Genesis: On a different topic I did say and still maintain that at its roots religious belief is fuelled by fear of death (the promise of an afterlife), whereas atheists like me accept that we will cease to exist.
You say: "Those who refuse to beleive/acknowledge God, they too enter eternal blackness when they die. No big deal. But if theyre wrong, and God does exist, and theyve lived their life rejecting Him, they will die and enter eternal hell."
I ask: you espouse a faith that condemns to eternal hell a person who adheres to the best judgements that his conscience can offer? Your God will torture me forever because in good conscience I don't believe in him? Perhaps he would prefer me to be a hypocrite and go thru the motions? You are welcome to such a monster.

People don't want to discuss other religions *sigh*- such a lack of curiosity.

Martin-Blessed was being more poetic than elegant. Nothing to do with the passages I quoted.

Martin, you place a quote in your answer on the passage in Leviticus but don't say who you are quoting- it could be your local postman. The quote just says that anyone who questions the passage are enemies of Divine Revelation and also the passage isn't explicit. The original text is quite clear and saying that people who question it are enemies of Divine Revelation is in the real tradition of the Bible-making bullying threats instead of intelligent explanations.

The doctrine of 'Preparatio Evangelica' claims all other religions had small pieces of Christianity embedded in them by God and were only preparations for the coming of Christianity. Of course, the other religions didn't think so and it is insulting to them. It doesn't explain why Christianity had to persecute and suppress other religions either. Maybe Christianity is only a preparation for Islam. And maybe Islam's a preparation for Falun Gong.

Numbat-Your explanation for the advice of Paul about slavery is sensible and Martin gives a similar explanation but I'm not convinced. The early christians were fed to the lions, stoned, crucified, etc, because they stood up so strongly for their beliefs. Why die rather than bend the knee to an idol and not die rather than bend your knee to a cruel and abusive dictator or slave owner unless you think one important and the other not? The apostles weren't worried about their members being martyred-they greatly encouraged it.

Secondly, saying that Paul had to encourage the slaves to serve their masters, etc. because of the political climate of the time means that neither of you believe that these particular parts of the Bible hold timeless truths relevant for today. You could throw the whole Bible out the window on that premise if you chose-or large amounts of it. Its a dangerous stance to take if you want to claim that every word in the Bible is 'Divine Revelation' and 'Universal Truth'.

Martin thinks the bible should not be taken literally! If you don't take it literally then do you make it mean anything you want it to? This also shows a lack of belief in the Bible. Does this mean that Martin and Numbat don't believe the bible? Or not all of it? Or that at least part of it is not relevant to us today?

Slavery was still widespread and there were still a lot of people to offend when the USA abolished slavery. A lot of people put their lives on the line and habouring runaway slaves was against the law. The Bible explicitly instructs not to harbour runaway slaves-the slave owners felt fully justified on a Christian Biblical level.

The Christian group that was most involved in harbouring runaway slaves and petitioning for the Abolition of Slavery were the Quakers and they were pacifists, Martin, not Leninist revolutionaries. They're highly unorthodox christians who don't believe reading the Bible is as important as following the Holy Spirit within. They also hold to the Pelasgian Heresy that works are more important than faith. You would think that would make them dangerous-and yet they are pacifists and have been in forefront of doing good works in so many areas. An interesting version of Christianity.

Genesis, not sure if you are aware of this but mental illness is not an all or nothing thing.

The (lunatic) portion of the lunatic, liar or god argument seems to hang on the idea that a lunatic is a babbling nut who's lunacy will be really obvious in all area's of their live.

I'm no expert but I'm suprised that some of those who work with people with mental health issues have not jumped on that one.

Probably quite possible for someone to manage their life fairly well in most area's and be delusional about a small part of it. After a while some people might get annoyed by your delision and if they are not the caring sharing types some of them might want to toss you off a cliff or crucify you or something.

Simplistic arguments might be good for convincing those who want to believe but they don't do much for those who want better evidence. The "lunatic, liar or god" argument is one that is good for making believers feel better but that is about the limit of it.

R0bert

RObert,

What about the evidence of the resurrection? The hundreds of witnesses that were tortured and massacred for hanging on to what they saw.

Some of them lived long enough to write it down for future generations.

Lunatic, Liar, or Lord… one thing is sure he can't be ignored.

Genesis
How do I begin to answer you. I don't want to insult you but you really should learn about ancient history before you make any claims concerning an ancient document. I would argue that it is impossible to understand an ancient document without understanding the world it came from.

Firstly I don't have to support ANY of those arguments. Why? because the argument that C.S.Lewis used relied on the fact that there are only 3 possible alternative answers. I just pointed out 4 more off the top of my head. There could be 400 or 4000 more for all you know. So if lewis' argument relies on the fact that there are only 3 alternatives, & there are more alternatives possible then that means the argument [known in philosophy as "abduction"] doesn't work. It is INVALID!

If you are going to use a philosopher's work try a decent christian philosopher like Thomas Aquinas not some 3rd rater like Lewis. Now let's get to your answers:
To be continued...