The alchemist:You come across as a sad, miserable creature one who just will not entertain any new thing.
No, as any ten year old could tell you,I have never been in eternity.
Ditto for Heavenly Paradise
These people with a 'death's door'experience? did they actually die?
My experiences show me an orderly Creator and I want to be "indoctrinated?" by Him.
Reincarnation is NOT! an option so you won't come back as a cockroach or anything else - sorry.
I do not know who or what God will have in Paradise, God just hasn't asked for my advice and I doubt that He will ask you.
There IS intelligent Life in the universe this Life made it all.
As there is NO evolution then there will not be any 'upwards' step for us as a species. Unless you see going to Heaven/Paradise or whatever you may term it the next "evolutionary" step
In spite of your present beliefs this God you reject has not rejected you He sees you as unique and wants you to be with Him for eternity. numbat

Coach, this is simply not an answer.

>>how come we don't have one single, solitary contemporary account?

Answer: we have 4 historical accounts in the new testament<<

How on earth do you expect to be taken even remotely seriously when you make statements like that?

It is the equivalent of you asking me "how come there are gaps in fossil history, doesn't that affect your thoughts on evolution?" and me answering "but look, we have lots of fossils".

Do you see the disconnect?

I'm sure that if tomorrow's Sydney Morning Herald reported that a man was raised from the dead in the CBD fifty years ago, someone would ask why they didn't think it worth reporting at the time.

Don't you think?

And while you are pondering that, can you also explain to me why there are plenty of lurid descriptions of the travails we can expect in hell, but no-one has yet been able to walk us through one single day in heaven?

Will we be as smart and beautiful as we are on earth? More so? Or less so, so we can practice humility? Can we choose what age we will be?

The assumption has to be that we retain some aspects of our corporeal existence in order to enjoy the torments of hell, but does this also apply to heaven? Or are we suddenly non-corporeal spirits? Do we think? Feel? Love?

And if it is to be the destination of christian believers, why isn't it more widely advertised through colourful descriptions of what people actually do, once they get there? Surely a little positive reinforcement wouldn't go astray...

By the way, this eternity thing scares me. Only death gives meaning to life, you know. "Living", or just "being" forever sounds like hell. Even if I do get to learn the harp.

And is it the same heaven for all religious sub-sets - do the catholics rub shoulders with episcopalians (I have no idea what an episcopalian is, but it sounds impressive) and proddy dogs from Ulster?

Enquiring minds need to know

Once again no christian answered my posts on slavery, etc. Why doesn't anyone answer? This is the third time I have asked.

Martin the difference between Pauline Chrisitanity and the Church of Jerusalem comes from a variety of sources including "Who wrote the New Testament?" by Burton Mack. The source documents used are primarily from the Pauline sections of the NT.

You say you are happy to accept what is repugnant in the bible. I don't approve of child sacrifice but nor do I genocide and the argument in the link you supplied says it was alright for Jehovah to order the israelites to massacre the very children of the Canaanites that were in danger of being sacrificed. Why, because he knew they would grow up to be bad people. In fact the whole article proves my point-that christianity encourages people to think others are evil and therefore have no rights-to the point they are prepared to slaughter them.

I'm well aware human sacrifice and cannibalism was widespread (not just the Canaanites) - I don't approve of it but I do try to understand why it was so universal.

In Egypt the religion of Osiris and Isis wiped out human sacrifice and cannibalism (Christianity didn't). Osiris travelled the land teaching people how to sow crops so they could use grain to make bread to eat instead of people. This gives a good revelation of why people were cannibalistic beforehand - they were hungry. Osiris gave them grain instead to get through lean times.

Israel sent his children into Egypt during famine because EGYPT HAD GRAIN and the Israelites then lived there 400 years, long enough to be influenced by their religion. Osiris was a dying and resurrected god whose body was eaten in the form of bread and his blood as wine - just like Jesus is.

Herodotus (5th Century BC) says the Egyptians found human sacrifice abhorrent. They had stopped the practice well before the Greeks did. The Osiris religion has inscriptions dating back to the third millenium BC

The Egyptians were called the children of Ham. If you know your Bible then you would know Ham is one of the three children of Noah. The Canaanites are also the descendants of Ham -a relative race to the Egyptians. Isis of the Egyptians is the Bible's hated Ishtar of the Canaanites.

Isn't that a joke? The very religion that in Egypt wiped out human sacrifice and probably influenced the Israelites, in another branch is remembered forever for human sacrifice. Of course the Christians only want to remember the bad bits. As Martin says, the christians take all the good bits from other cultures and religions and then turn around and call them evil. Talk about a lack of gratitude.

Even so there are episodes of human sacrifice in the Bible that are a source of a lot of controversy. Such as Jephthah's daughter Judges 11:29-40 which most scholars agree was a case of human sacrifice and also a law in Leviticus that directs the israelites to do human sacrifice: 27:28 27:29 also Exodus 22:29; Numbers 31:25-29; and of course Genesis 22:2

All that aside, if God says - "Go slaughter all those people because they have offended me" that is a human sacrifice for a god anyway.

Martin, condoning genocide and the murder of innocents and thinking that schizophrenics 'know something' when they go on a killing spree because of the Revelations is twisted.

coach - I didn't ask Edi, I told her what differentiated Christianity from other faiths. Your three points are 1. wrong (as I posted earlier) 2. Just saying 'we are better' without defining why 3. Saying others are no good because they arent Christians. You are not debating at all.

All I have seen on this forum is simply "We are right because we believe in God" - even to justify tortures, slavery, murder of innocents, genocide etc Well if that is what you believe then who can argue with you. You simply say - anything is alright if God did it, or told us to do it.

Aziliz, I find the circular logic employed facinating.
The following is my paraphrasing of how I read the discussion.

Q How do you know that God is good?
A Because he says he is?
Q How do you know that you can trust God?
A Because he is good.

I've also got the distinct impression that the christain Gospel boils down to.

Kind of interesting how in the end the message seems to boil down to "God is a LOVING and JUST God and you'd better accept that or you will burn in HELL for eternity, get it, and don't you dare question wether he is a LOVING and JUST God or you are even more dammed" (sorry about the capitals Kay but they are fun sometimes).

It seems that most of the christain posters are unable to comprehend that there are a variety of other speculations around regarding the afterlife, God, mans place in the scheme of things etc, or else they do comprehend it and try and stop people considering the possibility by the claim that it is extroadinarly arrogant to try and make an informed choice about those specuulations and other varieties of attempted intimidation.

R0bert

Azilis,

Let me correct you and bring exactly what you said:

>>Edi-Its not simple. There are other systems that believe in God, have rules, morals,encourage love and compassion towards others. What makes Christianity (and Judaism and Islam) stand out is their intolerance of other religions and philosophies and insistence others are evil.<<

Now go back and read my answer.

You also seem to be stuck in the old testament - time to move on...
You ask too many questions - maybe you expect us to tell you "you're right Azilis we all got it wrong - thanks for pointing that out and saving humanity..."

e.g. There was a reason why people offered blood sacrifices in the OT but now it's no longer needed. Jesus was the ultimate sacrifice.

No offense but if your Q's were genuine I'm sure you'll find plenty of sites on the net to satisfy your hunger for answers. This is OLO.

Pericles,

My answer to the first part of your post is still the same. The word of God is immortal. What was written 2000 years ago is as fresh as today’s paper. Read it.

As for your second set of questions; ditto -

“Enquiring minds need to know”

Enquiring minds need to read – I wouldn’t want to spoil the plot for you. Get it directly from the source. I'm sure you can manage that instead of making a fool of yourself on OLO.