SteeleRedux, Friday, 20 November 2015 6:28:06 PM
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Well said Df

Faith is the antithesis of all thinking human beings.
Blind, unthinking dogma that inevitably leads to hatred and violence.
It has always been the way of the faithful. Always.
Posted by mikk, Friday, 20 November 2015 6:54:40 PM
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There is a world of difference between faith on the one hand and believing that a certain action would bring you certain results on the other.

The Muslim terrorists who blow themselves up do it not for the love of God, but because they believe they'll get 72 virgins in heaven - that's not faith, that's a combination of lust and superstition.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Friday, 20 November 2015 7:08:53 PM
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This is classic Davidf: Christianity is as bad a Islam - even though he ignores the New Testament and the fact that the Koran never left the 7th Century. His absurd comments about faith is typical of bullies without logical argument, but that is not for a nominal Christian like me to argue.

What I take issue with is David's 'relativism': Islam is no worse than Christianity; all cultures are equal, good and bad is a relative thing, etc. All the blah that is huge danger to liberal democracies.

Pure ignorance and scuttlebutt, David. More expected from callow youths than a man of your age.
Posted by ttbn, Friday, 20 November 2015 8:42:09 PM
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Dear runner,

Thanks for reading my post. Had you been born of Muslim parents in Saudi Arabia I believe you would be as fervent a believer in that superstition as you are in the superstition you subscribe to.

Dear SteeleRedux,

Adopting a religious faith does not mean having a deep knowledge of the faith or even being observant. The word, religion, comes from Latin word, religio, which means to bind. Religions bind believers together. They can feel a part of something bigger, and their life has been given meaning by that. A petty criminal who has been a layabout now has status. In his view he has earned it by being part of a brotherhood. They are united in a cause which gives them meaning. Shakespeare in Henry V had Henry use that feeling to inspire his troops.

WESTMORELAND. O that we now had here
But one ten thousand of those men in England
That do no work to-day!

KING. What’s he that wishes so?
My cousin, Westmoreland? No, my fair cousin;
If we are mark’d to die, we are enow
To do our country loss; and if to live,
The fewer men, the greater share of honour.
God’s will! I pray thee, wish not one man more.
By Jove, I am not covetous for gold,
Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost;
It yearns me not if men my garments wear;
Such outward things dwell not in my desires.
But if it be a sin to covet honour,
I am the most offending soul alive.
No, faith, my coz, wish not a man from England.
God’s peace! I would not lose so great an honour
As one man more methinks would share from me
For the best hope I have. O, do not wish one more!
Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host,
That he which hath no stomach to this fight,
Let him depart; his passport shall be made,
And crowns for convoy put into his purse;
We would not die in that man’s company
That fears his fellowship to die with us.

continued
Posted by david f, Friday, 20 November 2015 8:44:51 PM
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continued

This day is call’d the feast of Crispian.
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam’d,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say “To-morrow is Saint Crispian.”
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars,
And say “These wounds I had on Crispin's day.”
Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,
But he’ll remember, with advantages,
What feats he did that day. Then shall our names,
Familiar in his mouth as household words—
Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester—
Be in their flowing cups freshly rememb’red.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered-
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs’d they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.

The men Henry spoke of may have petty thieves, pimps or layabouts, but they were ennobled by being one of a band of brothers.

Dear mikk,

Thank you.

Dear Yuyutsu,

Religion is simply one variety of superstition.
Posted by david f, Friday, 20 November 2015 8:47:53 PM
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Dear ttbn,

My initial post said nothing about Christianity at all. The story of Abraham and Isaac comes from the Jewish Bible. Christianity merely incorporated the scripture of another religion into its Bible. Abraham and Isaac were not Christians. For that matter neither was Jesus.

Apparently you are one of the nominal Christians whose knowledge of your religion is limited, but you see it as under attack even if it has not been mentioned.

However, let’s consider Christianity. Christianity has almost two thousand years of history. Some of the features of Christianity during those years were the Inquisition, the Crusades, the Wars of the Reformation, the Holocaust which centuries of Christian hatred made possible, the opposition to science which Christian authorities felt challenged church dogma, the extirpation of indigenous cultures along with the people who formed those cultures, massacres, expulsions and other manifestations of Christian intolerance. It is doubtful that its record is better than that of Islam.

In recent years Christianity has been tamed by the Enlightenment and the secular state which resulted from the Enlightenment. Unfortunately the Enlightenment has not penetrated much of the Islamic world.

However, you are the one who brought Christianity into the discussion. Not me.

I am concerned with blind, unreasoning faith and regard it as an enemy of peace and humanity regardless of its origins.
Posted by david f, Friday, 20 November 2015 9:41:17 PM
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//Usually their attack on the God of Abraham, Issac and Israel is a cover to hide their bigotry because they know from this source is where every good thing comes//

So where do the bad things come from then runner? You wouldn't be proposing some sort of dualist theology, would you runner? Because that's heresy.
Posted by Toni Lavis, Friday, 20 November 2015 9:58:57 PM
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The new testament is just a collection of stories that suited at the time, it is far from the truth.
Mis- guided and uninformed, and that is the way it is kept. It needs to be burnt.
Posted by 579, Saturday, 21 November 2015 7:30:11 AM
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David, very good posts I can't add anything more. Something I learned from my "Old Man" 50 years ago. "Son, always be careful of a overly religious bloke, he believes god is on his side, and therefore believes he can do no wrong!" True then, bloody true today.
The "Old Man" was not all that educated, but could read people very well.
Posted by Paul1405, Saturday, 21 November 2015 7:58:28 AM
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They certainly are a display of faith, a faith that we don't need in this country; however the particular faith, Islam, is religio-political and therin lies the difference.
Posted by Is Mise, Saturday, 21 November 2015 9:17:46 AM
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'So where do the bad things come from then runner? '

just have a close look inside yourself and you will be a lot closer to some enlightment.
Posted by runner, Saturday, 21 November 2015 9:31:42 AM
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'he believes god is on his side, and therefore believes he can do no wrong!" '

nearly as bad as the man who makes up what is right and wrong according to his own warped world view. Thats why killing babies, perversion, treachery, lying and Christ hating is all part of the secularist world view. Just look at Stalin and Hitler.
Posted by runner, Saturday, 21 November 2015 10:21:12 AM
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Davidf,

Sorry David, but I have learned more about everything in 72 years than you have in 90. You are a wrong-headed old rascal; a relativist and an Australia-basher (as I have said before, and you denied that too). I sense that you are an amiable quiet old chap, who gets away with a lot of blah because of that, and because you are a very senior gentlemen. That's any if anyone other than your admirers on OLO take any notice.

I know that you will pardon my assumption, because you presumed to prounounce on what I don't know without knowing the first thing about me.
Posted by ttbn, Saturday, 21 November 2015 11:12:17 AM
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579,

How did you come by such theological genius?
Posted by ttbn, Saturday, 21 November 2015 11:15:28 AM
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579,

Forgot to ask. When did you last make a public announcement that the Koran "deserves to be burnt"? No. Silly question. People like you know it's safe to rubbish Christianity: you won't get your empty heads lopped.
Posted by ttbn, Saturday, 21 November 2015 11:20:12 AM
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ttbn,

Are you ever able to argue anything without resorting to ad hominem? You attack those with whom you disagree, providing no rational argument to rebut what they have said, only to slink off to another thread and re-assert the same discredited claims.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem
Posted by AJ Philips, Saturday, 21 November 2015 11:28:26 AM
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"Faith can promote and justify atrocity"

Yes it does. But let's not confuse faith with religion. Most who are religious have faith but many who have faith are irreligious or often anti-religion.

The chap standing on the edge of a trench shooting unarmed Jews also had faith that his state religion knew what was best and this task, which many found abhorrent, had to be done.
http://www.memorialdelashoah.org/upload/minisites/ukraine/en/en_exposition4-radicalisation.htm

Communists also had faith that they were at the forefront of a new age. There are iconic stories of party members arrested during Stalin's purges who, while knowing they hadn't done what had been asserted, still felt they must have done something wrong because the Party couldn't make a mistake. They had faith in the absolute 'goodness' and infallibility of the Party.

The default position for man is to believe in something. The vast majority of people in the last 50 millennia have had faith in a deity of some sort. Those without a belief in a deity seek to place their faith elsewhere which partially explains the green movement.

People need to feel they are part of something greater than themselves which transcends the 3 score and 10 years, be it a 1000 yr Reich, spreading the word of the Christ or hastening the return of the 12th imam.

The Islamist offer that something in spades and this, to their way of thinking, entitles the faithful to perpetrate their atrocities in the name of their religion.
The west can no longer match that certitude. It no longer has a story to tell that gives its peoples pride in their past and hope for their future. Movements like cultural relativism, a black armband view of history, seeing all problems as the result of western actions or imperialism have sapped the strength from our culture. For some Islam fills that hole.

Steeledux,

" if he knew Quran he wouldn't be member of ISIS."

I wonder if al-Baghdadi reads the Koran? Perhaps a little arrogant to think we know more and understand more about it than he does.
Posted by mhaze, Saturday, 21 November 2015 3:39:42 PM
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Davidf, could you be confusing faith with blind faith and unquestioning obedience, as you yourself described Abraham's actions. Perhaps his was a bit of both.

Personally I don't see faith as the enemy of reason or that they must be mutually exclusive. There is a place for faith in people's lives; its misguided faith that creates problems.

If a pole vaulter doesn't have the faith he can get over the bar, chances are he won't. By reason he knows his training and previous jumps favour a positive outcome but he must have faith in his ability to do what is required to make it happen.
Posted by ConservativeHippie, Saturday, 21 November 2015 3:47:05 PM
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mhaze,

The only difference is that one can have faith without religion, while you cannot have religion without faith.

<<But let's not confuse faith with religion.>>

Faith, in the religious sense, can be defined as a belief without evidence, the excuse people give when they don’t have a good reason to believe something, or hope and desire mistaken for knowledge. No matter how one chooses to define it, it is essential to religious belief as no-one has ever provided any reliable evidence for it.

<<The default position for man is to believe in something.>>

No, the default is no belief or a position of scepticism. Both the legal burden of proof and the philosophic burden of proof are examples of why.

<<The vast majority of people in the last 50 millennia have had faith in a deity of some sort.>>

That’s just because they were primitive, uneducated and fearful people.

<<Those without a belief in a deity seek to place their faith elsewhere which partially explains the green movement.>>

I think what you’re actually talking about a sense of purpose, not faith. Some feel a sense of purpose in being environmentally warriors, others find meaning in being sycophants to celestial dictators.

ConservativeHippie,

The pole vaulter doesn’t need faith because he/she has good reason to believe they can get over the bar.

<<If a pole vaulter doesn't have the faith he can get over the bar, chances are he won't.>>

You’re conflating two definitions of faith: trust and belief without evidence. Now sure, theists ‘trust’ their gods - and they resort to this definition when the absurdity of believing something without good reason is pointed out to them - but when they accuse atheists of having a faith too (or the Green movement, for that matter) they demonstrate that this is not what they mean when they usually talk of faith.
Posted by AJ Philips, Saturday, 21 November 2015 4:45:28 PM
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AJ Philips,

"Faith, in the religious sense, can be defined as a belief without evidence"

That's not faith; that's gullibility!

Faith is trust without proof.
Posted by Aidan, Saturday, 21 November 2015 5:03:57 PM
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No sorry, Aiden.

http://www.google.com.au/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=define%3Afaith
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faith#Religious_views
Posted by AJ Philips, Saturday, 21 November 2015 5:50:30 PM
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AJPhillips, in my opinion, any belief in the story of Jesus Christ must be the ultimate act of faith. Independentaustralia.net wanted to use a billboard stating "
'JESUS CHRIST — WHO IT TURNS OUT, WAS BORN OF A VIRGIN, CHEATED DEATH, AND ROSE BODILY INTO THE HEAVENS — CAN NOW BE EATEN IN THE FORM OF A CRACKER.'' as an advert for an atheist lecture.

My question has always been, if Jesus was born to Mary the virgin, who was married to Joseph at the time (otherwise Jesus would have been born illegitimate), then how/why hadn't the marriage been consummated? Joseph must have been one understanding bloke!

How does everyone know Mary was a virgin when she had Jesus?
Did they all just take her word for it, or was it the human bible authors who came up with that implausible notion?

Now THAT is faith!
Posted by Suseonline, Saturday, 21 November 2015 7:22:06 PM
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Faith is trust without proof.

I and those who know me have faith that I can hit a moving target at 50 metres with a pistol.

Proof comes after the shot.
Posted by Is Mise, Saturday, 21 November 2015 8:15:41 PM
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Dear 579,

I think it’s a bad idea to burn books because we don’t like them or disagree with their contents. The Bible, the Greek myths and other creations of the human mind tell us where we’ve been and who we are.

Heinrich Heine, the German poet, wrote:

Dort wo man Bücher verbrennt, verbrennt man auch am Ende Menschen.

(Where they have burned books, they will end in burning human beings.)

Almansor: A Tragedy (1823), as translated in True Religion (2003) by Graham Ward, p. 142

The Nazis first burned books, then people. I think it better to burn neither books nor people.

Dear Is Mise,

All religions are religio-political or try to be. Christians have put fundamentalist chaplains in Australian public schools. The Queen of England is head of the Anglican Church. Buddhist clergy support the government’s war against the Hindu Tamils. Judaism has a preferred position in Israel. The BJP party in India pushes Hinduism.
Some religious people support separation of religion and state. Even in that they are political. Islam is not essentially different from other religions in being religio-political.

Dear runner,

You wrote: “just have a close look inside yourself and you will be a lot closer to some enlightment.”

You are close to the truth. All things, both good and bad, come from within ourselves.

You also wrote: “Just look at Stalin and Hitler.”

That’s a good idea. Stalin was a seminary student who discovered Marxism while he was in the seminary.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Stalin

When Ioseb was sixteen, he received a scholarship to attend the Tiflis Spiritual Seminary, the leading Russian Orthodox seminary in Tiflis; the language of instruction was Russian. Despite being trained as a priest, he became an atheist in his first year. He was a voracious reader and became a Georgian cultural nationalist.

Continued
Posted by david f, Saturday, 21 November 2015 9:42:26 PM
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Continued

He anonymously published poetry in Georgian in the local press and engaged in student politics. Although his performance had been good, he was expelled in 1899 after missing his final exams. The seminary's records also suggest that he was unable to pay his tuition fees. Around this time, Ioseb discovered the writings of Vladimir Lenin and joined the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party, a Marxist group.

In contrast Hitler was raised a Christian and died in the faith. He was not excommunicated by his church and died in good standing.

http://www.evilbible.com/hitler_was_christian.htm

Hitler’s involvement with the Church:

a) Hitler was baptized as Roman Catholic during infancy in Austria.

b) As Hitler approached boyhood he attended a monastery school. (On his way to school young Adolf daily observed a stone arch which was carved with the monastery’s coat of arms bearing a swastika.)

c) Hitler was a communicant and an altar boy in the Catholic Church.

d) As a young man he was confirmed as a Soldier of Christ. His most ardent goal at the time was to become a priest. Hitler writes of his love for the church and clergy: I had excellent opportunity to intoxicate myself with the solemn splendor of the brilliant church festivals. As was only natural, the abbot seemed to me, as the village priest had once seemed to my father, the highest and most desirable ideal. Adolf Hitler (Mein Kampf)

e) Hitler was NEVER excommunicated nor condemned by his church. Matter of fact the Church felt he was JUST and avenging for God in attacking the Jews for they deemed the Semites the killers of Jesus.

f) Hitler, Franco and Mussolini were given VETO power over whom the pope could appoint as a bishop in Germany, Spain and Italy. In turn they surtaxed the Catholics and gave the money to the Vatican. Hitler wrote a speech in which he talks about this alliance, this is an excerpt: The fact that the Vatican is concluding a treaty with the new Germany means the acknowledgement of the National Socialist state by the Catholic Church.

Continued
Posted by david f, Saturday, 21 November 2015 9:47:56 PM
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Continued

This treaty shows the whole world clearly and unequivocally that the assertion that National Socialism [Nazism] is hostile to religion is a lie. Adolf Hitler, 22 July 1933, writing to the Nazi Party

g) Hitler worked CLOSELY with Pope Pius in converting Germanic society and supporting the church. The Church absorbed Nazi ideals and preached them as part of their sermons in turn Hitler placed Catholic teachings in public education. This photo [on the website] depicts Hitler with Archbishop Cesare Orsenigo, the papal nuncio in Berlin. It was taken On April 20, 1939, when Orsenigo celebrated Hitler’s birthday. The celebrations were initiated by Pacelli (Pope Pius XII) and became a tradition.

Each April 20, Cardinal Bertram of Berlin was to send ... warmest congratulations to the Fuhrer in the name of the bishops and the dioceses in Germany with fervent prayers which the Catholics of Germany are sending to heaven on their altars. (If you would like to know more about the secret dealings of Hitler and the Pope I recommend you get a book titled: Hitler’s Pope: The Secret History of Pius XII, by Cornwell)

h) Due to Hitler’s involvement with the Church he began enacting doctrines of the Church as law. He outlawed all abortion, raged a death war on all homosexuals, and demanded corporal punishment in schools and home. Many times Hitler addressed the church and promised that Germany would implement its teachings: “The National Socialist State professes its allegiance to positive Christianity. It will be its honest endeavor to protect both the great Christian Confessions in their rights, to secure them from interference with their doctrines (Lehren), and in their duties to constitute a harmony with the views and the exigencies of the State of today.” Adolf Hitler, on 26 June 1934, to Catholic bishops to assure them that he would take action against the new pagan propaganda “Providence has caused me to be Catholic, and I know therefore how to handle this Church.” Adolf Hitler, reportedly to have said in Berlin in 1936 on the enmity of the Catholic Church to National Socialism

continued
Posted by david f, Saturday, 21 November 2015 9:53:09 PM
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Continued

How Christianity was the catalyst of the Holocaust:

Hitler’s anti-Semitism grew out of his Christian education. Austria and Germany were majorly Christian during his time and they held the belief that Jews were an inferior status to Aryan Christians. The Christians blamed the Jews for the killing of Jesus. Jewish hatred did not actually spring from Hitler, it came from the preaching of Catholic priests and Protestant ministers throughout Germany for hundreds of years. The Protestant leader, Martin Luther, himself, held a livid hatred for Jews and their Jewish religion. In his book, “On the Jews and their Lies” Luther set the standard for Jewish hatred in Protestant Germany up until World War 2. Hitler expressed a great admiration for Martin Luther constantly quoting his works and beliefs.

Hitler was born a Christian, was raised as a Christian, died a Christian and his hatred for Jews was a product of his Christianity.

Dear mhaze,

There is no reason we should match the certainty of religious faith. We may find out with new information or experiments that we are wrong. That is the scientific method, and I prefer it to the certainty that religious belief brings. Certainty that is impervious to evidence or reason is bad.

Dear ConservativeHippie,

If there is proof or evidence that a belief is correct or wrong it is no longer faith. It is based on reason or evidence. You cannot have it both ways. If a view is supported by evidence or reason there is no need for faith. It is only when our belief is supported by neither reason nor evidence that we must rely on faith to support it.

Dear Aidan,

Gullibility is the oxygen of religion. There is no evidence for the existence of a Big Daddy in the sky, no evidence that some entity can take on other people’s sins, no evidence for an afterlife, no evidence for angels or devils, no evidence that a ghost can impregnate a woman and no evidence for a lot of things that people believe. If it were not for gullibility religion would disappear.
Posted by david f, Saturday, 21 November 2015 9:58:57 PM
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If God wanted to kill the Inidel surely he would have
The power to immediately strike them dead.

How do you then explain the same kind of killing
And warefare
Carried out in exactly the same way, by revolutionaries and Warlords
And many other non-religious armies and militants across the globe.
The ethnic cleansing is the same as Hitler, the only thing missing is the gas ovens.

Holy war, my foot, it is a murderous, racist,territorial war is what it t is,

These terrorists are not radicalised, so much as filled with racial hatred

This so called Holy murder is the same old human war like behaviour.
Posted by CHERFUL, Sunday, 22 November 2015 12:09:47 AM
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Hitler,
We want a German , blue eyed, blonde haired race,world wide

The muslim terrorists,
We want a Muslim caliphate, world wide
(As long as it only has members of our own partticular
Muslim tribe in it, we will ethnically cleanse the rest)

This is text book Nazi speak by the so called holy Muslims.
Posted by CHERFUL, Sunday, 22 November 2015 12:25:32 AM
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Dear davidf,

I am rewatching Fisk's 1993 series 'From Beirut to Bosnia'.

“From Beirut to Bosnia is a three part documentary by Robert Fisk shown on the Discovery Channel focusing on Lebanon, Palestine, Egypt and Bosnia. It spans different nations and different peoples, but the problems and tragedies, the false hopes and betrayals, these are always the same. Muslims all over the world bear the brunt of Western foreign policy and local dictatorial rule. They pay the price of these policies and adventures with their land, freedom, property and lives. This mixture, of oppression, poverty and abuse has alienated millions of Muslims from their own governments as well as from some in the West. Today we witness a region on fire, plagued with instability. Robert Fisk analyses some of the root causes of the conflicts and tragedies we hear about daily.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGDoyxzRlgE

What is notable is that when I viewed these in the mid 1990s the movement toward religiosity in the face of occupation, of brutal dictatorships and of deep poverty was not something I picked up on. Watching it again after all these years and now it seems that was the central theme.

One doesn't have to go to the Middle East to see this in action. Look at Muhammad Ali and Malcolm X with their deep involvement with the Nation of Islam. While all religions may well deliver a sense of community one gets the sense that there is something about Islam that is particularly attractive to the poor and oppressed.

I would be interested in your thoughts.

Dear runner,

As a young artist in Vienna Hitler had retreated from much of the prejudice toward Jews and was happily mixing freely with them. Even as young as 14 and 15 he had a real aversion bordering on abhorrence he says to disparaging remarks about Jews. It was the mayor of Vienna, Karl Lueger, a prominent Christian Socialist and virulent anti Semitic, who radicalised a teenage Hitler, and the rest is history.
Posted by SteeleRedux, Sunday, 22 November 2015 12:31:15 AM
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davidf,

You forgot to add that Pius XII was also credited with saving thousands of Jews.
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/anti-semitism/piusdef.html

and that he was held in high esteem by many Jews
https://www.ewtn.com/library/issues/pius12gs.htm

Strange that you managed to miss all this positive Jewish information.
http://www.haaretz.com/jewish/israel-s-vatican-envoy-praises-pope-pius-xii-for-saving-jews-during-the-holocaust-1.369479

One of my relatives, the late Mons.Hugh O'Flaherty had a bit to do with saving Jews as well as Allied Servicemen in Rome during WWII, he is sometimes called "The Scarlet Pimpernel of the Vatican".

Flip a coin, there are two sides to them.
Posted by Is Mise, Sunday, 22 November 2015 7:39:06 AM
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//just have a close look inside yourself and you will be a lot closer to some enlightment.//

Well how is that supposed to help, runner? You assert all the time that it's God that creates people. Now you've claimed that God only creates good things. Surely even you can comprehend this syllogism.

1. God created me.
2. God only creates good things.
Therefore: I am good.

So looking inside myself isn't going to help, because all I'm going to see is goodness. Presumably you think the conclusion to that syllogism is false, but since it's a valid syllogism that means that one or more of premises must be false. So which one are you prepared to abandon? That God is the maker of all things, or that It only creates good things? Or both?
Posted by Toni Lavis, Sunday, 22 November 2015 7:53:57 AM
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//If there is proof or evidence that a belief is correct or wrong it is no longer faith. It is based on reason or evidence. You cannot have it both ways. If a view is supported by evidence or reason there is no need for faith.//

From the Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy:

'Now it is such a bizarrely improbable coincidence that anything so mindbogglingly useful could have evolved purely by chance that some thinkers have chosen it to see it as a final and clinching proof of the non-existence of God.

The argument goes something like this: "I refuse to prove that I exist," says God, "for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing."

"But," says Man, "the Babel fish is a dead giveaway isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. QED."

"Oh dear," says God, "I hadn't thought of that," and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.

"Oh, that was easy," says Man, and for an encore goes on to prove that black is white and gets killed on the next zebra crossing.

Most leading theologians claim that this argument is a load of dingo's kidneys, but that didn't stop Oolon Colluphid making a small fortune when he used it as the central theme of his best-selling book Well That About Wraps It Up For God.'
Posted by Toni Lavis, Sunday, 22 November 2015 8:00:04 AM
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AJ,

You haven't been able to discredit my 'claims'. And referring to what I say as ah attacks, is, in itself ah. Not to deft with language, are you?
Posted by ttbn, Sunday, 22 November 2015 10:39:51 AM
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I see Robert Fisk mentioned. Robert Fisk has devoted his career to equivalence and hatred of his own culture.
Posted by ttbn, Sunday, 22 November 2015 10:43:01 AM
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Davidf,

'Hitler was baptised as a Roman Catholic' Hitler was this. Hitler was that. What Hitler was NOT is a Christian.

He also said: "The Mohammedan religion too would be more compatible to us than Christianity".

His Arab Muslim allies during WW2 obliged him, as did the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj al-Husseini, with his advice in regard to the final solution of the Jewish problem.

I converted from the rubbish you talk 40 odd years ago. I don't think you have enough time left to see the error of your ways.
Posted by ttbn, Sunday, 22 November 2015 11:02:30 AM
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On the contrary, ttbn, myself and others have done it a few times.

<<You haven't been able to discredit my 'claims'.>>

For me, there was your claim about the New Testament allegedly overriding the Old Testament (http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=7032&page=0). Then there was the one about the idea of a homosexual couple raising a child being a “truly horrible prospect” (to be fair, you did most of the discrediting of your own arguments there, I just pointed out the fallacies you were using) (http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=17786&page=0). Now, in this thread, david f had explained to you why you were wrong (http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=7084#217130), only for you to later repeat the same naive claim on another thread (http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=17836#315847).

And in every case, as usual, you simply resorted to ad hominems after your argument flopped.

But thanks for giving me the opportunity to elaborate on what I meant earlier.

<<And referring to what I say as ah attacks, is, in itself ah.>>

Erm, no. I already addressed this here http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=17786#314899.

Once again (and as the link I provided you explains), an ad hominem is the use of personal attacks to redirect the focus of a discussion to the person instead of their arguments. If you have already started engaging in ad hominem attacks, then others allowed to point that out without being accused of using ad hominems themselves since you have now made the use of ad hominems relevant to the discussion.
Posted by AJ Philips, Sunday, 22 November 2015 11:19:22 AM
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In elemental physics, one cannot see the actual neutrinos or Higgs bosons - they are only detected by observing their by-products such as gamma radiation.

Belief is just a by-product of faith.
It may not even always be present.
Those who have no experience of faith can only see some beliefs that ensue - and mock them accordingly.

Actions that are based on faith are never a sin.
Actions that are merely based on a belief, are often sinful.

Which case is terrorism?
It's sinful, because the perpetrators selfishly desire to reach heaven, believing that such actions would get them there.

Which case was Abraham's?
We may never know because the bible only describes Abraham's actions and is silent about his motive.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Sunday, 22 November 2015 1:01:05 PM
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Hitler did not slaughter the Jews by himself

Thr German people slaughtered the Jews.

They drove and walked past that walled in area where the Jews were starved to death
To do their shopping etc everyday. Did no one ever ask what's in there.

The German people quietly took possession of all the homes,cars, and bank accounts
Jewellery left behind by millions of Jews.

The work of one dictator I don!t think so.
It was tribal, ethnic territorial cleansing, the same as Isis is doing in
Syria.
Posted by CHERFUL, Sunday, 22 November 2015 2:12:50 PM
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David f

your twisted dishonest description of Christianity and Hitler is what has contributed to Paris attacks, London being a basket case, Belgium being locked down and threats in every other western nation. With no moral base to draw on it does not surprise me that you along with Islam will lie for the cause (hatred of Christ). Degrees in changing terminology to support ones warped narrative abounds among secularism That is why the term human being is exchanged for foetus by the baby killing industry (you know like Hitler refused top see Jews as human). It seems the older you get the harder your heart becomes preventing you from seeing anything to clearly.
Posted by runner, Sunday, 22 November 2015 2:44:08 PM
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Runner, both you and Ttbn are a disgrace to anything you believe in by personally denigrating AJ and David F re their age.
That is called ageism and bullying, and it is morally wrong in any intelligent person's thinking.

It isn't the same as giving your opinion on the Paris atrocities or the 'faith' displayed by any religious group. Age is not something anyone can control, and you two are bullies.
Runner, no one cares what you think about abortion, so stop being so boring...
Posted by Suseonline, Sunday, 22 November 2015 2:57:45 PM
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SteeleRedux,

I watched the video link you posted to about 3/4 through.

The video started with the Israelie occupation of the border
Around Israel.

This is where the Arab account always begins.
They always fail to mention why Israel occupied that border land around Israel

What caused the Israelis to occupy that land, was called the 6Day war.

3 or 4 Arab states raced over and attacked the Jewish state when Britain
Pulled out of Palestine which they occupied after the 2nd world war, because the
Arabs had plotted with hitler to annihilate the Jews.

Also, I have clear memories going back decades,of Arabs who were allowed to
Move freely around Israel, to work and shop etc. blowing up buses killing school children.
That reporter has lived too long in Lebanon, he needs to go and live in Israel for 20years and hear their side of the story.
Posted by CHERFUL, Sunday, 22 November 2015 3:00:09 PM
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SteeleRudux.

More Middle Eastern history not covered by your video link.

It goes back to the Muslim Ottaman Empire in the 18hundreds,
They mass slaughtered any Christians and Europeans in the Middle East.

Eventually pockets of Europeans faught back. And took back some countries.
I suspect the Bosnian war had something to do with the earlier
Slaughter of the European Serbs, who now feel threatened by a build up of Muslims in their country.

Anyway here is some historical text, I obtained from Wikipedia,

In 1833, the Syrian Provinces were ceded to Muhammed Ali of Egypt
In the convention of Kutahya.
In this period , the Sublime Porte's firman (decrees), of 1839 And more decisively of
1856-equalising the status of Muslim and non Muslim subjects -produced a dramatic
Alienation of Muslims from Christians.
The former resented the implied loss of superiority and repeatedly assaulted
And massacred Christian communities, in Aleppo in1850, ,
in Nablus in 1856, in Damascus and Lebanon in 1860.

Notice Damascus included in the massacres, That's Assad territory today,
Maybe he has a reason for not liking thousands of Muslims coming angrily
Into Damascus in a threatening, revolutionary way.

Putin may understand the ethnic history and tribal hostilities much better
Than the West,.
Posted by CHERFUL, Sunday, 22 November 2015 3:32:06 PM
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Dear CHERFUL,

I agree that knowledge of the history of the region is important in exploring the shift in Muslim attitudes to the West, especially that of the last 50 years.

Therefore forgive me if I take a small moment to correct you. You claimed the following;

“The video started with the Israelie occupation of the border Around Israel. This is where the Arab account always begins. They always fail to mention why Israel occupied that border land around Israel. What caused the Israelis to occupy that land, was called the 6Day war.”

The video starts in Lebanon, Beirut to be precise and moves to the area of Lebanon occupied by Israel. This was not the result of the 6 Day War as you assert which occurred in the 60s but as a result of the invasion of Southern Lebanon by Israel in 1982. it was during this time Israel watched and did nothing as hundreds of armed rightwing Christians entered the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps and raped and slaughtered up to 3,000 unarmed Muslims, mainly women and children.

A BBC reporter said “People who committed the acts of murder that I saw that day were wearing crucifixions and were calling themselves Christians.” It was deemed an act of genocide by the UN.

Other massacres of Muslims by Christians occurred during this time including Tel al-Zaatar and Karantina.

The video is one of a series of three. I really do recommend watching them all.
Posted by SteeleRedux, Sunday, 22 November 2015 5:08:14 PM
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Dear ttbn,

I enjoyed davidf cuffing you around the ears so much I've decided I like having you around. It truly was a delight. You really can't muster anything of substance can you.
Posted by SteeleRedux, Sunday, 22 November 2015 5:08:48 PM
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Dear Is Mise,

Pope Pius XII did much to help save the Jews from the Nazis. Mons. Hugh O'Flaherty is a man to be proud of.

As you point out there are two sides. Pius XII has been criticised by Catholics and others for his silence in not openly condemning the Nazis and not excommunicating Hitler. The Catholic Church has excommunicated many others. As Cardinal Secretary of State he negotiated a Concordat with the Nazi state. This gave the Nazis legitimacy that they would not otherwise have had. When the Nazis rounded up the Jews in Rome under the Vatican windows Pius XII kept silent. The puppet government of Slovakia under the Nazis was headed by Father Tiso, a Catholic priest.

https://www.wilsoncenter.org/event/no-saint-jozef-tiso-and-the-holocaust-slovakia tells about him.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_J%C3%A4gerst%C3%A4tter is about Franz Jagerstatter. If you don’t read any of the other references please read this. He was an Austrian Catholic and a heroic figure. He has been beatified and I hope will be sainted.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_von_Faulhaber tells about Cardinal Faulhaber who told his priests to be loyal to the Nazi government. He was also against democracy and the Weimar government which he apparently regarded as worse than the Nazis. He also condemned Jew hatred.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aloysius_Stepinac tells about Cardinal Stepinac who supported the Nazi-puppet Ustace even though he disagreed with some of their activities.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ratlines_(World_War_II_aftermath) tells of the escape routes of Nazi war criminals. From the site:

By 1946, there were probably hundreds of war criminals in Spain, and thousands of former Nazis and fascists. According to US Secretary of State James F. Byrnes, Vatican cooperation in turning over asylum-seekers was "negligible". According to Phayer, Pius XII "preferred to see fascist war criminals on board ships sailing to the New World rather than seeing them rotting in POW camps in zonal Germany".

Members of the Catholic Church hierarchy including Pius XII supported the Nazis even though they did not like some of their activities.

Continued
Posted by david f, Sunday, 22 November 2015 5:46:45 PM
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Perhaps I can offer my perspective. During WW2 I was a soldier in the US army. We were shown a series of propaganda films called “Why We Fight”. It showed the Soviet Union as a happy land in which enthusiastic people lived in a good society. I was horrified. Some of my family fled czarist Russia. Others had fled Soviet Russia. I much preferred democracy in the United States with all its flaws to any kind of dictatorship. Nevertheless, as bad as it was, I was glad that the USSR was on our side as I thought Nazi Germany was much worse.

I think Pius XII and much of the Catholic hierarchy thought, as bad as Nazi Germany was, the Soviet Union was much worse.

Dear Cherful,

Hitler could have done nothing without the support of many people. It took great courage to speak up, and I don’t think many people in any group are willing to risk death to speak up.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_J%C3%A4gerst%C3%A4tter is about Franz Jagerstatter. He is one person who spoke up and was beheaded. My wife’s uncle was in Germany during the war. He refused ever to say, “Heil Hitler.” Nobody reported him so nothing happened to him.

There is a story about Khrushchev who gave a speech after Stalin’s death condemning the acts of Stalin. The story goes that a loud voice from the audience cried, “Where were you? Why didn’t you speak out?”

Khrushchev asked, “Who said that?”

No answer.

Khrushchev said, “Please tell me who you are? I guarantee nothing will happen to you.”

Still silence.

“That’s where I was.”

A correction to your last post.

The British pulled out in 1948 when the Israelis fought the War of Independence. The 6 day war which resulted in Israel occupying the West Bank, Golan Heights and Gaza was in 1967.

I agree that Fisk is one sided. To use the term martyr as the Arabs do to describe a soldier killed in battle or a suicide bomber is not as far as I am concerned a legitimate use of the word.

Continued
Posted by david f, Sunday, 22 November 2015 5:50:12 PM
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continued

To me a martyr is one who will not submit, will not deny his or her faith and is willing to suffer the consequences.

War is horrible and people die, kill and destroy. However, in 1967 after the 6 day war Israel offered to negotiate a settlement. The Arabs rejected Israeli offers of peace at the Khartoum. Their slogan was “no negotiation; no recognition and no peace.” Peace was not given a chance. I do not know if that was mentioned in Fisk’s video as I did not watch the whole thing. However, I doubt it. The result of the Arab stance has been the hardening of attitudes in Israel. In any narrative of the Middle East a lot depends on where you start the narrative. The point at which I would start the narrative if I were making a video would be during World War 1 where the British made conflicting promises to Arabs and Jews.

Dear SteeleRedux,

You wrote: “While all religions may well deliver a sense of community one gets the sense that there is something about Islam that is particularly attractive to the poor and oppressed.”

Before Constantine’s victory at the Milvian Bridge, Christianity was particularly attractive to the poor and oppressed. Like Islam Christianity advised one to submit to the powers that be in the present in the hope of an afterlife where one will be rewarded for one’s sufferings. Christianity with its advice to subjects and slaves to submit to the powers that be as they are put there by God is also a religion the ruling class can rely on to help them maintain their rule. Christianity gave US slaves hope for liberation as it did for many other oppressed peoples. Islam did not have a chance in the nineteenth century as many in the Christian areas had no contact with or knowledge of Islam.

continued
Posted by david f, Sunday, 22 November 2015 5:57:39 PM
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continued

However, in twentieth century US Islam offered two things that Christianity did not. In the US Christianity was the religion of the slave traders and slave owners. Muhammad Ali changed his name from Cassius Clay and Malcolm X from Malcolm Little thus getting rid of family names either of the slave owners or given to them by the slave owners. In the US churches were by and large divided into black churches and white charges. Islam was not as racially conscious as US Christians were. In the former colonies of the imperialist powers Christianity was the religion of most of the imperialists.

I think the appeal of Islam to those suffering from colonial oppression and racism is that it does not have the association with the white ruling classes and European imperialist powers that Christianity has. The same kind of appeal can be found in both religions.

I don’t enjoy cuffing anyone around the ears - ttbn, runner or anybody else. I am not happy that our disagreements are sometimes not very civil. I have not always been civil myself, but I will try to be. If I don’t feel a discussion with another person can be civil I will not respond.
Posted by david f, Sunday, 22 November 2015 6:04:13 PM
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Steele Ruddick,

I don't condone the rape and killing of women by male soldiers.

Whichever year ISRael occupied the areas surrounding
Israel, it would have been because of the continuing provocation by the militant muslims.


Actions speak louder than words. And the Muslims
had 15tunnels dug trying to get into Israel in the last missile
attacks on Israel.

I don't see any Israelie people digging tunnels trying
to get into Lebanon. They wouldn't want the place. It is a
badly run slum.

However the unemployed over populated Lebanese look over
at the beautifully built and well run Isreal, and they want to
just get over there and loot the place.

The religious priests are the blame for their poverty,
a lack of contraception and a lack of scientific knowhow
has held them back in the dark ages.
It is ludicrous for them to go on having big families when
they have no resources or land for them.

China turned it's poverty around when they adopted the one
child policy.
Even in the Western wealthy countries, you condemm yourself
to a life of poverty and hardship if you have 6 or more childeen.

Therein is the real reason why the Arabs are trying to get
rid of the Jews. If the Jews threw up their hands and said
have it! tomorrow. In a few years it would look just like the
slums on the other side of the wall.
The Arabs would soon overpopulate it and run it into the ground.
When that happened they'd have a hard time getting the ocean
to move aside to give them more space.

But they would probably still keep on populating until
they had to stand on each others heads.

Come to think of it are you sure it wasn't the Arabs that
raped all the women in the refugee camp, that seems to fit
their style of doing things. Maybe they just blamed it on
the Israelies.

It is a male thing in war. on any side though,I know that.
Posted by CHERFUL, Sunday, 22 November 2015 7:09:22 PM
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The Paris atrocities as display of faith, is to me questionable.

>>> Faith is the antithesis of all thinking human beings.

1. Yes and no, in the frame of this discussion point. I cannot know every persons view, faith, religion or belief, as they can vary.... unless I am personally told very exact details - but I may have to take that on faith or belief, as a person may or may not be telling me the truth.

>>> Blind, unthinking dogma that inevitably leads to hatred and violence.

2. I could then argue (as a vegetarian) this applies to all meat eating individuals, with these people having the "faith" to leave the killing and violence involved to someone else and when sitting down at the "killing" table are actively benefiting from various forms of violence.

This could then be the start of violence (based on these people's own faith) and lead to violence across the planet, as it is seen as an acceptable activity.

>>> It has always been the way of the faithful. Always.

3. Eating meat has been the way of the very faithful over many periods. I could also argue if humans keep taking the strong anthropocentric view where many consider human beings as the most significant entity of the universe, there will little to no change in relation to violence impacting on others. Some, will also see themselves higher than other human beings, potentially showing no respect to values, principles, ethics, life or beliefs, regarding free movement as a result.

So, it is not simply faith that can promote and justify atrocity, it is the actions, occurring on a daily basis being undertaken by humans that is the real issue.
Posted by NathanJ, Sunday, 22 November 2015 7:35:43 PM
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Dear CHERFUL,

Okay my friend I'm now going to ask something of you. Could you please at least do some modicum of research rather than just repeating mantras you have picked up from the misinformed, mischief makers on this forum. This is the second time I am having to correct you and I would be grateful if there wasn't a third.

Firstly the total fertility rate (the expected number of births per woman over her lifetime) for Lebanon issued by the World Bank in 2013 was 1.5 births. The figure for Israel is double that at 3.0.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependent_territories_by_fertility_rate

That's right Israel has twice the fertility rate of Lebanon.

Not only that the Christian proportion of the Lebanese population is expected to increase in the upcoming years;

“Opposite to popular perception, the 40 years old trend of declining Christian numbers has been reversed. This report highlights the stable numbers of the Christian population over the last couple of years, with the above statistics (respectively, Christian percentage of resident Lebanese and Christian percentage of eligible voters) increasing to around 38% and 40% over the next 19 years, and to around 39% and 41% over the next 34 years. the fertility rate of Lebanon is well under that of Israel”
http://www.lstatic.org/PDF/demographenglish.pdf

So what is the situation in the occupied West Bank? There the Palestinian fertility rate is 2.83 births per woman while for the Jewish settlers it is 5.07 births, far outstripping the Palestinian figures.

So when you offer up this crap;

“Come to think of it are you sure it wasn't the Arabs that
raped all the women in the refugee camp, that seems to fit
their style of doing things. Maybe they just blamed it on
the Israelies.”

I know it comes from a nasty, deeply prejudiced place but at least it is opinion. What I can't abide you making statements fact which are patently not only incorrect but are the exact bloody opposite of the actual figures. It is deceitful at worst, moronic at best and does you no credit whatsoever.
Posted by SteeleRedux, Sunday, 22 November 2015 11:28:42 PM
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Dear davidf,

May I please withdraw the cuffing remark and say instead I enjoyed the adroitness you displayed when replying to ttbn.

As I have said several times before you are a better man than I so I will endevour keeping any cuffing pleasures to myself.

The point you raised about Islam being attractive to people like Ali and Malcolm X because of the association with Christianity and the slave owners is a good one, especially remembering the 'CofE' with which the slaves owned by the Church of England were thus branded. One shouldn't forget though that slavery was a feature of Islam as well.

However I don't think this represents the whole picture. As you have mentioned in the past religion is about binding but it also provides order, hierarchy, and obedience – all crucial elements coincidentally in an armed resistance. Perhaps Islam is better equipped in providing these elements, particularly under the totalitarian regimes of the Middle East. The social services provided by organisations like Hammas are quite extensive and largely without the corruption rampant within government outreaches in the area.

Just a thought, ultimately there is not much separating the mass suicides of Masda and those of Jonestown. The power over the individual will of the people involved came from the same wellspring.
Posted by SteeleRedux, Monday, 23 November 2015 12:01:33 AM
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Dear SteeleRedux,

Some Muslims were slavers, but American black attitudes toward slavery and whites were formed primarily by their American experience and that of their ancestors. You referred to Muhammad Ali and Malcolm X. They were products of the American experience. The social services of Hamas were provided to a population already predominantly Muslim. It explains why that population voted for Hamas over Fatah but not why they were Muslim.

From what I understand of the Jamestown experience, there were many rehearsals before the actual ingestion of the poison. Many of those who took it were not aware this was other than a rehearsal and were duped. That was not comparable to Masada.

The fertility rate of Israelis does not bode well for Israel. It is apparently highest among the ultra-orthodox Haredi who are less likely to serve in the armed forces or to be well-educated in secular areas.

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Israel:

Over the past decade the Jewish growth rate in Israel was 1.7% per annum while the Israeli Arab growth rate was 2.2%. However, the Jewish growth rate in Israel was 1.2% pa for non-Haredi and 5.0% for Haredim. The high fertility rate among West Bank Jewish settlers conforms to the high rate among the Haredim but not to the general Jewish Israeli growth rate.
Posted by david f, Monday, 23 November 2015 2:41:36 AM
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SteeleRudux

Ok,
Your percentages show that the population in Lebanon
Is reasonable at this point in time. Good.
I did base my observation on my perception
Of these countries as being overcrowded.
The Indians too have an extreme overpopulation problem.

I always think that the overpopulation 7billion people and rising is
The cause of a lot of the refugee problems on the planet.
And it's about time family medical clinics were set up in every town and village across the world. Another perception I have is that it is the male leaders who
Cause a lot of the problems for their societies.

Again perceptions, from what I see and read about in some of these Muslim and Indian
And African countries.

I have always said the Palestinian conflict is a bloody, territorial dog fight and there is no answer to it apart from intermarriage, (mixing the blood lines),which is extremely unlikely given the nature of the Jews and the Muslims. Another solution would be for both sides to stop having children,again not likely. Or an all out war between the two sides with one winner.

Really, it is the fault of neither side, both sides want to have children and those children
Need ample land and resources to survive and prosper.
It is an existential problem for both.
Posted by CHERFUL, Monday, 23 November 2015 8:59:26 AM
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What did I say about your misuse of the English language? Your very hubristic claim of my dicrediting should have read: ' On the contrary, ttbn, I and others have done it a few times'. You have misused a reflexive pronoun. Perhaps you were schooled in the current PC area where it is unfashionable to correct little darlings for fear of hurting their 'self esteem'.

And, you and your cronies have not discredited me; you have merely disagreed with, which is fine. Fact and history is on my side.

I also note that you get your material from such dubious, unsubstantiated sources as 'wonkypedia' and google. If you are reliant on technical gadgets, you can still find things called 'books', written by scholars, and and critiqued by their peers.

new about about ad hominem 'attacks' long before Wikipedia existed, and I did study Latin. So, while I really appreciate your provision of 'links' for my edification, I don't really need them, thankyou. Nor do I need to be told that I go AH on occassion in response to particularly silly comments, often AH themselves. It is not banned on OLO, being accused of it regularly by you has no effect, apart from boredom, on me. I will usually respond to objections to what I post, but this is the last time I will respond to silly name calling.
Posted by ttbn, Monday, 23 November 2015 12:42:21 PM
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Pardon me. The above post was, of course, meant to be addressed to my favourite detractor, AJ Philips.
Posted by ttbn, Monday, 23 November 2015 12:48:53 PM
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Hi there DAVID F...

I've often expressed my admiration for your obviously clear intellect and the immense knowledge you've kindly shown many of us on this Forum. But I'm somewhat puzzled as to why you've been so vigorously antagonistic towards all religion ? To a point where you seemed to have dispensed with your usually, calmly persuasive strategies, and become much more impassioned even contentious in prosecuting your position ?

By the way, I lost all my 'religiousness' in Vietnam back in 1967/68, therefore I completely agree with you. But, what would happen if we're both completely wrong, and the Christian Doctrines are utterly accurate, what then ? We'd both be buggered I reckon ?
Posted by o sung wu, Monday, 23 November 2015 1:42:11 PM
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All religions are not responsible for the Paris atrocities and nor is 'faith'. It WAS Islam. That is what the Islamic State is all about.

World-wide, millions of Muslims along with leftists who are the Muslim apologists (figure that one out!) found it very easy to find dreadful, unforgivable offence in 'anti-Muslim' books or cartoons. They were not backward in taking to the media and the streets, picketing and rioting, demanding withdrawals, apologies and in delivering dire threats (threats that strangely multiculturalist governments turn a blind eye to).

So, where is the offence where ISIS is concerned? Where is the outpouring of bile against ISIS, as there was against a harmless book and some satirical cartoons?

It is all bald-faced sophistry. The leftists, the cultural Marxists, are refusing to 'fess up to the awful unintended (unintended, one hopes !) negative consequences of their social reengineering and their stated intent to rub the noses of those 'whites' in diversity.
Posted by onthebeach, Monday, 23 November 2015 2:28:25 PM
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Something that constitutes a non sequitur, ttbn, that’s what.

<<What did I say about your misuse of the English language?>>

You implied that my use of the English language was poor because I had (supposedly) been hypocritical:

“And referring to what I say as [ad hominem] attacks, is, in itself [ad hominem]. Not to [sic] deft with language, are you?” (http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=7084#217208)

That’s a non sequitur, ttbn. I had, after all, already demonstrated a clear understanding of the term, so surely you weren't implying that I didn't know what it meant. You, on the other hand, didn't even realise that pointing out an ad hominem did not constitute an ad hominem, despite all this Latin you've apparently studied.

<<Your very hubristic claim of my dicrediting [sic] should have read: ' On the contrary, ttbn, I and others have done it a few times'. You have misused a reflexive pronoun.>>

No, “myself and others” is perfectly acceptable English. Why, there’s even a book that uses that combination of words in its title. There seems to be plenty on OLO, too, who have used that combination of words (http://tinyurl.com/odcn5ok). Are they all hypocrites too?

<<And, you and your cronies have not discredited me; you have merely disagreed with [me], which is fine.>>

When one party’s reasoning (or their rebuttals to the other party’s reasoning) is met with nothing but ad hominem attacks, it’s pretty clear that what occurred exceeded mere disagreement. Usually someone has, shall we say, had their arse handed to them and didn’t like it.

<<I also note that you get your material from such dubious, unsubstantiated sources as 'wonkypedia' and google.>>

No, they’re just convenient and for your reference. I knew much of what I’ve claimed before Wikipedia was around. Funny you should also allege this when most of what I have linked you to is scholarly and peer-reviewed. Remember? You just dismissed it all as “scentific blah” (http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=17786#314796), and now you’re recommending “scientific blah” to me?!

Continued…
Posted by AJ Philips, Monday, 23 November 2015 2:55:46 PM
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...Continued

<<If you are reliant on technical gadgets, you can still find things called 'books', written by scholars, and and critiqued by their peers.>>

FYI, journal articles are more reliable than books. Being in hard copy form is not indicative of reliability either.

<<[I] new [sic] about about ad hominem 'attacks' long before Wikipedia existed, and I did study Latin. So, while I really appreciate your provision of 'links' for my edification, I don't really need them, thankyou.>>

Well apparently you do.

By the way, pointing out the use of ad hominems does not constitute “name calling” if one can demonstrate the validity of their accusation.

Speaking of which, your entire response was once again one big ad hominem. That’s a strange sort of reply for someone who claims to have the facts on their side.
Posted by AJ Philips, Monday, 23 November 2015 2:55:51 PM
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Dear o sung wu,

But, what would happen if we're both completely wrong, and the Jewish/Christian/Buddhist/Hindu/Shintoist/Sikh/Zoroastrian/Manichaean/Old Norse/Ancient Greek/Rastafarian etc. Doctrines are utterly accurate, what then ?

By what criteria can we choose one over the others? Is there any evidence for any of them? Is there any evidence that any of them are anything other than a creation of the imagination?

Is there any reason to protect any of them from cartoons, writing, analysis, criticism, ridicule etc.? There should be no Sacred Cows. No human idea should be protected from examination and challenge. Free expression should mean exactly that.

It seems to me they are all superstition. They are all based on faith in a number of unprovable propositions.

I am concerned that they do great harm. Islam is responsible for Isis and terrorism. Christianity is responsible for the Inquisition, Crusades and massacres of pagans, Jews, witches and heretics. Buddhism was the religion of the Japanese officer corps in WW2 and supplied the justification for their atrocities. Judaism sees God as a real estate dealer parcelling Middle East territory to the Chosen People. They all promote belief in fables which conflict with the scientific method which enjoins us to prove our hypotheses by evidence provided by observation and experiment. They promote seeking ‘truth’ by a mystical contact with imaginary beings.

Followers disagree with facts if they conflict with their beliefs. There is no evidence that Hitler was anything but a Christian. However, Christians don't want to believe that an evil person was a Christian so to them Hitler was not a Christian. That sort of nonsense is not restricted to believers in religion. I heard a Marxist argue that Stalin was not a Marxist. To him Marxists were good people so a bad person can't be a Marxist. My opposition to religion extends to any philosophy or ideology that is supported by nothing but faith.

There is enough conflict in the world in a contest for resources to promote further conflict in deciding between brands of mumbojumbo. Let’s grow up.
Posted by david f, Monday, 23 November 2015 3:33:49 PM
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I only received this Post today, but wish to post to Davids view of Abraham.

Abraham lived in a society that sacrificed their eldest child to the fertility gods - that was normal practice in his Middle Eastern culture as atonement to the gods of fertility. Abraham at that time was following the blind faith of the polytheistic father's religion. However his mind was challenging this idea and he accepted there was only one God El Shaddai; who created and supplied all so this changed his view of reality. To sacrifice to El Shaddai meant sacrifice of an animal. Abraham was not a man of blind faith,he was a man of vision emerging out of the polytheistic religion of the Middle East. He was a thinking man challenging the practice of his father and leaving the country of his relatives. The Molech / Baal religions of the time were far worse in their human sacrifices than anything that Abraham ever did. He never murdered any man, which David likes to think he did.

David reflects his upbringing by his father,ignoring context and cultural reality.
Posted by Josephus, Monday, 23 November 2015 3:48:47 PM
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Blind faith is eating saveloys.
Posted by Is Mise, Monday, 23 November 2015 4:37:58 PM
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Thank you DAVID F, you have blown my argument out of the water. I guess the only question or query if you like, that I might have, is concerning this fellow called Jesus of Nazareth.

Everything I've ever read of his statements in the New Testament I think it was, and despite many of the injustices occasioned to him and others - He never seemed to seek out any sort of revenge or desire to inflict any type of punishment on his assailants, rather he apparently stated, '...turn the other cheek...'. He seemed very much into forbearance and tolerance, while everyone else sought punishment for those who've been injured or who've stolen from them ?

If it's true, this bloke was a remarkable individual in many ways. However commonsense doesn't allow us to believe he survived after having been affixed or fastened high-up on a cross of wood, for the best part of 12 hours, and then being savagely stabbed with a spear. It's just not anatomically or medically conceivable? What I'm trying to say, he didn't seem to be a reprobate, quite the contrary in fact. Whatever the strange circumstances were surrounding his birth, and the mysterious particulars associated with his premature death ?
Posted by o sung wu, Monday, 23 November 2015 4:44:44 PM
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IsMise,

"Blind faith is eating saveloys".

Good one! We'd all agree on that. Absolute truth always beats mere opinion.
Posted by ttbn, Monday, 23 November 2015 6:28:27 PM
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Dear o sung wu,

If you find what you think is wisdom, accept it wherever it may be found. You don’t have to believe in the miracles cited in the Bible to follow what you think is wisdom. Revenge brings suffering on others, but it does us no good. We are not the same as time passes. All changes. We can’t even revenge ourselves on the person who injured us. He or she has changed through time and is not the same person who injured us. I find some of the sayings attributed to Jesus good. I find others not so good.

Leviticus 19:18

Jewish Publication Society

Thou shalt not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD.

King James Version

Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD.

Jesus was a Jew reciting the Jewish scriptures.

Mark 12:31

The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no commandment greater than these."

How much do we love ourselves? Maybe Martin Bryant who murdered the people in Port Arthur hated himself and loved his neighbour as much as he loved himself. If so he followed the commandment. I think a better commandment would be: “Be as kind as you can be under the circumstances.” If you had turned your other cheek when you were a police officer I don’t think you would have doing your duty.

One saying of Jesus I find objectionable is John 14:6 KJV.

Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

I see it as Jesus saying. It doesn’t matter how good or considerate a person you have been it is my way or the highway. Quite intolerant.
From your posts you seem to be a kind and decent man. That is much more important than looking for a bit of mumbojumbo to follow.
Posted by david f, Monday, 23 November 2015 6:42:01 PM
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Some here define christian by their claim, "I am Christian". Claiming Hitler was christian.

What did Jesus say who were his follower, "Those that obey my words" not the one who says I am a follower; as in the case of the two sons, one who said I will do the work and did not, and the other who said I will not do the work but later changed his mind and did. Which one is the obedient son? Matthew 21; 28 - 32. Again; Many will come in my name, Jesus said, and even perform miracles but he will say, "Depart for I never knew you".

Unless they follow Christ teaching they are not Christian.
Posted by Josephus, Monday, 23 November 2015 6:50:44 PM
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O sung wu,

DavidF and his smug cronies are not interested in the New Testament or the amazing good qualities - as opposed to the lunatic, Muhammed - of Jesus Christ. They are too busy scanning as much of the Old Testament as they can stay awake through, looking for the nasty bits. They don't dare open the New Testament because that would ruin their equivalence theories. How anyone, including athiests, cannot see the difference between the two main flesh and blood prophets of religion is beyond understanding. I am amazed that anyone claiming to be intelligent even mentions the Old Testament. The only nasty religious book in use in modern times is the Koran, which is much worse than the OT. They need to move on or stay in the same league as Muslims.
Posted by ttbn, Monday, 23 November 2015 6:54:55 PM
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David,
If you accept the passionate life, forgiving attitudes and self sacrifice of Jesus then you are accepting the "WAY", if you are accepting that he was truthful in his life as to his claims you are accepting the "TRUTH" and if you are accepting life as he lived it is the ultimate "LIFE" then you are accepting Him, [not his bodily presence] but you are accepting his spirit and character are of the God [Father]whom he lived by. You are coming to the Father, no man comes to the Father another way, another way of living, another selfish or debauched behaviour.
In the light of what I have previously said; Think about it!
Posted by Josephus, Monday, 23 November 2015 7:07:39 PM
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Dear David,

<<By what criteria can we choose one over the others? Is there any evidence for any of them? Is there any evidence that any of them are anything other than a creation of the imagination?>>

Just follow your heart and choose any of them which appeals to you most, it doesn't matter which. When followed sincerely, all religions lead to the same (which I name 'God' but you may use whatever name you like).

Now if you are looking for evidence, then don't look at the contents of beliefs - but watch the people who suggest any particular path, see how they live, then ask yourself: "do I want to go where they are going? do I want to be like them?". I cannot blame you if you cannot find that many inspiring examples in the established churches, but keep looking: all you need is one.

<<They all promote belief in fables which conflict with the scientific method>>

So what?

The scientific method is meant for finding out about the world.
It serves materialistic pursuits.
Religion serves the spiritual pursuit.

For achieving one's worldly desires, one's beliefs should better match the scientifically-observed facts of the world.

But for spiritual success, such matching is useless, irrelevant. All that matters is that the beliefs in question do their job effectively - to bring people to God.

<<There is enough conflict in the world in a contest for resources to promote further conflict in deciding between brands of mumbojumbo>>

Yet if you like a particular kind of food, then wouldn't you look for different brands of it in the supermarket? Even despite resource-scarcity? It's all a matter of personal preference: what do you want badly enough: the world - or God!
Posted by Yuyutsu, Monday, 23 November 2015 9:25:49 PM
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Pilger.
Brainswashed by the Hippy generation., he grew up with.


The Iraqis weren't so innocent when they raped and plundered Kuwait for
3months before America finally went in and put a stop to it.

It wasn't just the Iraqi army either.

There was a never ending stream of old trucks and vehicles coming across
The dessert coming back with loads of looted furniture and whatever they could take.
Posted by CHERFUL, Monday, 23 November 2015 9:30:05 PM
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ttbn,

So you have nothing to say in response then? Still going to keep us all in the dark with regards to these alleged facts?

<<They don't dare open the New Testament because that would ruin their equivalence theories.>>

As I’ve pointed out once before, I’ve read the whole Bible and spent every Tuesday night attending my church’s Bible study group for many years. Perhaps that’s why surveys tend to show that atheists generally know more about the Bible than Christians?

I have already linked you back to a post where I explained why the New Testament doesn’t override the Old Testament (http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=6865&page=0#209004) and here you are again, implying that is does. If you know so much more about Christian theology than everyone else, then perhaps you could explain what the point in any of the Old Testament was (particularly the bad parts) if Jesus was going to come and change it all anyway? (Hint: there are two main schools of thought on this)

<<How anyone, including athiests [sic], cannot see the difference between the two main flesh and blood prophets of religion...>>

Mohammed was no doubt the worse of the two. However, Jesus wasn’t perfect himself. He claimed to be sin-free, and yet he unleashed wrath on the money changers in the temple. It’s not like his actions were a temporary moment of insanity either. He went off and, having had the time to cool down while he made his weapon, came back and acted irrationally violent. Mohammed at least never claimed to be sin-free.

If you accept that Jesus was who he allegedly said he was, then you accept that he allowed nonsense about demon possession to continue all the way through to the Enlightenment, which undoubtedly cost many lives over many centuries. He also allowed disease to spread more than it had to by not informing us of bacteria and disease prevention through basic hygiene.

The biggest thing Mohammed had over Jesus though, was that we know he actually existed. We can’t say that with the same degree of certainty even for an historical Jesus.
Posted by AJ Philips, Monday, 23 November 2015 10:18:49 PM
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Oh, I forgot to mention the divisiveness of Jesus demanding that people place him over their families (Matthew 10:34-36). Not to mention his false dichotomy in Matthew 12:30.

He was also fine with the fact that most people would go to hell and suffer infinite punishment for finite crimes (Matthew 7:13-14). He invents the notion of an unforgivable sin in Mark 3:29, reaffirming it in Mark 12:10.

There’s plenty more where that came from. The guy was apparently a real piece of work.
Posted by AJ Philips, Monday, 23 November 2015 10:40:50 PM
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Dear Yuyutsu,

You wrote: “Now if you are looking for evidence, then don't look at the contents of beliefs - but watch the people who suggest any particular path, see how they live, then ask yourself: "do I want to go where they are going? do I want to be like them?"

I have followed your advice. From ancient times until now going back to Protagoras and Epicurus the people I see in history who I would like to model myself after are the atheists.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_atheists lists the lists of atheists to which I have added Epicurus and Lucretius.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_atheist_philosophers lists the philosophers. In that long list I have received the most from: Marquis de Condorcet, Daniel Dennett, Paul Edwards, Epicurus, William Godwin, Eric Hoffer, Lucretius, John Stuart Mill, Friedrich Nietzsche, Protagoras and Peter Singer.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_atheist_authors lists the authors. In that long list I have received the most from: Jorge Amado, Isaac Asimov, Italo Calvino Richard Dawkins, Umberto Eco, George Eliot, Vardis Fisher, Anatole France, Rebecca Goldstein, Robert Graves, A. E. Housman, Henrik Ibsen, Franz Kafka, Pär Lagerkvist, Philip Larkin, Jack London, H. L. Mencken, Arthur Miller, Dame Iris Murdoch, Philip Pullman, François Rabelais, Philip Roth, Salman Rushdie, Jean-Paul Sartre, Maurice Sendak, George Bernard Shaw Robert Louis Stevenson, Gore Vidal and H.G. Wells.

There are probably more who aren't listed. The intolerance of religion has probably made many people afraid of admitting their lack of belief. Burning at the stake and the iron maiden are not pleasant ways to die.

You also wrote: “The scientific method is meant for finding out about the world.
It serves materialistic pursuits.
Religion serves the spiritual pursuit.”

There is only the world. The spiritual pursuit is looking for something which doesn't exist.
Posted by david f, Monday, 23 November 2015 11:08:04 PM
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Deserved "intellect whippings" aside, for some Theists, I have heard it described as a kind of "Home Sickness," wherein no-one, even the world itself, measures up to the ideal.

And, if we look closer at some of the romantic idealism, we find the young Jesus, replete with trade skills, heading off into the country where he earns his keep by helping out the cockies of that time repair their agricultural equipment, get the crop in or get the harvest done on time.

I'd add at this point that even today if you turn up and give the locals a hand to get them over the hump that you end up pretty popular and on the receiving end of a lot of good hospitality.

But, as some would tell it, with JC there was something more, something that made people pause and look, a person who did not have to make spider webs of laws backed by lethal force, but rather someone who people were naturally attracted to and instinctively loyal to.

And no doubt, he had more than his fair share of secret admirers.

And yet, what did he do with this new found adulation? Well, as the story is told by some, he went out of his way to seek out and heal those afflicted with illness, including those suffering so called "Demonic possession."

Now, even today in places I have visited such people are chained by the foot, straight jacketed and kept in a "monkey house." And, given the general unavailability of quality modern psychiatry, it is not without reason that ultimately it falls upon the family (which certainly pains some of them deeply) to incarcerate their loved ones in this fashion.

If nothing else, such tales perhaps reflect the deep longings and aspirations of a persecuted and down trodden people struggling to survive.

..

And what do we have in the guvment today?

Well, they say Jesus, but they seem Hell bent on inflicting Demons (psychiatric impediment) on even children.
Posted by DreamOn, Monday, 23 November 2015 11:55:56 PM
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Dear David,

<<I have followed your advice>>

Excellent! But still, strangely you claim that you are not religious...

And ironically, that those foolish people who display intolerance ARE religious (just because they say so?). Would you seriously consider that people who burn others at the stake could ever lead you to God?

Certainly, Epicurus was more religious than most contemporary priests and Imams. I happen to agree with some of his teachings: while I do not share all his beliefs, it's not their contents which matter, but the way they affect your spirit. By following Epicurus devotedly, you may eventually reach God - or at least make good progress.

<<There is only the world. The spiritual pursuit is looking for something which doesn't exist>>

There is no world - existence is an illusion. The spiritual pursuit is to wake up from this nightmare, rather than hanging on to it, trying to have a good time while it lasts.

Now given that spiritual pursuit is not after anything that exists (and I agree), why are you complaining about religious belief conflicting with science?
Posted by Yuyutsu, Tuesday, 24 November 2015 12:49:22 AM
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DreamOn,
I might mention that belief in demons is a pagan concept widespread in New Testament times rising from Greek and Persian mythology that permeated society at that time as Israel had been was under the spread of Persian and Greek views of the world. The Greeks believed alcohol contained spirits that entered the person on consumption and we still use the term spirits today. Christ was about freeing people from the belief spirits controlled them and this was done by freeing them. If they believed they were free they were free of the superstition.

Some uninformed Christians and certainly Muslims still believe in demons as do many primitive Asian cultures.
Posted by Josephus, Tuesday, 24 November 2015 7:54:20 AM
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'Faith is the antithesis of all thinking human beings.
Blind, unthinking dogma that inevitably leads to hatred and violence.'

Utter rubbish.

And I'm an athiest
Posted by Houellebecq, Tuesday, 24 November 2015 9:56:29 AM
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By far the nastiest and most violent people in Australia are those of the socialist alliance. They are intolerant, bigoted and self righteous. Many belong to the gw religion I suspect. Certainly a display of faith.
Posted by runner, Tuesday, 24 November 2015 11:47:59 AM
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No mere Pagan concept alone I would say Josephus, as it has a psychiatric basis to it.

And, with the different levels of understandings as they are and has they have been in the past, if you could experience something of what a sufferer of say Schizophrenia "sees" & "hears"

(and the other sense can also be involved)

then I am reasonably certain that you would conclude that it was not "illogical" for people to conclude "Demonic Possession" even if the extent of your ability to experience that was limited to observation of the afflicted.

And of course, environmental pressures and certain substance can also induce altered states of consciousness such as Psychosis, like the amphetamines used by the German and Japanese militaries during WWII,

(and the West has also indulged in this)

or the more modern and cruder varieties such as that allegedly being used by ISIS.
Posted by DreamOn, Tuesday, 24 November 2015 12:54:59 PM
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Of course, one of the tricks and the challenges for modern medicine

(in the absence of a cure)

is to be able to stabilise the mood

(and given that all of the good stuff for mood stabilisation is contra-indicated that is something easier said than done)

for that goes to make "Dark Hallucinations" into warm and fuzzy ones, which is far more tolerable.
Posted by DreamOn, Tuesday, 24 November 2015 1:05:19 PM
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So dear DavidF,

if Ibrahim was only hallucinating, then maybe he did, through force of his own mind and personality, overcome the cultural norms and in the finality, say no.

And maybe that's the point, or at least, an alternative interpretation.
Posted by DreamOn, Tuesday, 24 November 2015 1:09:15 PM
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Hi there DAVID F...

You have this singular ability to reduce the most complex elements of biblical scholarship into an elementary, easily understood template by which we should all try to live by ? Whether we're religious, agnostic, or atheist it doesn't seem relevant, it's about doing the right thing(s) for other people, as you would have them do for you.

Another good illustration you gave - the abject stupidity of looking for 'revenge' ? Regrettably I've subjected myself to seeking revenge against many a ne'er do well over the years. Particularly whenever I've felt I've been seriously spurned, physically assaulted or allegations that I've perjured myself, either in Court or during interrogatories etc.

And I'm here to freely admit to you DAVID F, despite what many may say to the contrary, 'revenge', provides one with precisely, a nought amount of gratification. In fact over time some instances of having exacted revenge, leaves you with some serious doubts concerning your own moral code ?

Thank you DAVID F.
Posted by o sung wu, Tuesday, 24 November 2015 2:02:10 PM
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mhaze, AJ Phillips

'"The default position is for man to believe in something."

No, the default is no belief or a position of scepticism.'

Expressions of the cognitive state we choose to call 'belief' are pretty much paradigmatic with being a normally functioning human. We have thousands of them.

Believing plausibly evolved for survival rather than for the later esoteric cultural practice of seeking truth, and it would be hard not to see it as a cognitive default.

Its variant 'believing in ...' contributes to our individual psychological homeostasis, the operational range within which we function and tell ourselves we have some control over the randomness and confusion of living, and from this functional point of view a distinction between religious and other beliefs may not be particularly significant in informing action. There's ample empirical evidence for that.

AJ, I thoroughly endorse your sceptical, critical thinking goal. I only caution that we who adopt it are as as subject as anyone to the errors and biases attributable to the evolutionary functions of believing, but I'm sure you're aware of that.
Posted by lasxpirate, Tuesday, 24 November 2015 8:06:40 PM
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//There is no world - existence is an illusion.//

Nonsense: existence definitely exists. It's tautological, dude: no amount of your mystical mumbo-jumbo can get around that.

Even if we accept that we're all living in the Matrix and most what we perceive to be real is illusory, you still run up against the cogito ergo sum problem. If I don't exist, then just who is it that is considering the illusory nature of existence? Here's a clue: it isn't God. So I, at least, exist - even if everything else in the universe is false and I'm really hooked in to a massive computer system built by highly advanced machines who have somehow still managed to completely fail to comprehend the Laws of Thermodynamics. This seems unlikely.
Posted by Toni Lavis, Tuesday, 24 November 2015 11:07:50 PM
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DreamOn, My point was that observable dysfunction in human behaviour was in the Greek world view attributed to spirit beings / demons. As my example of drunkenness was attributed to spirits. The person was drunk but nnot under the influence of spirits or demons as they believed.

Dysfunction in human behaviour has chemical, mental or physical causes.
Posted by Josephus, Wednesday, 25 November 2015 8:07:13 AM
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Dear Toni,

I am so happy that you are aware of yourself - the one who is beyond all doubt!

That you ARE is beyond controversy, but that you are some-thing is only a speculation: only things, or objects, exist. Objects can also be destroyed thereby becoming non-existent.

Existence is only an interpretation of reality, a misinterpretation that assumes duality, at least between subject and object.

You, however, are not an object - you ARE. Nothing can ever make you not-ARE, nothing can make you different: you are the immutable, eternal, the subject, not an object - you are God!
Posted by Yuyutsu, Wednesday, 25 November 2015 9:38:26 AM
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*YuYuTsu*
There is an interesting fork in the road of belief though isn't there between those that subscribe to a belief system that holds that the Divine also has an internal, very personal and intimate aspect to it as distinct from it being a purely an external thing.

*DavidF*

I have sufficient experience of some modern languages to put a big question mark on some of the translations. To be convinced of their "accuracy" I would have to want to make a study of it. That's not to say that I know that all of the works are of sub-standard quality, but certainly of the material that I have seen much of it is is pretty shoddy.

To look at the sub-titling on some movie media, sub-titles on TV etc etc and I would say that a lot of it is less than ordinary. Conversely, in the digital and on line worlds great development clearly is being done and an ongoing work in progress.

See, even if you get a handle on the mechanics of a language, to wield it and deploy it as a native speaker would is a whole other storey involving learning new ways to think and new ways to generate meaning. On top of that, the jump from a modern language to an ancient language is no small intellectual undertaking.

..

I am also wondering about what may be an increasing population of drug induced, paranoid schizophrenics

(and a whole lot more variant and other psychiatric conditions)

in the form of ISIS, being lined up for mass extermination.

..

And I wonder if those in priest's robes did actually try and Exorcise some of the paedophiles before they cut them loose, and their abject failure in that regard is what they were also trying to cover up?
Posted by DreamOn, Wednesday, 25 November 2015 2:43:01 PM
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Yuyutsu

"That you ARE is beyond controversy, but that you are some-thing is only a speculation: only things, or objects, exist. Objects can also be destroyed thereby becoming non-existent.

Existence is only an interpretation of reality, a misinterpretation that assumes duality, at least between subject and object."

You make this distinction between (A) 'ARE-ness', which is 'beyond controversy', and (B) 'existence', which is 'an interpretation/misinterpretation' of reality.

According to your (B), we interpret reality, such that, for example, the 'thing in itself' as proposed by Kant is a chimera. I see this as an analogue of the kind of (cognitive) model-dependent realism theorised by Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow, which is quite well supported by what neuroscience tells us about the brain's mechanisms.

(A), which is for you an a priori ('beyond controversy'), looks to me like the same foundational Cogito, the experiencing, thinking self, that Descartes thought he had pinned down and exempted from controversy, but it's not clear to me how your phenomenologically identified (A) is any less subject to interpretive model-dependent realism than (B). The same brain mechanisms are required for both operations, and they carry no warranty. The innaccuracy of memory, and even confabulation about past 'selves', is quite well attested in psychology..

I suspect for these reasons that a speculative distinction between 'ARE-ness' and 'existence' is gratuitous.
Posted by lasxpirate, Wednesday, 25 November 2015 6:49:21 PM
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If one wants to prove one's existence one only has to refuse to pay taxes.
Or if you want a more immediate proof just kick the door of a police car.
If however you hold that the repercussions from these actions are illusions, then lend me a few hundred dollars.
Posted by Is Mise, Wednesday, 25 November 2015 7:00:13 PM
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In a court case in the 1950's a person of Christian science belief had a serious car accident and the Insurance Company was able to use their belief to prove they had not been injured in reality so lost a huge compensation case. The religion is neither Christian or scientific, but merely a belief.
Posted by Josephus, Wednesday, 25 November 2015 7:47:24 PM
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Dear Pirate,

ARE-ness (or in its alternate grammatical forms, AM-ness and IS-ness) only requires one. No differentiation, no comparison. Existence on the other hand, implies a relationship between at least two: subject and object - the property of being and something that complies (or doesn't comply) with that property. It also suggests space (where this objects resides), time (when it appears) and causality (why it appears).

The latter differentiation is a much-stronger assertion, which doesn't follow from the experience of 'cogito'.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Wednesday, 25 November 2015 10:31:49 PM
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Dear Josephus,

You wrote;

“Abraham lived in a society that sacrificed their eldest child to the fertility gods - that was normal practice in his Middle Eastern culture as atonement to the gods of fertility.”

I really do get tired of this rubbish getting trotted out by those who would sanitise God's actions in commanding Abraham to raise the blade over the throat of his son.

Besides which there is absolutely no evidence that this was 'normal practice' at all.

Rather it is evident from Genesis that Abraham's actions were that of a man in deep fear of a raging God who had wiped out the cities of the plain before Abraham's very eyes. This is despite Abraham trying to bargain for their lives. God was mindful of Abraham's judgement and probably resentful of it therefore the 'test'. What a deeply inhumane thing to have done though. It is pretty clear that God and Abraham never spoke afterward and that Abraham and Jacob were understandable estranged from each other.

This is part of the story of the humanising of a God, a theme which continues throughout the Bible culminating in the crucifixion where God finally gets to experience something akin to what he put Abraham through.

Your rather insipid interpretation attempts to strip much of the power from the binding of Jacob and we are left with a shallow take on one of the great biblical narratives.
Posted by SteeleRedux, Thursday, 26 November 2015 12:16:16 AM
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SteeleRedux,
I do not know how you can claim Jacob was estranged from Abraham. That is nonsense as Abraham was long dead before Jacob was old enough to know his grandfather Genesis 25.
Human sacrifice was practiced in Mesopotamia during the time of Abraham.
http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Human_sacrifice

Abraham refused to accept the polytheistic gods of his father Terah and it was he who was estranged from him and departed for the land now known as Israel.
Posted by Josephus, Thursday, 26 November 2015 12:52:56 PM
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Dear Josephus,

My apologies. I of course meant Issac.

You wrote;

“Human sacrifice was practiced in Mesopotamia during the time of Abraham.”

It was also practiced at time in Judea with great relish by Israelites and children were among the victims. But to claim that the eldest son was routinely sacrificed to the fertility gods is completely without evidence.
Posted by SteeleRedux, Thursday, 26 November 2015 2:19:59 PM
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Dear Josephus,

The polytheistic gods were more tolerant than the monotheistic God. One could add one’s god to the polytheistic pantheon with a minimum of fuss. Followers of the Abrahamic Gods have a record of intolerance. "Thou shall have no other Gods before me." Why not? However, monotheism was a much more effective mechanism of social control so the ruling classes could take it on as the divine right of kings and other nonsense supported them. One can condemn heresy and equate it with treason. I think the story of Abraham as are many of the stories in the Bible is simply a Stone Age tribal legend which is used to inculcate unquestioning obedience to the dictates of the sometimes unreasonable tribal leader. Of course it is all nonsense. Women do not get impregnated by gods except in pagan legends and Christianity. Nobody can take on another’s sins except in pagan legends and Christianity. No one gets resurrected except in pagan legends and Christianity. The Roman Empire probably would have broken up earlier had it not adopted Christianity as the official religion. As it was the eastern Roman Empire lasted until 1453.

If mankind cannot cast off the superstition of believing in god(s) at least we can get rid of monotheism and return to a more tolerant and humane polytheism. In the legend Terah was wiser than his son. Father knows best.

I would rather worship Athena, the goddess of wisdom, than the no good God of the Bible who orders a man to murder his son and then subjects his own son to an unpleasant death.
Posted by david f, Thursday, 26 November 2015 2:48:40 PM
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Yuyutsu

You wrote: "ARE-ness (or in its alternate grammatical forms, AM-ness and IS-ness) only requires one. No differentiation, no comparison. Existence on the other hand, implies a relationship between at least two: subject and object - the property of being and something that complies (or doesn't comply) with that property. It also suggests space (where this objects resides), time (when it appears) and causality (why it appears)."

The distinction you make between 'IS-ness' and 'existence' has the appearance of being quite arbitrary, so any properties the concepts are said to have, or implications they are said to have that differentiate them, can only be equally arbitrary. Even so, you might like to explain your concepts a little:

"Is-ness ... Only requires one": One what?

"Existence ... Implies a relationship ...": A statement, assertion, speculation, denial, proposition, hypothesis or theory may be said to have implications. 'Existence' is none of these. How can it be said to have implications?

What are the specific grounds for your distinction, other than in question-begging terms?
Posted by lasxpirate, Thursday, 26 November 2015 3:06:58 PM
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Posted by david f, Thursday, 26 November 2015 2:48:40 PM

" ... I think the story of Abraham as are many of the stories in the Bible is simply a Stone Age tribal legend which is used to inculcate unquestioning obedience to the dictates of the sometimes unreasonable tribal leader. ... "

Well said! To which I would add that I consider that the unsavoury underlying principle in that remains with us still today.

And I suspect that many of the old stories have been ever so slightly "kinked" to do exactly as *DavidF* has suggested.

See, who said God spoke? Can anyone tell us?

..

Thereafter, I think we need a better word than "non-sense" as if you accept that they were only hallucinating, then obviously hallucinations do actually originate in part in the world of sensory experience (and by the part that does not originate in sense I mean that aspect of a hallucination which has come about by the particular re-arrangement of stimulus and prior experience by the individual's concerned brain, and that of course can give the appearance that the hallucination is strange in the sense of it being outside the persons previous experience, but of course, that is unlikely to be the case.
Posted by DreamOn, Thursday, 26 November 2015 4:10:00 PM
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Dear Pirate,

By "only requires one" I just mean that it doesn't require two, it doesn't require any duality of whatever kind, it doesn't require a background, it doesn't require contrast, it doesn't require relationship, it doesn't require a context, it doesn't require a universe...

Whereas existence requires a context, a universe within which objects "reside" (or are absent from).

For example, "there doesn't exist a number whose square is minus-one", is true in the context of real numbers, is true in the context of the physical world (where numbers do not even exist), but is not true in the context of complex numbers.

To say that "the number 'i' exists', implies that there are two separate "things": the universe of complex numbers and the specific number 'i'.

That I AM, however, is independent of any context, it does not require a universe: even if there is no universe, you still ARE.

Perhaps the confusion comes back to Descartes:
Indeed, in order to be able to think there must be at least two (probably many more) and indeed Descartes stated "Cogito ergo sum" and indeed, Cogito is a sufficient condition for Ergo. However, Cogito is not a necessary condition for Ergo: You ARE even while you do not think.

That you also exist (while not thinking, say when your body is asleep or dead), that there also is a universe apart from you while you are not thinking, is not that obvious.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Thursday, 26 November 2015 4:43:00 PM
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Some of the elements in the biblical stories don't even ring true as authentic hallucinations either to be honest.

Allow me to provide an example of why I say that.

So, have you ever seen an example of so called psychedelic art?

Well, if you have, then you may also know that some of it is but a 2D representation/a frame or captured moment of what otherwise is more like an animated 3D pattern that you could see on a digital device, and one that may appear suspended (mirage like/with a degree of transparency) within the environment that you are in ( assuming ones eyes are open.)

Same thing applies with hallucinations, and such is the majesty of the Human Brain that indeed it can generate some absolutely unreal experiences.

So .. " and GOD spoke " is at best perhaps just a "loud" sub vocalisation and at the tamer end of the scale.

And as for the language, was the verb really "spoke" or perhaps a verb which is similar but subtlety different in meaning?

..

Conversely, some of the stream of consciousness and symbolic stuff like that in Revelations seem a bit more interesting. Perhaps some of Joseph's dreams. But other elements as said seem plainly contrived.
Posted by DreamOn, Thursday, 26 November 2015 6:39:09 PM
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david f,
Abraham adopted El Shaddai one of the gods of Ur as his God, and she was a god of many breasts representing one who nurtures life. Moses changes this in Exodus 6: 2 to YHWH meaning the presence or "I AM".

I happen to believe the entire Universe is a single cohesive unit and not a conflicting diversity operated by many gods.

I do not believe in gods impregnating virgins, as I have explained previously. Mary was a virgin artificially impregnated by the seed of a descendant of King David as authorized by Zechariah to ensure the child born was of royal lineage. Such practices were used by the Essene community to avoid becoming ceremonially unclean.
Posted by Josephus, Thursday, 26 November 2015 7:08:08 PM
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Dear Josephus,

What is your evidence for the statement about Abraham selecting a God? Why pick one god and not another god? How do you know who or what impregnated Mary if she existed? Was there a reliable witness?

My younger son once asked his mother about how he got here. She told him that Daddy planted a seed in Mommy. He looked at her doubtfully and said, “I never saw you do it.” He is now a biochemist.
Posted by david f, Thursday, 26 November 2015 7:40:13 PM
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david f,
Of course you do not believe the Hebrew text, but it is written there, and if you studied the archaeology of Ur you would know of the many temples to the gods that Terah served.

Again if you do not accept the witness of James the eldest son of Joseph who later wrote about Mary and the birth of Jesus then you do not accept any witness. James was raised in the household of Mary and his father Joseph. James son of Joseph was initially skeptical of Jesus but later recognized the role of Jesus and he wrote several books.
You are on the Net search "Protevangelion" by James.
Posted by Josephus, Thursday, 26 November 2015 8:25:47 PM
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Davidf,
I believe Joseph's first wife was Simone as she was traveling with the family to Bethlehem.
This site has an English copy of the text.

http://www.gnosis.org/library/gosjames.htm
Posted by Josephus, Thursday, 26 November 2015 8:35:21 PM
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Dear Josephus,

Thank you for telling your source. I regard it and the Bible as most unreliable.

http://www.hist.cam.ac.uk/undergraduate/tripos-papers/themes-sources is about historical sources from the history department at Cambridge.

http://www.hist.cam.ac.uk/undergraduate/tripos-papers/part-ii-papers-2015-2016/specifieds-pdfs-2015-16/paper-7 refers to the period from 284 to 476 in the Roman World. At the bottom of the page are sources that those working in the period can use. Note that none of them are religious documents. Serious historians when writing about a period examine coins, archeological findings, government archives and similar material. Legends such as found in religious material are useful for what they tell us about what people believed or were influenced by during the period. However, they are completely unreliable as a chronicle of what actually happened.
Posted by david f, Thursday, 26 November 2015 9:28:28 PM
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There was only two displays of faith that I can see that come under this threads heading; faith in the Koran and the Kalashnikov.
Posted by Is Mise, Thursday, 26 November 2015 9:50:46 PM
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Yuyutsu

“Perhaps the confusion comes back to Descartes”.

I’m not sure we should be too ready to blame Descartes, because your ontological dualism presents as characteristically Cartesian, with some differences of detail.

His phenomenologically derived identification of the thinking self/soul is guaranteed from error by a benevolent and truthful deity, with its distinction from the material universe (required by “existence” in your terms) effected through the pineal gland.

Your decontextualised “IS-ness” (“independent of any context”) seems to me to be fundamentally the same ontological character as Descartes’ thinking self/soul. However, your “IS-ness” seems to want it both ways:

(1) it wants to be ontologically autonomous like the subject of Descartes’ Cogito, in that “it does not require a universe”, a universe which you have previously said to be “implied” by “existence” (“existence requires a context, a universe”), but at the same time,

(2) “you [“IS-ness”, independent of “existence”] also exist (while not thinking, say when your body is asleep or dead)”.

“IS-ness” independent of “existence”, yet it “exists”? Puzzling equivocation.
Posted by lasxpirate, Friday, 27 November 2015 4:21:37 PM
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Dear Pirate,

We are coming close to the limit that words can express.

Let me try another way of saying the same:

It's conceivable (or makes sense) to talk about things which do not exist.
It's inconceivable (or doesn't make sense) to talk about things which are not what they are.

If you consider the latter trivial, then indeed it is: let there be any context whatsoever or no context at all, still I cannot ever be what I am not!

I am not "blaming" Descartes, I just explained that he can be easily misunderstood as one could say "Descartes says Cogito Ergo Sum, thus Ergo must be subject to Cogito", which Descartes of course never said.

Now Descartes may have said many other things, but please don't hold me responsible for his views, especially since I never introduced "ontological dualism".

Yes, I did say that existence would require duality, but that would imply ontological duality only if existence was real. Descartes might well have assumed that existence is real, thus conclude that "I think therefore I exist", but I follow the Hindu (and Buddhist) school of Advaita Vedanta, which states that existence is an illusion, an error of perception, or "Maya", that in fact there is nothing but God and duality is but an illusion.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Friday, 27 November 2015 6:54:44 PM
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This could all be solved pretty quickly if
God would come down to earth and say

"Look here I am, and here is what My commands are, to
Clear up any confusion."

If you doubt I am God, well here is a demonstration of my power.
He could then lift a mountain off the ground and suspend it in the sky.
Or some such thing,

What is God hiding for.
Why doesn't God deal with humankind honestly and face to face so to speak.
Why all the secrecy. God has nothing to hide surely.
God must realise how confused humans are. Why not clear things up by appearing?
Posted by CHERFUL, Friday, 27 November 2015 11:11:41 PM
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Yuyutsu

“We are coming close to the limit that words can express.”

Well, as words are our medium for discussion, I guess it’s your call.

“Now Descartes may have said many other things, but please don’t hold me responsible for his views, especially since I never introduced “ontological dualism” “

I introduced the term because (1) you were presenting and explaining an ontology, (2) it presented as dualism for the reasons I outlined, and (3) I was exploring different ways of construing your worldview in order to find common ground.

Anyway, thank you for engaging in discussion.
Posted by lasxpirate, Saturday, 28 November 2015 5:13:09 PM
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CHERFUL,
Christ /Messiah came so read his words, and they killed Him.
Posted by Josephus, Saturday, 28 November 2015 7:38:29 PM
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Dear Josephus,

If there is a God, and that God is really God no human could kill he/she/it.
Posted by david f, Saturday, 28 November 2015 8:56:30 PM
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Dear Josephus,

Please use your common sense. A human being that could be killed by other human beings is no more a god than those unfortunates in mental institutions who claim to be god. He is to be pitied but not worshiped.
Posted by david f, Saturday, 28 November 2015 9:59:03 PM
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David, Messiah was mortal human with a message from God, as the scripture says he laid aside any desire to be God, unlike the Roman Emperor. Beside he directed us to worship and serve the Creator - father of the human Spirit.
Posted by Josephus, Sunday, 29 November 2015 7:32:53 AM
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//Messiah was mortal human//

How many mortal humans do you know that can get up and walk around again after having been nailed to cross for three days and stabbed in the side with a spear, Josephus?
Posted by Toni Lavis, Sunday, 29 November 2015 7:40:27 AM
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Dear Josephus,

The Scripture does not make sense. You may believe it if you wish, but I do not see any reason to believe obvious nonsense even if the nonsense is dignified by calling it scripture.
Posted by david f, Sunday, 29 November 2015 8:25:11 AM
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Good point Toni lavis. I would add however, how many humans are born of virgin women who are married, but yet had obviously not consummated the marriage either before or after she had become pregnant?
How did the 'holy' blokes of the day know she was a virgin? Or was Jesus born to an unmarried mother?

How many humans can also 'rise again' and wander around the earth for a few days before 'ascending to heaven', but yet then be still eaten each mass day in the form of a bread wafer?

How anyone at all can 'believe' any of this is true is beyond me.
Posted by Suseonline, Sunday, 29 November 2015 12:29:05 PM
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As an atheist and a person who's seen his fair share of human misery often caused by excessive overreaction, or seeking revenge for some perceived slight or something else, as equally idiotic, perhaps Jesus of Nazareth's prescription for a peaceful lifestyle isn't all that bad eh ?

I must tell you of a bloke I know, and know very well. Previously, he was a really bad bastard, standover man, and very very violent towards anyone (particularly coppers) who he didn't like. In and out of the Bay, numerous times, the latest which earned him 12 with a 8 for 'attempt murder'.

I heard from a former colleague of mine (we both on separate occasions had locked this bloke up), that whilst in boob he'd found 'God' ? And after he was granted parole, he regularly attended the Wayside Chapel, consequently he's not put a foot wrong since. Nor has he appeared in any Court for at least, the past twelve years - in fact he's studying for the 'Minister-ship' or whatever it's called, he's a completely changed man...perhaps ?

I had by chance run into him not so long ago, normally he'd bristle with sheer aggression, trying to provoke some sort of physical encounter with me but no, quite the contrary, he appeared completely relaxed, almost at peace with himself ? So I 'courageously' inquired what had happened, what caused this miraculous change ? All he would say on the subject '...I found Jesus...' ? Go figure ?
Posted by o sung wu, Sunday, 29 November 2015 2:35:59 PM
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Toni,

"How many mortal humans do you know that can get up and walk around again after having been nailed to cross for three days and stabbed in the side with a spear, Josephus?"

I'm sure Josephus doesn't know of any and neither do I.
Posted by Is Mise, Sunday, 29 November 2015 2:43:00 PM
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The fact is he did not resurrect himself. The Apostle Paul said God raised him from the grave. There have been many classified as clinically dead by doctors that have come back to life.
Posted by Josephus, Sunday, 29 November 2015 7:10:33 PM
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Dear Josephus,

It may be a fact that the Apostle Paul said what you quoted him as saying. If he did I think it also is a fact that he was speaking nonsense.
Posted by david f, Sunday, 29 November 2015 9:00:39 PM
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Josephus, any ideas about who said Mary was a virgin when Jesus was born?
Just wondering....
Posted by Suseonline, Sunday, 29 November 2015 9:33:41 PM
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//The fact is he did not resurrect himself.//

You're nearly there, dude

//There have been many classified as clinically dead by doctors that have come back to life.//

Well that's nice. How many of those many have been crucified for three days and mortally wounded with the Spear of Longinus? I'm guessing none. If you follow the folklore, a mere scratch from the Spear of Longinus can spell death.
Posted by Toni Lavis, Monday, 30 November 2015 12:22:00 AM
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Toni,

"How many of those many have been crucified for three days and mortally wounded...."

None, absolutely none.
Posted by Is Mise, Monday, 30 November 2015 6:51:53 AM
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One person's faith is another person's gullibility. Is there any difference between faith and gullibility? Perhaps there a number x. If x people share a particular gullibility it becomes faith.

I was trying to point out when I started this thread that faith can do great harm. Better doubt and question.
Posted by david f, Monday, 30 November 2015 7:28:30 AM
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A person who lives by doubt never achieve or invest. Faith engenders hope and vision and creates positive minded people. I'd rather mix with people of faith than with negative pessimists.
Posted by Josephus, Monday, 30 November 2015 8:52:34 PM
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Josephus,

This is a false dichotomy.

<<I'd rather mix with people of faith than with negative pessimists.>>

Negative pessimism is not the opposite of faith. Nor is it the only alternative. A healthy scepticism is the opposite of faith. Like so many others, you confuse or conflate scepticism with cynicism.

I would rather not mix with people who deliberately delude themselves into believing something just because it feels nice.

Faith is belief without good reason. How on Earth could that possibly, in any way, be a positive thing?

Anything positive that may appear to have resulted from faith is likely to have been a fluke, and would inevitably come with drawbacks.
Posted by AJ Philips, Monday, 30 November 2015 9:31:48 PM
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"Is there any difference between faith and gullibility"
and "Faith is belief without good reason. How on Earth could that possibly, in any way, be a positive thing?"

Perhaps I may offer an example of Faith, in a positive light, that answers the above?

"Father Damien or Saint Damien of Molokai, SS.CC. or Saint Damien de Veuster (Dutch: Pater Damiaan or Heilige Damiaan van Molokai; January 3, 1840 – April 15, 1889),[2] born Jozef De Veuster, was a Roman Catholic priest from Belgium and member of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary,[3] a missionary religious institute. He won recognition for his ministry from 1873 to 1889 in the Kingdom of Hawai&#699;i to people with leprosy (also known as Hansen's disease), who were required to live under a government-sanctioned medical quarantine on the island of Moloka&#699;i.[4]

After sixteen years' caring for the physical, spiritual, and emotional needs of those in the leper colony, Father Damien died of leprosy...."

One presumes that Damien's faith is what spurred him on, it certainly wasn't the money.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Father_Damien
Posted by Is Mise, Monday, 30 November 2015 10:00:27 PM
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//One presumes that Damien's faith is what spurred him on//

Or perhaps he was just a man of unusual compassion. Compassion is not contingent on religious faith, and is displayed by theists and atheists alike.
Posted by Toni Lavis, Monday, 30 November 2015 10:09:18 PM
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Thanks Is Mise. I was waiting for a response like yours.

People like that would probably be compassionate and charitable no matter what their beliefs are with regards to superstition. Those who would not, are probably just earning a credit rating with an imbecilic God who falls for feigned charitable deeds.

Good deeds are often wrongly attributed to religious belief. What people often don’t seem to realise, however, is that all religion does is provide a framework for otherwise genuine charitable people. No-one, for example, is going to start a charity in the name of a lack of belief in something. So, for this reason, we don't see any overtly atheistic charities (although, I have a list that I donate to, so as to not provide any faith-based institutions with a reason to exist).

Faith, however, does come with major drawbacks. Which has been the main topic of this thread. A more subtle problem with the belief in something for which there is no evidence can be demonstrated with the example of the person who thinks they’ve won the lottery when they haven’t.

But I’ve been through that many times in the past and see no reason to repeat myself now.
Posted by AJ Philips, Monday, 30 November 2015 10:53:30 PM
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Actually, my claim about those forming charitable institutions in the name of a lack of belief in something wasn't quite accurate. There are a few atheist groups now who have started charitable groups such as http://www.facebook.com/AtheistsHelpingtheHomelessHouston, where the homeless can get a feed without having to hear a sermon first.

There's always the catch of conversion when it comes to religious charity.
Posted by AJ Philips, Monday, 30 November 2015 11:00:54 PM
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The very nature of the term atheist is a negative idea given to the seeker of a meal; at least our meals to persons living rough is called Hope.

Obviously you guys do not listen to love songs as it has no rational logic and it might make you feel good. As you have divorced basing feeling good from logic.

There is no logical reason to care about one who wishes you dead, but for followers of Christ it is expected - "Love your enemy", "Feed your enemy," "Be concerned in prayer for the welfare of your enemy," Of course following Christ is not logical but it changes hearts and minds. It changes minds because they cannot follow the logic.
Posted by Josephus, Tuesday, 1 December 2015 8:53:11 AM
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Damien devoted his life to helping the lepers now he may have done it out of compassion alone but given that he was a Catholic priest one may also assume that he was moved by faith.

However let us take an example nearer to home; o sung wu's reformed criminal, if his reformation was genuine then I would imagine that he was moved by faith.
I don't see compassion coming into the picture nor monetary reward.
Posted by Is Mise, Tuesday, 1 December 2015 10:50:28 AM
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Dear Josephus,

Christianity did not invent hope. Hope was one of the items in Pandora’s Box in Greek legend. Christianity did not invent a humanoid god who was born of a virgin and was resurrected. Pagan myth is replete with examples of such imaginary creations. Hopefully humanity will advance beyond the need to worship humanoid gods or any other kind of god. We care for each because we are all human beings and part of society. We care for each other because we are able to put ourselves in the other person’s place. We care for other because we hope that in our hour of need someone will care for us.

There are many other reasons to care for each other. We do not need mystic, superstitious mumbojumbo to care for each other.

From questioning and doubt we gain knowledge. Maybe what we’re told is wrong. Maybe we can find another answer besides the currently accepted one and be aware that what we think is so is not so. Faith is the enemy of knowledge. It keeps us from examining and questioning. Hope along with doubt and questioning leads us to work for a better future because we think we may be able to change things for the better. Faith drags us back into a morass of superstition.
Posted by david f, Tuesday, 1 December 2015 10:52:37 AM
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Dear Is Mise,

Both the reformed criminal and Father Damien are examples of men who either became better human beings or devoted their lives to helping others. Maybe their religion lead them to it. Maybe not.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_J%C3%A4gerst%C3%A4tter tells about Franz Jägerstätter who I think is a heroic figure. He was a Catholic layman who openly opposed the Nazis. Since he was a member of the master race and belonged to no proscribed organisation the Nazis were at a loss on how to deal with him. They had various members of the clergy and others talk to him. He would not give in, and the Nazis eventually beheaded him. He found inspiration in his religion. However, if it really was his religion why was he the only one who did what he did. Austria is predominantly Catholic. If it was the religion why was he the only one?

Vinoba Bhave, an Indian holy man, advised against religious conversion. He advised a person with doubts about his or her faith to look deeper in the faith. If you can't find what you are looking for, it is probably not there. A person of conscience really didn't need any reason to oppose Nazism. However, in the Austria of that time a reason was needed. Jägerstätter appealed to his religion.
Posted by david f, Tuesday, 1 December 2015 11:15:47 AM
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"If it was the religion why was he the only one?"

Because the rest weren't stupid?

Here's a better example of faith doing good,
"he was transferred to Auschwitz as prisoner #16670.[19]

Continuing to act as a priest, Kolbe was subjected to violent harassment, including beating and lashings, and once had to be smuggled to a prison hospital by friendly inmates.[2][16] At the end of July 1941, three prisoners disappeared from the camp, prompting SS-Hauptsturmführer Karl Fritzsch, the deputy camp commander, to pick 10 men to be starved to death in an underground bunker to deter further escape attempts. When one of the selected men, Franciszek Gajowniczek, cried out, "My wife! My children!", Kolbe volunteered to take his place.[8]

According to an eye witness, an assistant janitor at that time, in his prison cell, Kolbe led the prisoners in prayer to Our Lady. Each time the guards checked on him, he was standing or kneeling in the middle of the cell and looking calmly at those who entered. After two weeks of dehydration and starvation, only Kolbe remained alive. “The guards wanted the bunker emptied, so they gave Kolbe a lethal injection of carbolic acid. Kolbe is said to have raised his left arm and calmly waited for the deadly injection.[11] His remains were cremated on 15 August, the feast day of the Assumption of Mary.[16]"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maximilian_Kolbe

Faith exists therefore it can be an inspiration for good or evil.
Posted by Is Mise, Tuesday, 1 December 2015 12:18:01 PM
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Dear Is Mise,

You wrote: "Faith exists therefore it can be an inspiration for good or evil."

The power to do good or evil lies in all of us. We or other people can ascribe our acts to faith.

I don't have enough information to say whether non-believers in religion on the average behave better or worse than believers in religion. The men carrying out the atrocities in Paris were presumably inspired by their faith as were the Inquisitors and Crusaders. Father Damien, Franz Jägerstätter, the reformed criminal cited by o sung wu and Maximilian Kolbe were also presumably inspired by their faith.

Since I was a small child and heard the story of Abraham and Isaac I have been horrified by faith. I felt Abraham should have said, "No." Deeds of self-sacrifice, heroism and nobility can be motivated by faith. However, knowledge is stimulated by doubt and questioning.

Darwin, Galileo, Einstein and Newton all doubted the scientific knowledge of their time. To me they are also heroes.
Posted by david f, Tuesday, 1 December 2015 2:41:53 PM
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Galileo, and Newton were men of Christian faith it did not seem to deter their search for reality.

David most of the examples you believe are the belief of Christians you post are not concluded by the blind faith of Christians. You constantly quote Abraham and Isaac but you fail to recognize the development in his thinking. His action to reject polytheism estranged him from his father Terah and he moved out of Ur, into the land of the Canaanites who were equally sexually promiscuous as Ur, as they worshipped Baal and sacrificed their newborn to Molech.

Our society today are equally sexually promiscuous and surgically murder their unwanted unborn children. They do not do it by following a religion but by believing atheism. They believe there is no accountability to the Creator of the Universe to abort children. Abraham was equally disgusted by infant sacrifice to appease the gods of fertility.
Posted by Josephus, Tuesday, 1 December 2015 3:26:15 PM
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Dear Josephus,

You wrote: “Galileo, and Newton were men of Christian faith it did not seem to deter their search for reality.”

Your faith is equalled by your ignorance. Galileo was put under house arrest by the Inquisition for maintaining that the earth goes around the sun and spent the last years of his life under arrest.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galileo_Galilei tells you about Galileo.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Newton tells about Newton. He wrote religious works, but they were published after his death probably to save him from trouble if he had published them while he was alive. Since none of his scientific works challenged church dogma he was not persecuted as Galileo was. It is moot whether he accepted the Trinity.

As far as polytheism goes I refer to Thomas Jefferson. He said, “The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.”

Human sacrifice is now illegal, but polytheism was notably more tolerant than monotheism. I believe it would be a step forward to return to polytheism without the human sacrifice if we can’t get rid of religious superstition entirely.

Atheism is not a belief. You reject a belief in Zeus and many other gods that the imagination of man has invented. There is no more reason to believe in the god you believe in than to believe in Zeus, Baal or other human inventions. You are an atheist to all gods but the polytheistic trinity. I believe in one (or three) fewer gods than you believe in.

continued
Posted by david f, Tuesday, 1 December 2015 4:40:57 PM
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continued

I see nothing wrong in being sexually promiscuous before marriage. I think it is good for young people to experiment sexually. With proper sex education including knowledge of contraceptives and their availability abortion would be rare. A fetus is not an unborn child. It is an embryo, part of a woman’s body. You are an undead human because eventually you will be dead. However, a foetus may never develop into a baby since many pregnancies do not go to term. Most abortions are spontaneous. Calling a foetus an unborn child is an emotive and inaccurate term.

If Abraham was so disgusted by infant sacrifice why did not the stupid, evil sob say no when he was commanded to sacrifice his son. There is no way you can put a gloss on that ugly story.
Posted by david f, Tuesday, 1 December 2015 4:48:28 PM
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david f

"I see nothing wrong in being sexually promiscuous before marriage. I think it is good for young people to experiment sexually."

No problems with VD?

You say calling a foetus an unborn child is an emotive and inaccurate term, then your knowledge is very defective for a foetus is, by definition the child as it exists from the second month till birth.

Only a fool would say that as a woman goes into labour that what is about to enter the world is not an unborn child.
Posted by Is Mise, Tuesday, 1 December 2015 10:17:23 PM
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Dear Is Mise,

One of the benefits of a good sex education is the knowledge of how to lessen the chance of getting VD. A baby is a baby after it is born. Until its birth it is a foetus. I don’t know why it should be so hard to understand that. Calling a foetus an unborn child remains an emotive description equal to referring to all living people as undead humans.

Wilfred Owen who was killed in action a week before the end of WW1 wrote the following:

Parable of the Old Man and the Young

So Abram rose, and clave the wood, and went,
And took the fire with him, and a knife.
And as they sojourned both of them together,
Isaac the first-born spake and said, My Father,
Behold the preparations, fire and iron,
But where the lamb for this burnt-offering?
Then Abram bound the youth with belts and straps,
and builded parapets and trenches there,
And stretchèd forth the knife to slay his son.
When lo! an angel called him out of heaven,
Saying, Lay not thy hand upon the lad,
Neither do anything to him. Behold,
A ram, caught in a thicket by its horns;
Offer the Ram of Pride instead of him.
But the old man would not so, but slew his son,
And half the seed of Europe, one by one.

He took the binding of Isaac as a metaphor for old men sending young men out to die in a senseless war.

I think of the senseless murder of an old man, Curtis Cheng, by teenage Islamic terrorist Farhad Khalil Mohammad Jabar.

Probably Jabar was a virgin as a result of the pathological Islamic horror of non-marital sex except in Islamic heaven. Perhaps if the joy of sex had been encouraged and Jabar had experienced those joys he would not have been so willing to murder and leave this life. That may be true of many religious fanatics. They might not be so fanatical if they had experienced sex and were looking forward to more.
Posted by david f, Tuesday, 1 December 2015 11:06:36 PM
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david f,
Saying a fetus isn't an unborn child is like saying Sydney Harbour isn't an unglaciated fjord. That a fjord must be formed by glacial activity (otherwise it's a ria) is a technicality of the english language rather than a feature of coastal landscapes.

And have you noticed the irony here? While complaining about the technicalities of what a fetus is, you claim it to be something that it certainly isn't (for if it's definitely a fetus than it's no longer an embryo). And nor is it part of a woman's body (despite being utterly dependent on that woman's body).

As for Abraham, it's only because of God that he had a son in the first place, and he believed that God could raise the dead — and would have to do so to keep His promise.
Posted by Aidan, Wednesday, 2 December 2015 1:09:32 AM
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Dear Aidan,

You are free to call a foetus whatever you wish.

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fetus

“This article is about the stage of human development. For other species, see Fetus (biology). ... In human development, a fetus (plural "fetuses"), also spelled foetus, is a prenatal human between its embryonic state and its birth. The fetal stage of development tends to be taken as beginning at the gestational age of eleven weeks, i.e. nine weeks after fertilization. In biological terms, however, prenatal development is a continuum, with no clear defining feature distinguishing an embryo from a fetus. The use of the term "fetus" generally implies that an embryo has developed to the point of being recognizable as a human; this is the point usually taken to be the ninth week after fertilization. A fetus is also characterized by the presence of all the major body organs, though they will not yet be fully developed and functional and some not yet situated in their final anatomical location.”

A natural growth in a woman’s body is part of that body until it leaves that body. Denying that it is part of her body is denying her the right to have a say in its future – her right to decide whether she wants to let it go to term or have an abortion. That is possibly what you want.

The story of Abraham and Isaac is mythology. Like the Greek myths it is a story told by people who lived long ago. It tells us about what those people believed. It is not an incident that really happened.
Posted by david f, Wednesday, 2 December 2015 4:02:24 AM
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David, What is your angst if the story is a myth?

"The story of Abraham and Isaac is mythology. Like the Greek myths it is a story told by people who lived long ago. It tells us about what those people believed. It is not an incident that really happened."

You show a lot of anger toward your claim the threat to Isaac never happened, while condoning the destruction of over 2,000,000 unborn potential youth in Australia which has happened.

Australian schools has sex education yet VD is rife in promiscuous teenagers.
Posted by Josephus, Wednesday, 2 December 2015 8:17:05 AM
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David,
I thought you ought to look at what really happens between Jews and Christians in this story. http://forward.com/news/breaking-news/312104/holocaust-survivor-bankrolls-rescue-of-2-000-isis-victims/#ixzz3gRUR7JG8
Posted by Josephus, Wednesday, 2 December 2015 8:47:14 AM
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david f,

Then may we take it that you are quite happy with the killing of a feotus by a jab in the head with a knitting needle whilst the head is still inside the mother's body?
Posted by Is Mise, Wednesday, 2 December 2015 8:53:27 AM
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Dear Josephus,

I heard that story as a little child and was badly frightened. The Bible is not a fit book for children, and I suppose other children are still getting frightened by that horrid story. We try to shield children from material that is not fit for them but subject them to the Bible which has many appalling stories.

I am glad that women have had the choice to terminate pregnancies they didn’t wish to continue. I am more concerned with the life of women than I am with the foetuses. Apparently the fate of the foetus is of greater concern to you than what a woman wants.

http://www.cdc.gov/healthyyouth/sexualbehaviors/index.htm is a site concerning sexual behaviour of teenagers in the US. It contains the following:

34% had had sexual intercourse during the previous 3 months, and, of these 41% did not use a condom the last time they had sex.

Apparently either sex education is inadequate, and/or there is not enough access to contraceptives and disease preventive materials.

The story of the Jew funding an escape for victims of ISIS is inspiring. It would be good if relations between religions were more like that.

Dear Is Mise,

I am very unhappy with abortion by knitting needle or a backyard butcher.

I support legal abortion by an approved medical procedure so desperate women do not have to resort to such measures.
Posted by david f, Wednesday, 2 December 2015 10:06:07 AM
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//Australian schools has sex education yet VD is rife in promiscuous teenagers.//

I think you might be mistaking 'teenagers' for 'koalas'. An easy enough mistake to make if you're complete bloody idiot.

The best stats I could find for STI rates were ABS stats, available here:

http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/Lookup/4102.0Main+Features10Jun+2012

The STI with the highest rate of infection was chlamydia. The highest infection rate is found amongst female teenagers, with a rate of approx 2.2%. This is less 'rife' than psychotic disorders, and about as 'rife' as eating disorders.

Koalas can also catch chlamydia (a different strain to humans). In some parts of Australia, koala infection rates are as high as 90%:

http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-22207442

If 'rife' is the appropriate adjective to use for a disease effecting about 1 in 50, how low would infection rates have to be for disease to be considered rare, or even just common? And what is the appropriate adjective for infection rates of 90%? Extra-rife?

Just for future reference, it's really easy to tell the difference between koalas and teenagers: one is smelly, dopey and sleeps for most of the day, and the other is a marsupial.
Posted by Toni Lavis, Wednesday, 2 December 2015 10:44:50 AM
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david f,

"I am very unhappy with abortion by knitting needle or a backyard butcher."

You may well be unhappy but is it a baby that is killed by the quick jab when the head is insight but still inside?

Let's have a hypothetical; two sisters become pregnant on the same day and their pregnancies go fine until the eighth month when one of them has to be delivered by caesarean section, the girl baby is fine and thrives, a really healthy child.
I would consider that her cousin, still in the womb, to be an unborn child and that to deliberately kill it is morally murder.
Posted by Is Mise, Wednesday, 2 December 2015 10:53:06 AM
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Dear Anti-Abortionists,

I think it is a great forward step that abortion is now legal, and I would not want to go back to the bad old days when it wasn't. I don't feel like arguing further.
Posted by david f, Wednesday, 2 December 2015 3:38:19 PM
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david f,

Good time to pull out; you obviously see the pitfalls ahead!!
Posted by Is Mise, Wednesday, 2 December 2015 5:16:03 PM
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What about women who bled to death from botched
Backyard abortions.

You would be surprised at the large numbers of women who sought backyard abortions. And it was quite often the men who didn't want a child when their girlfriends got pregnant who pushed them to have an abortion too.

So if abortion is banned it will just go underground again, and the backyard butchers
Will still do it for money.

The foetus and quite possibly the women too will die a much more horrible
Death in the hands of the backyard non medical abortionists.
It is best left in the hands of the professionals who can make it as medically quick and painless as possible for both foetus and mother. Banning it certainly doesn't stop the demand for it that was obvious when it was illegal before.

After 4months I think it should only be allowed in extremely rare cases.
But be legal until that time to stop the practise going underground again
Posted by CHERFUL, Wednesday, 2 December 2015 8:30:02 PM
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Well hasn’t this thread taken a turn since I was last here?

Is Mise,

Yes, there are many conversion stories like that of the one that o sung wu mentioned. Having had a little to do with the prison system, I can also assure you that there are plenty who turn their lives around without “finding” a god (and, co-incidentally, the god that it is predominant one in one’s own culture, too, mind you). That some find a god is neither evidence for a god, and nor does it mean that society needs religion. All it means is that there is something in society that needs fixing, and that we need to find out what that is so that others don’t simply replace one dysfunction for another.

As for this abortion angle which this thread developed, well, that’s an easy one:

No-one has the right to use someone else’s body to support their own life. We wouldn’t force a mother to donate a kidney to her child if she was her child’s only hope of survival, so why does a foetus deserve more rights in that respect?

The usual anti-abortionist response to this is that the woman should have thought of this before she got pregnant. However, this is easily countered by pointing out that consent to sex is not consent to pregnancy.

Full stop. End of story.

Anti-abortionists simply don’t have a case.
Posted by AJ Philips, Wednesday, 2 December 2015 10:02:38 PM
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AJ,

"Faith is belief without good reason. How on Earth could that possibly, in any way, be a positive thing?"
I think that you answered your own question.

I was not being anti-abortion and I'm a firm believer in retrospective abortion in certain cases.
I was asking if a foetus stabbed in the head when the head was in sight was a child or not; after all the child is still within the mother's body

What's your take on this?
Posted by Is Mise, Thursday, 3 December 2015 8:02:04 AM
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AJ Philips,
You are right somthing in society does need changing.
"All it means is that there is something in society that needs fixing, and that we need to find out what that is so that others don’t simply replace one dysfunction for another."

Give them from Infancy strong personal and moral values that direct and protect them and their society for life. The problem is we have removed shame and guilt from offensive behaviour and praise defiance, greed and selfishness.
Posted by Josephus, Thursday, 3 December 2015 8:33:58 AM
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Josephus wrote: "Give them from Infancy strong personal and moral values that direct and protect them and their society for life. The problem is we have removed shame and guilt from offensive behaviour and praise defiance, greed and selfishness."

Dear Josephus,

Back to the ugly Abraham/Isaac story. Sometimes defiance is a virtue and should be praised. When commanded to commit an atrocity as was Abraham, "no" is the proper answer. One problem with much of religion is that it promotes obedience and submission where defiance is called for.

Possibly your idea of strong personal and moral values come from the mumbojumbo you believe in.

To me strong personal and moral values are exhibited by being kind and questioning authority.

Defiance may come from strong personal and moral values.
Posted by david f, Thursday, 3 December 2015 9:22:11 AM
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Dear David,

<<Defiance may come from strong personal and moral values>>

Yes, defiance of others, of authorities - not of one's own conscience, not of one's own inner being.

Had God been some external deity, omniscient, omnipotent and all that, but separate from oneself, then I would agree with you that Abraham should have said "No". However, I think it's safe to assume that we are in agreement that no such deity exists, right?

Did Abraham in fact knew God? Or was it just his imagination?

When Abraham is claimed to have heard God's voice, did it come from without or from within? (or did he even hear it at all?)
Unfortunately we'll probably never know, so we have no tools to judge him.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Thursday, 3 December 2015 11:00:04 AM
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Okay Is Mise, so I overstated my case. Slightly.

My main contention is - and if you check my posting history, has always been - that the negatives that come with billions of people believing something without good reason (i.e. faith) outweigh the positives that MAY result from it. Just imagine a world where everyone actually cared about the truth of their beliefs. Not just that, but try thinking of something positive, that has resulted from faith, that could not have possibly come about through secular means. I’ve asked many Christians this question over the years and the best answer I’ve had so far was the threat of hell, but that’s not a positive thing given the drawbacks that accompany it. Anyway, I think my overstating of my position is forgivable given that faith is, by and large, still widely considered a virtue.

Thanks for informing me of your position on abortion, but that part of my post was a general comment to all. Sorry I didn’t make that more clear.

As for your question, I would have thought, from my pro-choice argument, that it would've been clear that it shouldn’t matter if the head can be seen. I’m happy to call a clump of cells a “child”. The bottom line is that no-one has the right to use someone else’s body to survive.

If the fetus is at an age where it is viable without the mother, then I would be less inclined to support abortion, but that’s why we have limits on the age at which one can abort a fetus.

An abortion is simply the termination of a pregnancy. Do you know what a late-term termination of a pregnancy is called? A ‘caesarian’, and the child gets to live.
Posted by AJ Philips, Thursday, 3 December 2015 11:52:46 PM
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AJ stop showing your ignorance; there is a difference between the termination of a pregnancy and the termination of the unborn.

Yuyutsu, What misinformation! Abraham did say NO! your statement "then I would agree with you that Abraham should have said "No"." David is fixated on the knife and the fire, and not the spared life of Isaac.
Posted by Josephus, Friday, 4 December 2015 7:58:52 AM
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Dear Josephus,

Abraham should have said "No" when he was told by the evil God of the Bible to sacrifice his son. Yes, I am fixated at that because it is an evil thing to obey an unjust authority.

One should defy evil even when it comes from God.
Posted by david f, Friday, 4 December 2015 8:46:20 AM
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AJ,

I agree that person has the right to use another's body to survive, unless that body be dead and its owner had given permission for parts of it to be used to benefit others, or if it is needed for emergency sustenance.
However in your book the fetus is not a person therefore your contention does not apply.

You don't think that the fetus is a child if the head is visible, what about a breech birth?
Would it be still abortion to stab upwards before the head emerged; how about a cesarian, would it still be abortion to kill the fetus when it is visible but still within the mother's body?
Posted by Is Mise, Friday, 4 December 2015 9:11:35 AM
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Insert 'no' before person in the above (I blush).
Posted by Is Mise, Friday, 4 December 2015 10:19:14 AM
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The one thing that all religions have in common is the requirement that devotees must have a blind faith in a god(s). and an unquestioning loyalty to the church, and by extension to the state as well. Through blind faith and unquestioning loyalty, control is maintained.
Josephus see a need for the instilling in children a sense of strong personal and moral values, I agree. However I believe that can be achieved without the overriding influence of religion.
Posted by Paul1405, Friday, 4 December 2015 10:34:25 AM
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The myth of Abraham and Isaac encapsulates the evil of Bahai’i, Christianity, Islam and Judaism. It promotes the idea that unquestioning obedience to the dictates of authority will turn out alright in the end. “I was only following orders.” is not an excuse for evil, but the Abrahamic religions promote unquestioning obedience.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prometheus tells of the myth of Prometheus who defied the Gods to bring fire to humankind. He was punished for it, but his story is far more inspiring than the servility and unquestioning obedience of Abraham. The Bible accepts slavery and promotes unquestioning obedience along with religious intolerance.

Josephus wrote: "Give them from Infancy strong personal and moral values that direct and protect them and their society for life.”

Although there is some good in the Bible it contains so much evil that it is not a good source for strong personal and moral values. I think the best way to give your children strong personal and moral values is to set a good example by exhibiting those values yourself.

However, one can find better values than those found in the Bible. In my opinion the following humanist principles are a good guide.

http://vgweb.org/manussa/coreprin.htm contains the principles and commentary on them.

H1. The only relevant spheres of action for humans are humanity in a collective sense, individual human beings, and the physical environment (nature) in which they operate.

H2. Human beings are not subject to God or any divine agency. They have no obligation to love, fear or obey any such supernatural agent.

H3. All beliefs must be founded on reason and human experience. Where the progress of knowledge reveals that any belief is or becomes untenable it should be abandoned.

H4. All human beings are entitled to inalienable human rights such as those enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

H5. These rights inhere to humans from the time the human fetus becomes a viable biological entity capable of independent existence without physical or organic dependence on another human being.

continued
Posted by david f, Friday, 4 December 2015 11:21:05 AM
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continued

H6. Humans do not have a right of dominion over animals and the environment, it being recognized that humans along with many other species of animals do change their environment by their very existence.

H7. Children shall not be subjected to physical and mental abuse, nor to religious or political indoctrination by parents or others. The rights of children should be codified in a charter of children's' rights.

H8. Civil laws should be arrived at by a collective consensual process and should promote the common good, not the tenets of a particular religion or philosophy.

H9. Special privileges should not be given to any group on the basis of religious or philosophical belief, nor should any group be discriminated against on grounds such as race, ethnicity, beliefs, gender or age.

H10. There is no conclusive evidence that life exists after death so humans should exert themselves primarily in terms of their present life.

H11. The following ethical principles should in general be promoted:

1. Abstaining from conduct injurious to life and the physical well-being of persons.
2. Abstaining from the theft of property of others
3. Abstaining from sexual violence and misconduct
4. Abstaining from falsehood, fraud and deception
5. Abstaining from drunkenness, narcotics and mind bending drugs

H12. Humanism should develop an attitude of compassion to those in a state of suffering from whatever cause that leads to the suffering, and seek to engage in action that alleviates this suffering.
Posted by david f, Friday, 4 December 2015 11:31:35 AM
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Humanism is an arbitrary and irrational value-system.

It just happens to pick and select certain positive elements from certain religions.

It defies all logic that something so temporary and inconsequential as a human life, or even the life of humanity, should be of value and further, that it should be of more value than the life of an animal, a light-bulb or a sand-castle.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Friday, 4 December 2015 1:10:56 PM
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Paul,

"The one thing that all religions have in common is the requirement that devotees must have a blind faith in a god(s)...."

How did you manage to get that so wrong?
Posted by Is Mise, Friday, 4 December 2015 5:17:56 PM
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David F

Human right to life is only important to humans

It doesn't exist in nature, the natural world.

Nature without immunisation and modern day medicine would wipe
Millions and millions of people out every year, those in infant years
And many before the age of 20years.

This was the norm a short 115years ago.
Human rights aren't respected by the animal, reptile or insect populations like mosquitos
Either.

Let a puny human venture into animal territory without guns or weapons
He,d soon find out how little he mattered to a crocodile,lion or shark.

It is clear that human right to life is merely a very recent emotive idea
Based around the ego of the human species.
Posted by CHERFUL, Friday, 4 December 2015 10:41:18 PM
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David,
Abraham was emerging from a culture of infant sacrifice, give him a break! The culture expected it of him, his peers were doing it, He rejected it against the culture of his former religion. Similarly today teenage pregnancy can equally have peer and boyfriend pressure to take the life of the unborn. It takes courage to stand against peer pressure. Of course you haven't the courage to change your mind to recognize this development in his life. Initially he had no conviction about it, till it was revealed to him atonement did not need to take a human life, the sacrifice could be an animal.

I will look more closely at these laws you have suggested to control people. Unless you have educated peoples conscience and they accept the values no laws will ever be accepted. Self control and love of the values and selfless love of one's neighbor is the answer.
Posted by Josephus, Friday, 4 December 2015 11:19:37 PM
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Dear Josephus,

Whatever the culture of the past was it is an ugly story in the light of the world we have today. Much of the Bible is obsolete superstition.

I remember my reaction to that story as a child, and I don't think it is good to subject children to it as something they should believe. The Bible stories are myths which people at one time believed. We should tell children about it in the same manner that we tell them about the Greek myths.

You are trying to change the story. He accepted the command. He did not change his mind. He was given an alternative which he accepted. The evil man still should have refused in the first place. It remains an ugly story. Defiance was called for not obedience.

I see no reason to give anyone a break who is motivated by superstition to murder his child.
Posted by david f, Saturday, 5 December 2015 8:28:36 AM
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Paul wrote:

"The one thing that all religions have in common is the requirement that devotees must have a blind faith in a god(s)...."

Dear Paul,

Buddhism does not even postulate the existence of a God. Unitarians leave the question open. Humanistic Judaism denies the existence of a deity.

Unfortunately you applied to all religions something that is only true about some religions.
Posted by david f, Saturday, 5 December 2015 8:39:32 AM
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Josephus,

Of course there are differences between abortions and caesarians. You seem to have missed a more subtle point. That being that the main issue surrounding abortion is bodily autonomy, not the killing of an unborn child, a human baby who would otherwise grow up to one day enjoy the same dreams and aspirations that the rest of us enjoy.

You see what I did there? I’m happy to go along with the emotive language of anti-abortionists because it changes nothing.

If your infanticidal god doesn’t like abortions (as Christians assume he doesn’t), then he should have come up with a different design. It is not our fault that he cocked up. Perhaps humans could have laid eggs instead? That would have come with the added bonus of contradicting evolution too. As it stands, we have been forced to choose between the lesser of the two evils - allowing the slaughter of millions of unborn human children, so innocent and sweet, with their ten little fingers and their ten little toes, and their gorgeous little heart beats; over forcing women to continue with pregnancies they don’t want, or seek backyard abortions.

But some Christians and even some conservative atheists will never accept this because an anti-abortion stance has become the last bastion for controlling women in a world where doing so overtly is no longer socially acceptable.
Posted by AJ Philips, Saturday, 5 December 2015 10:28:38 AM
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Is Mise,

No I never said that.

<<However in your book the fetus is not a person therefore your contention does not apply.>>

In fact, I have gone to great pains to say that it doesn't matter what it is, so I don’t know where you get this from.

<<You don't think that the fetus is a child if the head is visible, what about a breech birth?>>

No, I never said anything like that either. You need to read my post again.

<<Would it be still abortion to stab upwards before the head emerged how about a cesarian; would it still be abortion to kill the fetus when it is visible but still within the mother's body?>>

In my opinion, that would depend on whether or not the unborn child was viable outside the mother’s body. But again, I already made this clear in my last post. I don't see the significance of this question.

Your response is a good example of just how deluding a dogmatic belief can be. I write one thing, and you somehow read what you want to see. Did the words on your screen alter like a hallucination, or is it a cognition thing, I wonder?
Posted by AJ Philips, Saturday, 5 December 2015 10:28:43 AM
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Speaking of the suitability of Bible stories for children, it never ceases to amaze me that, what would have been the most horrific case of genocide in all history had it actually happened, is made into children’s stories with pictures of cute giraffes poking their heads out the top of a cartoonish-looking ark. There’s a book for small children called My Very Little Noah’s Ark Story (http://www.booktopia.com.au/my-very-little-noah-s-ark-story-lois-rock/prod9780745963181.html). I wonder if publishers would be willing to touch it if I wrote and submitted a children’s story called, ‘My Very Little Auschwitz Story’?

This is an example of how desensitised we are to Biblical horror, and the privilege religion still enjoys. Another example can be found in the story of the Bible Adventure games made for the 1980s Nintendo Entertainment System. What some game makers were doing was creating game cartridges that zapped the licence validation chip in the console so that they could make unlicenced copies of their games. Nintendo went after the development companies doing this, however, they never went after the developers of the Bible Adventure games because they were afraid of the bad publicity that would come with taking legal action against a Christian group.

Is Mise,

One other point I forgot to make is if, in my book, a foetus is not a child/baby/person, then that only strengthens my argument. Because a thing would have even less of a right to use someone’s body for its survival.
Posted by AJ Philips, Saturday, 5 December 2015 11:22:46 AM
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Hi David, you are correct as usual, I did think of Buddhism and I should have said "the majority of religions", particularly the two largest on the planet, Christianity and Islam. I have visited a Buddhists Temple as an invitee and they come across as a rather gentle religious mob. I think if I was going to choose between them and the big two I would go for the blokes in the saffron robes.
Could you imagine how different the world would be if all religions were as the Buddhists.

As for that bloke Abraham, Josephus "Abraham was emerging from a culture of infant sacrifice, give him a break! The culture expected it of him, his peers were doing it,"
So just go along with the majority? Please explain then, are people wrong for opposing war, and refusing to fight, are pacifists wrong to refuse to engage in war when the vast majority support war, like during WWI, WWII and in my time some of the time during the Vietnam War, other wars as well had popular support.
Posted by Paul1405, Saturday, 5 December 2015 3:51:30 PM
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Dear Paul1405,

I don’t think matters would be noticeably different if all religions were like the Buddhists. Buddhism was the religion of the Japanese officer corps in WW2. The Sri Lankan Buddhist clergy in general support the repression of the Hindu Tamils by the government.

Buddhism like most other religions is fragmented into various sects. Some of the sects are pacifist. Many are not. If you can see the phenomenal world as an illusion you can dismiss what is actually happening as the Buddhist officer corps of the Japanese army might have done at the Rape of Nanking.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacifism_in_Islam tells about pacifism in Islam.

Christianity has the Quakers, Mennonites and other pacifist sects.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Jewish_pacifists lists Jewish pacifists.

John Ferguson wrote “War and Peace in the World's Religions.” In the 15 he examined he found tendencies toward violence and rejection of violence.

IMHO it would have been better to say “most religions” rather than “the majority of religions.” I find a virtue in simplicity
Posted by david f, Saturday, 5 December 2015 4:47:46 PM
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Most people watching TV any night are watching violence as entertainment. Let us start boycotting violent movies, as children watch this in the home. The average 24 hours there are 40 murders shown on TV.
Posted by Josephus, Saturday, 5 December 2015 7:17:00 PM
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Dear Josephus,

I don't go to such movies. However, what does that have to do with the discussion? Such movies and the Bible are not fit for children or me for that matter.
Posted by david f, Saturday, 5 December 2015 9:17:56 PM
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Is Mise,

I just remembered that you’re also all for the death penalty!

As someone what was against the death penalty when they were a Christian, do you mind explaining this apparent contradiction to me? I’ve asked others in the past, but I’ve never received a satisfying response. The best response I’ve received so far was that the death penalty was a preventative measure for future offences and, therefore, constitutes self-defence. But unless these people are fortune tellers, and so long as locking someone up for life is an option, this doesn’t really wash.

One cannot be pro-death and pro-life at the same time in such instances.

Ironically, both positions are right-wing, and studies on brain activity demonstrate that gods will always agree with the believer as the same part of the brain is activated when an individual is asked about their own opinions and the opinions of their god. Yet when asked about the opinions of other people, a different part of the brain is activated.

So is god a paradox of both pro-death and pro-life positions, or are the majority of Christians just conservatives and their gods just imagined beings that are happy to contradict themselves because conservatism is generally an anger-fueled and chauvinistic position that contradicts itself?
Posted by AJ Philips, Sunday, 6 December 2015 12:13:57 AM
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AJ Philips, If you cannot accept the paradox, should we be incarcerating ISIS rather than bombing them. It would be ideal to incarcerating and reeducating them rather than bombing them. However 30,000 fighters and 3,000,000 supporters intent on killing or being martyred is a task beyond any Union of Nations.
Posted by Josephus, Sunday, 6 December 2015 7:01:56 AM
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Dear Josephus,

This only seems to be a paradox due to the false assumption as if all men are equal and thus ought to behave the same.

Recall from Christianity that the best are encouraged to be celibate though it is not expected of the masses. Similarly, the best are encouraged to turn the other cheek, while for the masses it is not a sin to kill and/or incarcerate as required for self-defence.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Sunday, 6 December 2015 7:52:36 AM
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AJ,

The retrospective abortion penny dropped?

I'm all for abortion when it is necessary but not for it when it is used merely as a matter of convenience, I along with the State believe that the unborn have rights.

As for the death penalty it stops re-offending and saves much public money that could be used for useful purposes.
The murderers of Anita Cobby have cost at least one country hospital, possibly more.
It may be a deterrent but that is hard to prove, if not impossible, however it is a punishment and in the instance above, would have been a well deserved one.
Posted by Is Mise, Sunday, 6 December 2015 10:55:36 AM
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Josephus,

There is a difference between bombing a combatant enemy and executing one’s own civilian. But I’ve been through all that several times before.

Your pro-life/pro-death position is a contradiction.

Is Mise,

Has the no-one-has-the-right-to-use-someone-else's-body-for-their-survival and the consent-to-sex-is-not-consent-to-pregnancy penny dropped yet?

<<I'm all for abortion when it is necessary but not for it when it is used merely as a matter of convenience, I along with the State believe that the unborn have rights.>>

This does not negate any of my points. They all still stand regardless of whether or not abortion is used for convenience.

<<As for the death penalty it stops re-offending and saves much public money that could be used for useful purposes.>>

Yes, yes, we’ve already been through this on other threads (http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=6830&page=0, http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=17371&page=0). There are other sentencing aims and procedures other than incapacitation and there are also major drawback to the death penalty.

<<It may be a deterrent but that is hard to prove, if not impossible...>>

No, it’s actually fairly easy and the evidence heavily weighted towards the argument that it’s not a deterrence.

So, your pro-life/pro-death position is also a contradiction.

I think you and Josephus could benefit from this little bit of wisdom from George carlin: http://youtu.be/AvF1Q3UidWM?t=20

Here’s the first verse of a poem I think you’d like too...

Jesus loves the little zygotes,
All the little zygotes of the world,
Jesus loves then ‘til they’re born,
Then abandons them forlorn,
Jesus love the little zygotes of the world...
Posted by AJ Philips, Sunday, 6 December 2015 11:45:47 PM
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I just thought too, Is Mise, your point about the State apparently agreeing with you is fairly irrelevant given that politicians are required to put a religious bent on their stance, whenever possible, to retain a certain amount of votes since atheists are more willing to vote for religious politicians than religious voters are willing to vote for atheist politicians. The religious are more likely to boycott since non-believers are used to religion getting a free ride and won’t chuck such a tanty over the religious getting their way because, historically, they usually have anyway.

Then there’s the issue of census figures being skewed because there are many non-believers checking-off the religion that they were born into even though they are don’t believe in the nonsense anymore and nor do they attend church ever. They may never have even attended church with their parents and yet they check off, say, ‘Lutheran’ on the census form because that’s the class they were put in for RE at school.

If we had a plebiscite on free-for-all abortions, I’d be willing to bet everything I owned that an overwhelming majority would vote for it. Appealing to the State’s pandering to a more rigid, unforgiving and zealous minority doesn’t do much to strengthen your argument.

Anyway, I know what your position is, however, I’d be more interested in a justification for it. And I mean a justification beyond a fallacious, 'The State agrees with me.' The best you’ve done so far is contradict yourself by agreeing with me that no-one has the right to use someone else’s body to survive, and then claim that unborn children, human babies with feeling and consciousness and adorable little button noses, have rights too.
Posted by AJ Philips, Monday, 7 December 2015 12:16:42 AM
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What we need to do is start having respect for international law.
That means NO-ONES ALLOWED in Syria or Iraq without an invitation from their elected governments.

And right now neither government wants the West anywhere near the place.

We cant have nations making laws and then breaking them when it suits them.

US is trying to start a war with Russia.
There's no way Turkey shot that plane down without US intel and NATO approval, and the US did send F16C's to Incirlik in October meaning US preemptively intended to counter the Russians.

(Not sure if Kiev is planning on invading Crimea also.)

I'd say the US was well aware there were oil and arms transactions occurring over the Turkish border, and they intended to try to start a conflict with Russia, by trying to get him to respond militarily in which case Turkey could invoke NATO Article 5.

I wonder what Obama's Oval Office address will be about today.
Will he take the guns or invade Syria?
Posted by Armchair Critic, Monday, 7 December 2015 9:05:10 AM
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Obviously the OP did what it was intended to do, to divert the attention away from Islam onto other religions to muddy the waters, minimise and share the blame.

The atrocities keep coming though.

Hitchens was right,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0tN75e5gtw4
Posted by onthebeach, Monday, 7 December 2015 2:40:21 PM
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on the beach wrote:

"Obviously the OP did what it was intended to do, to divert the attention away from Islam onto other religions to muddy the waters, minimise and share the blame."

Dear onthebeach,

I started this string. My intention in starting this string was to point out my view that faith is not a virtue and is just another form of gullibility.
Posted by david f, Monday, 7 December 2015 6:01:59 PM
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AJ,

You miss the point, according to you an unborn child is not a person therefore your contention that no person has a right to use another persons body, though valid, does not apply.
My statement that the unborn have rights that are recognized by the State rests on the fact that convictions have been recorded at law for harm done to an unborn child. I am, as I said, in good company.

Historically too the fetus has been referred to as a child for some thousand of years; 'with child' is a common expression, I have yet to hear anyone use the expression 'with fetus'.

You haven't yet said where you stand on the under the chin stab o kill the child whilst the head is still inside in a breach birth?
Posted by Is Mise, Monday, 7 December 2015 8:28:26 PM
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david f,

Humanity would never have advanced without faith and risk. A farmer sows a crop in the faith and risk he will reap a harvest. An inventor develops a product in the hope the risk capital he has invested will return him an income.

Abrahan was told by the Elohim [plural gods Genesis 22: 3] to take his son Issac to the Mount and offer sacrifice. However it was the spirit of the Lord [Jehovah Genesis 22: 12]who spoke to him to not touch the lad.
This was defining moment in Abraham's conversion from polytheism to monotheism. His was a step of faith in the face of peer and paternal opposition.
You said:
"I started this string. My intention in starting this string was to point out my view that faith is not a virtue and is just another form of gullibility."

Ignorance is also gullibility
Posted by Josephus, Monday, 7 December 2015 8:50:10 PM
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//Ignorance is also gullibility//

No it isn't. Ignorance is an absence of knowledge, and according to some people, bliss. Gullibility is the tendency to blindly accept falsehoods without applying sufficient critical analysis. Ignorance can lead to gullibility and gullibility can certainly lead to ignorance but it is a mistake to conflate the two because they aren't the same.
Posted by Toni Lavis, Monday, 7 December 2015 9:33:32 PM
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Josephus wrote: Humanity would never have advanced without faith and risk. A farmer sows a crop in the faith and risk he will reap a harvest. An inventor develops a product in the hope the risk capital he has invested will return him an income.

A farmer has evidence for past experience that planting seed, fertilizing, cultivating and doing the other tasks involving in raising crops will produce a yield if all goes well. The risk is that all will not go well. However, he has evidence of what has happened with past plantings. That is not faith. He is operating on probability. Faith in something like the existence of a God is something else. There is absolutely no evidence for the existence of any God. Faith is to believe in something for which there is no evidence. A farmer would not be a good farmer if he or she operated on faith.

You keep giving excuses, explanations and interpretations to explain the nasty Abraham/Isaac story. The excuses, explanations and interpretations you come up are not implicit in the story. The excuses, explanations and interpretations are attempts to make an ugly story palatable. There is no evidence for either polytheism or monotheism so it is reasonable to reject both on the grounds that there is no evidence on which to accept either.

From what we know of the historical record both monotheism and polytheism have led to atrocities. However, monotheism historically has been more intolerant than polytheism so if we have to have one of the other polytheism seems to be the better choice. Possibly humans adopted monotheism because a single deity which does not exist in reality but is the creation of the human mind resembles monarchy which was a prevalent form of government at the time that monotheism was invented.
Posted by david f, Monday, 7 December 2015 10:47:41 PM
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Is Mise,

For the second time, I’m not missing the point.

<<You miss the point, according to you an unborn child is not a person therefore your contention that no person has a right to use another persons body, though valid, does not apply.>>

I’m quite happy to call a foetus a “person” with personhood. It makes no difference to my argument. And for the second time, it actually strengthens it because if a foetus isn’t a baby/human/child/person, then it would have even less of a right to use someone else’s body for its survival.

<<My statement that the unborn have rights that are recognized by the State rests on the fact that convictions have been recorded at law for harm done to an unborn child.>>

Yes, unborn PERSONS, little bundles of unborn joy that are capable of making a childless couple very happy, have the right to not be subjected to negligent and reckless behaviour that would endanger its life or increase its chances of being born with health issues by the woman who is carrying it, or a dropkick father that is trying to cause a miscarriage. If she doesn’t want the adorable little PERSON growing inside of her, then she needs to go about terminating the pregnancy in the correct way.

<<Historically too the fetus has been referred to as a child for some thousand of years; 'with child' is a common expression, I have yet to hear anyone use the expression 'with fetus'.>>

This does nothing to discredit my position, and I have even been going out of my way to refer to a foetus as a child to highlight the point.

<<You haven't yet said where you stand on the under the chin stab [t]o kill the child whilst the head is still inside in a breach birth?>>

That would be a really dumb way of going about an abortion and some penalty should be enforced for not doing it in a safe and more humane way. I still don’t see the point to this question.
Posted by AJ Philips, Monday, 7 December 2015 11:09:21 PM
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AJ,

Your argument verges on the absurd for a fetus cannot use anything so is not using the mother's body but is dependent upon it.
The fetus, as you would be well aware does not possess free will so cannot make a decision.

The legal matter to which I aluded involved a man unknown to the mother doing damage to the unborn child in a public place and IIRC by accident.
The law recognized that the fetus was a lgal entity etc.
So save the humour.
Posted by Is Mise, Monday, 7 December 2015 11:49:43 PM
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//Your argument verges on the absurd for a fetus cannot use anything so is not using the mother's body but is dependent upon it.//

Like a tumorous growth.

//The fetus, as you would be well aware does not possess free will so cannot make a decision.//

Like a tumorous growth.

//The legal matter to which I aluded involved a man unknown to the mother doing damage to the unborn child in a public place and IIRC by accident.
The law recognized that the fetus was a lgal entity etc.//

So if the unthinking foreign body growing inside you inside you is a tumour, cut it out. But if it is a fetus, leave it be.

What do you do if it is a teratoma?

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/apr/27/teratoma-tumour-evil-twin-cancer

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teratoma
Posted by Toni Lavis, Tuesday, 8 December 2015 12:22:26 AM
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Is Mise,

You must really be getting desperate if you’re now playing irrelevant semantical games.

<<Your argument verges on the absurd for a fetus cannot use anything so is not using the mother's body but is dependent upon it.>>

There are a few creatures without brains (and therefore, no free will) in nature that “use” other things to survive. To suggest that something cannot “use” something else because it lacks free will is ridiculous.

Toni Lavis's example using tumors is good.

<<The fetus, as you would be well aware does not possess free will so cannot make a decision.>>

The definition of the word “use” does not require the exercise of free will nor the making of a decision (http://www.google.com.au/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=define%3Ause).

<<The legal matter to which I aluded involved a man unknown to the mother doing damage to the unborn child in a public place and IIRC by accident.>>

If your only point here is that the foetus is a legal entity, then great. That still does nothing to discredit my arguments. If the woman wanted the baby and the other party’s actions were negligent, then yes, some sort of legal action would be justifiable.

<<The law recognized that the fetus was a l[e]gal entity etc.>>

So are corporations, but they don’t have the right to use people’s bodies against their wills in order to survive. Nor be dependent on them, for that matter.

<<So save the humour.>>

What humour?
Posted by AJ Philips, Tuesday, 8 December 2015 12:25:45 AM
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Dear David,

<<Faith in something like the existence of a God is something else. There is absolutely no evidence for the existence of any God.>>

Obviously so: one ought to have faith in God - not in the existence of God.

Existence is a secular term which only secular people may be interested in. One who has faith in God keeps repeating: 'Thy will be done', so they have no reason to be invested in mundane outcomes. For such a person, silly questions of existence or the lack thereof never even arise to cloud their minds.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Tuesday, 8 December 2015 1:20:14 AM
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David prefers to have bling faith in his view of the world, and cannot accept research into historical reality. Perhaps it comforts him as he faces the reality of death that his future is over.

It is paradoxical that some abhor the death caused on innocent persons by terrorists while supporting without question the surgical death of a healthy innocent unborn. Ask any woman who lost an unborn child during a pregnancy what she felt about the child she lost by spontaneous abortion. She lost a child, not a tumor. Ignorant men are gullible.
Posted by Josephus, Tuesday, 8 December 2015 8:22:57 AM
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Dear Josephus,

You wrote: “David prefers to have bling faith in his view of the world, and cannot accept research into historical reality.”

What research into historical reality have I not accepted?

You also wrote, ”Ignorant men are gullible.”

What is your evidence that ignorant men are any more gullible than educated men?
Posted by david f, Tuesday, 8 December 2015 8:34:59 AM
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Josephus,

I think I have adequately differentiated between the victims of terrorist acts and aborted unborn children, with their playful childlike kicking about in their mother's womb.

<<Ask any woman who lost an unborn child during a pregnancy what she felt about the child she lost by spontaneous abortion. She lost a child, not a tumor.>>

Of course. But that doesn't negate anything I've said. It's just a fallacious appeal to emotions.

Speaking of spontaneous abortions, it seems your god is happy to abort unborn children but doesn't like when we do it - an infanticidal god who takes an immoral do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do approach.

By the way, the term "blind faith" is a bit of a tautology. Kind of like someone saying that a statement is the "real truth". I don't think we need to be adding the "blind" in front of faith.
Posted by AJ Philips, Tuesday, 8 December 2015 9:07:07 AM
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AJ I have never used the term "blind faith". For me faith is not blind, it is rooted in an assurance of future.

Historical research shows that Abraham was the first to believe there is only ONE Creator of the Universe, the event with Isaac was that defining moment. No longer to follow the many gods and their human sacrifice for fertility, but follow his new conviction, that the Universe, though diverse, was created as a unit by only ONE power, of which we are a part with. That same creative power that gives the Universe meaning is present within us; either to recognize or blindly deny as fictitious.
Posted by Josephus, Tuesday, 8 December 2015 4:43:46 PM
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Sorry Josephus, but I thought your “bling faith” was a typo meant to read “blind faith”. Tell me more about this apparently ostentatious form of faith.

<<For me faith is not blind, it is rooted in an assurance of future.>>

Yes, a form of confidence or trust. That’s more or less what it is for every Christian when it’s pointed out how foolish it is to believe something without evidence. In my experience, however, Christians are happy to revert back to the original religious definition of faith when accusing atheists of having a faith too.

By the way, unless this assurance of the future has come from a reliable source (and not an imagined being), then it is still blind.
Posted by AJ Philips, Tuesday, 8 December 2015 5:20:15 PM
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Dear Josephus,

What historical research shows that Abraham was the first monotheist? Please cite your source and tell what the evidence was that justifies your assertion.

Historical research is digging up the evidence to show certain things happened in the past.

My oldest son has actually done historical research. Pella is the first Christian settlement east of the Jordan. He was part of an archaeological team that made a dig at Pella. Pella is at the confluence of two rivers so it was an attractive place to settle. It was also an attractive place to attack. There are at least 33 settlements there one on top of another with layers of dirt in between gathered in the periods between settlements. The middle Bronze Age in that area was the time of Abraham, and they went down that deep and deeper. My son is a palynologist. His job on the dig was to examine the pollen grains in the dirt at a particular level and to tell from that what plants were growing at that particular time in that area. From that evidence he could tell about the climate and what they probably ate. That is historical research - gathering the data from which a historian can base a historical narrative. Some other sources of historical research are records of business transactions, cargo manifests and school lessons. Kramer of the University of Pennsylvania Museum has translated cuneiform tablets to get that sort of information.

Speculation about the meaning of Biblical texts is NOT historical research. Anyhow what is the source for the assertion that Abraham was the first monotheist and what evidence supports the assertion?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akhenaten tells about a pharaoh who might have been the first monotheist. From that site:

Historian James Henry Breasted [87] considered Akhenaten to be “the first individual in history,” as well as the first monotheist, romantic, and scientist.
Posted by david f, Tuesday, 8 December 2015 5:32:37 PM
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AJ,

"You must really be getting desperate if you’re now playing irrelevant semantical games."

Must be catching!
Posted by Is Mise, Tuesday, 8 December 2015 9:26:31 PM
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No. No games being played here, Is Mise. My point with regards to abortion has simply been that no-one has the right to use someone else's body for their survival and that consent to sex is not consent to pregnancy. Nothing said in rebuttal to that so far has invalidated it.

No need for semantics.
Posted by AJ Philips, Tuesday, 8 December 2015 9:41:49 PM
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//Historical research shows that Abraham was the first to believe there is only ONE Creator of the Universe//

So what did Adam and Eve believe then? Because if you look in Genesis 3, they actually meet and talk with the guy. Surely they weren't worshipping any other gods?
Posted by Toni Lavis, Tuesday, 8 December 2015 10:06:32 PM
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Is there any "historical evidence" that Abraham actually existed? I wont even ask about Adam and Eve.
Posted by Paul1405, Wednesday, 9 December 2015 4:24:45 AM
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//Is there any "historical evidence" that Abraham actually existed? I wont even ask about Adam and Eve.//

Is there any historical evidence Adam and Eve existed? How about this highly detailed photograph of Adam, Eve and a dinosaur?

http://ak-hdl.buzzfed.com/static/2014-02/enhanced/webdr05/5/1/enhanced-4835-1391582190-2.jpg

Well, it's about as reliable a historical source as the Bible...
Posted by Toni Lavis, Wednesday, 9 December 2015 6:38:14 AM
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Dear Josephus,

No matter how assured you are that something is true, without any evidence to support it, it remains faith. Any faith is blind faith.

To the best of my knowledge there is no evidence to support the existence of any Hebrew mentioned in the Bible predating Hezekiah.

http://phys.org/news/2015-12-israelite-judean-king-exposed-situ.html
Posted by david f, Wednesday, 9 December 2015 8:06:22 AM
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"And as for Seth, to him also a son was born; and he named him Enosh. Then men began to call on the name of the Lord."

[Genesis 4:26]

Now 'Enosh' in Hebrew means 'human' (and 'enoshi' means 'humane').

It is only due to human limitations that we tend to think of God as an object, ascribing to Him a name, a form, some qualities and/or a function.

According to the biblical story (regardless whether or not it is historically true), Adam and Eve knew God directly so it hasn't occurred to them to call Him by name - only Enosh did and thereafter.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Wednesday, 9 December 2015 8:54:48 AM
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The evidence is found in billions of persons who class Abraham as the founder of their world view, and trace their heritage back to him. It is the origin of ideas that does not show in paleontology unless inscribed in stone. Abraham was a single person who moved from Ur on the Tigrus River to West toward current Israel.

Abraham believed the world is a unity under ONE Creator. Adam and Ever were located in Ur along with Abraham, so prior to Abraham the view was that Elohim [plural gods] created the Universe. Jewish writers wrote the text of the Old Testament and interpreted all events in the light that no other Gods existed. The Septuagint [Greek translation] translates all the terms used for God / gods as Kurios [English Lord] assuming no other deity could be written in Jewish scripture, because they did not exist.

David Abraham had more in common with your attitudes than you are willing to admit.

I am away now for several days.
Posted by Josephus, Wednesday, 9 December 2015 9:02:38 AM
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Dear Josephus,

To claim that something is true because millions of people believe it is to admit that you have no evidence.

At one time many people believed in the bygone pantheon of Zeus et al. That didn't make it true. In the future when Christianity, Judaism and Islam are also bygone people will believe in other nonsense.
Posted by david f, Wednesday, 9 December 2015 9:53:07 AM
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Behold, the modern day witch doctors.

In their theatrical robes and headdresses.
Like the popes big strange white hat.

And the imans too.

See the superstitious millions believing in their magic connection to
The divine powers.
Totally in awe of the magic as the pope walks around with his smoke gizmo
And blessings (magic incantations).

The human race has changed little in their superstitious need for a magic power to protect them. It is childlike behaviour.
Posted by CHERFUL, Wednesday, 9 December 2015 11:53:20 AM
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david f,
You are arguing at cross purposes.
The fact is when the view first began, not whether it was true or not, which seems you cannot perceive. It is the origin of an idea not if the idea was true. Get it?

The world view has permeated three major cultures and 90% of the people of the World and all attribute Abraham with the first known author of the idea. It is written of Abraham's grandson Job in his conflict with polytheistic counselors in a book bearing his name "Job".
Posted by Josephus, Wednesday, 9 December 2015 12:30:30 PM
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Dear Josephus,

It might be good if you would check the validity of a statement before you make it.

90% of the world’s population do not follow the Abraham religions. You can look up the info yourself.

However, if all the people on believed in rubbish, their beliefs would still be rubbish. You made the statement that “Historical research shows that Abraham was the first to believe there is only ONE Creator of the Universe, the event with Isaac was that defining moment.”

Please cite the historical research you referred to. You make a lot of statements who have no basis in fact. When ask to substantiate them you make more statements which you can’t substantiate.

Have you no regard for truth?
Posted by david f, Wednesday, 9 December 2015 1:05:47 PM
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Josephus wrote: "The fact is when the view first began, not whether it was true or not, which seems you cannot perceive. It is the origin of an idea not if the idea was true. Get it?"

Dear Josephus,

I don't get it. I don't understand why an idea that is not true should be accepted. Please tell me why anyone should accept an idea that is not true.
Posted by david f, Wednesday, 9 December 2015 3:26:11 PM
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Ideas as such cannot be true or false - they are just ideas!

One could obviously construct truth/false statements about ideas, for example:
- "Person A entertains idea X", or
- "Idea Y correlates to an external fact in universe U".

Why ought one to adopt a particular idea?

- Because it would be good for them to do so. I see no other reason.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Wednesday, 9 December 2015 6:41:42 PM
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People have adopted the idea that a human fetus is a parasite in the mother's body, obviously untrue yet accepted as it suits a weird theory.
Posted by Is Mise, Wednesday, 9 December 2015 6:48:29 PM
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Clearly you weren't talking about me there, Is Mise. It should be apparent to even you by now that I have used, and am happy to use, the most emotive possible language to describe the epitome of sweetness and innocence that is the unborn human child, as it makes no difference to my argument.

But in fairness to those whose arguments for abortion do rely on portraying unborn babies as parasites, an unborn human child, full of so much potential, is, by definition, a parasite: http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/parasite
Posted by AJ Philips, Wednesday, 9 December 2015 7:05:52 PM
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If Abraham is the figment of someones imagination, then it begs the question, why would someone want to create this Abraham myth? I am sure it was for some greater purpose than simply creating an historical narrative, when no such narrative existed before. The bible is full of anecdotal stories, Moses and the ten commandments, Noah's Ark, Jonah living in a whale, and many more. All could be classed as ripping yarns, but what was their purpose?
Is the bible a bit like Shakespeare's plays, a mix of historical fact with a liberal amount of poetic licence, making for a good story. Are those who believe in the biblical narrative as historical fact, as misguided as someone who would believe Shakespeare wrote history books?
One very good reason for creating stories based on god to explain the un-explainable would be to give the creator of the "facts" and their descendants, an air of superiority over those not privy to this firsthand knowledge from the ultimate being. This makes the lesser ones in society, the majority, subservient to the privileged group. By extension that privileged group are the natural leaders with authority vested in them from the ultimate being, who possess all knowledge and can only pass on that knowledge indirectly through those that have the ear of god, that privileged group.
Henry VIII believed that his agenda was exactly the same as God's agenda, and anyone who opposed him, opposed God, and therefore was a heretic, there could be but one punishment for heretics, death. it all worked very nicely for Henry as it has for so many others throughout history.
Posted by Paul1405, Thursday, 10 December 2015 4:59:19 AM
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Dear Paul,

http://www.amazon.com/History-Begins-Sumer-Thirty-Nine-Recorded/dp/0812212762 tells the source of many of the biblical myths. The writers of the Bible were influenced by the myths of the people around them. Samuel Noah Kramer translated many of the cuneiform tablets which predated the Bible by over 2,000 years.

http://faculty.gvsu.edu/websterm/SumerianMyth.htm tells of the Sumerian myths. Almost all the Biblical myths were taken from other peoples living in the area.
Posted by david f, Thursday, 10 December 2015 5:47:49 PM
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AJ,

"Parasites exist in huge variety and include animals, plants, and micro-organisms. They may live as ectoparasites on the surface of the host (e.g. arthropods such as ticks, mites, lice, fleas, and many insects infesting plants) or as endoparasites in the gut or tissues (e.g. many kinds of worm), and cause varying degrees of damage or disease to the host"

Your reference doesn't apply because part of the nucleus of the child is a natural function of the mother's body and the other part is a natural function of the father's body together they ensure that the natural continuation of the human race takes place.

Hardly parasitic; that's why I thought that you were trying to be humourous, to think that you are serious would be to ignore the intelligence displayed in others of your posts.
Posted by Is Mise, Thursday, 10 December 2015 9:21:38 PM
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Is Mise,
In the definition they use every living being is a parasite, all humans get their nourishment from other bodies they cannot survive outside of absorbing from other living bodies as they take another life to survive, unless they only drink water and absorb earthen salts.
Posted by Josephus, Thursday, 10 December 2015 9:52:11 PM
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So you WERE referring to me and my allegedly "weird theories" then, Is Mise.

Sorry, but I've made it abundantly clear that my argument doesn't rely on portraying an unborn human baby, adored by our Lord and Saviour, Jesus the Christ child, as a parasite. So you're barking up the wrong tree.

If my "theories" are "weird", then explain why and settle this once and for all. Of course, you can't, and that's why you're grasping at straws now by attributing completely fictional assumptions to my reasoning.

You're getting desperate now. I know it's hard to realise that you've gone your whole life with an opinion that is stupid and just plain wrong. Believe me, I know what that's like. But get over it.

By the way, I was only going by the dictionary definition, but once again, that's irrelevant anyway.
Posted by AJ Philips, Thursday, 10 December 2015 10:10:30 PM
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Sorry about the harsh tone in that last post, Is Mise, but I get really irritated when my position is misrepresented.

A quick question, though: if an unborn human child, made in the image of God, is not an individual whose survival is totally dependent on its mother’s body, then what is it?

I mean, we wouldn’t force a parent to donate an organ to their dying child, so why do unborn human children, potential Beethovens (to borrow from the Christians' Great Beethoven fallacy), deserve more rights than a child that has already been born?
Posted by AJ Philips, Thursday, 10 December 2015 10:31:22 PM
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AJ,

A human child, like all the offspring of mammals, is totally dependent on its mother's body but that doesn't make it a parasite, once it has become non-dependent then there is no obligation, legal or moral, for the mother to continue support with her body,e.g. there is no obligation to breast feed if other options are available.

The parasite theory is one of the great fallacies of our times.
Posted by Is Mise, Monday, 14 December 2015 10:21:21 AM
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I know, Is MIse.

<<A human child, like all the offspring of mammals, is totally dependent on its mother's body but that doesn't make it a parasite...>>

I’ve never said or implied otherwise. How many times do I have to use the most emotive possible language to describe the unborn human child before you understand that?

<<...once it has become non-dependent then there is no obligation, legal or moral, for the mother to continue support with her body…>>

I wouldn’t be so quick to write off a moral obligation. There is a case for a moral obligation to use one’s body to assist the child in both instances. However, the moral obligation not to strip someone of their bodily autonomy is greater because of the social costs that that would entail.

That being said, There is also no obligation for the mother to support the unborn human baby before it is born either. By what logic or reasoning have you come to the conclusion that there are obligations in one instance and not the other? You haven't explained that.

<<The parasite theory is one of the great fallacies of our times.>>

Yeah, I’m happy enough to go along with that.
Posted by AJ Philips, Monday, 14 December 2015 11:04:19 AM
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//A human child, like all the offspring of mammals, is totally dependent on its mother's body but that doesn't make it a parasite, once it has become non-dependent then there is no obligation, legal or moral, for the mother to continue support with her body,e.g. there is no obligation to breast feed if other options are available.//

That just means that it is a facultative parasite - a parasite which is not dependent on a host to complete it's life cycle - rather than an obligate parasite - a parasite which cannot complete it's life cycle without exploiting a host.

If want to talk about biology, it helps to learn some biology first. Otherwise you just wind up coming across as an under-educated goose.
Posted by Toni Lavis, Monday, 14 December 2015 11:38:31 AM
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Thanks for that, Toni Lavis. I didn't think the dictionary definition would contain such an inaccuracy, but didn't bother to look into it further because it's been beside my point.

Is Mise,

Since I apparently haven’t been clear enough, let’s assume that not only is the unborn human child not a parasite, but that your God exists and that souls somehow magically possess or spontaneously appear in ovums at the moment of conception. In light of my comments in the third paragraph of my response to Josephus at http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=7084#217848, how would that change my point?

Furthermore, since everything that happens is the will of God (Isaiah 45:7), then God is responsible for spontaneous abortions, making him the worst abortionist in history, and many times worse if you take the Catholic point of view in which every sperm is both sacred and great, and that if a sperm gets wasted, God gets quite irate.

Another reason I’m happy to assume that souls enter ovums at the moment of conception is because, according to Christian theology, abortion should ultimately be a good thing since there would be no risk to the soul of the unborn human child if they get to skip this Earthly life which is, after all, just a place to wipe one’s feet, according to the theology of the Abrahamic religions. We should be encouraging pregnancy and abortion because souls would be created and sent straight to heaven with no risk of them using their God-given reasoning and becoming atheists, or being born into a criminogenic environment.

If I was given the choice of eternal bliss or eternal nothingness, then I think I’d choose eternal bliss. How could a god, with unlimited love to give, ever be disappointed with, or even indifferent to, the idea of having even more souls to love?
Posted by AJ Philips, Monday, 14 December 2015 6:56:12 PM
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Toni,

"If want to talk about biology, it helps to learn some biology first. Otherwise you just wind up coming across as an under-educated goose."

you left out 'but in good company'.

The human child is needed for the continuation of the humanity, therefore it cannot be a parasite.
Posted by Is Mise, Monday, 14 December 2015 8:59:33 PM
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