It is false to assume as if one's faith in the bible has to depend on the bible's accuracy, feasibility or consistency.

The only good reason for anyone to believe in anything is that it is good for them to so believe.

Whence the need to fill page after page with hateful mockery in the name of science when Exodus 32:15 says: "the tables were written on both their sides; on the one side and on the other were they written"? The Jewish understanding is that the tables were carved all the way through, so you could see the light on the other side, yet they could be equally and correctly read from both directions - and not as a mirror image as the constraints of geometry would dictate!

The Jews do not beat around the bush, sheepishly trying to reconcile God with the natural sciences. They tell it unabashed: God can even defy the laws of geometry!

Now my understanding is somewhat different since I do not follow the Abrahamic religions, but all I can say is GOOD ON THEM FOR PUTTING GOD FIRST!

Do you place your faith in the world, including in its laws of physics, logic and geometry, or do you place your faith in God? You cannot do both, you cannot serve two masters, so if your faith is in the former, then you have missed God and live in sin.

---

Dear Altrav,

«I maintain that it is a weak, simple and gullible mind that reaches for religion.»

Of the three, I accept the middle with both arms: SIMPLE. I am all for simplicity and a simple mind is the best mind.

Now the weak and gullible minds reach for the world and its temptations, not for religion. We all rationally understand that our stay on earth is short and none of our works here will remain for long, yet the weak and gullible irrationally follow their insatiable human desires, while the wise and strong rationally forgo such desires, favouring the eternal instead even if they consider it to be only a probability.

"Keep in mind that if there were a GOD, IT would not be in a solid form but gaseous or vapour."

Our learned teacher and brother in Christ says he is spiritual. Almost Christ himself. Well, actually...
Certainly he has the vapour and gas. Charisma . Revelations . Send your cheque and year's susbscription to "Opinionated Ministries of The Wise One".

Yuyutsu, the weak do not have the strength to reject the notion of religion. The gullible do not have the imagination to question the veracity of religion and it's bone-fide.
Nicknamenick, if you believe in God, good for you. If you do you already know that the general opinion is that 'IT' is not human. Fact 1. If God is not human then IT is not in a solid state. Which would ring true with popular belief and the fact that at best God has presented as a voice, not an image. Forget the clap-trap about 'I have created man in my image'. Makes for great theater but absolutely no sense. Anyway, as I said from the start. Religion is a creation of mankind to control and manage the people. There is no magical, spiritual 'world' beyond this one where you go to after death and the Muslims go through one door where they get to live forever with their choice of a dozen virgins. Really? Oh and by the way, did anybody happen to check if those virgins were male or female? Or maybe you get to select to your particular preference, after all you're going to be there for eternity. HAH! Guys the simple truth is we are the product of nature. When we die, we die! We are dead! The lights do out! The end! Fin! The rest is all fantasy and was started because someone wanted power and wealth. End of!

MASS MURDER, INFANTICIDE, AND WHO KNOWS WHAT ELSE!...Moses again!

Numbers 31:7-18 And they warred against the Midianites, as the LORD commanded Moses; and they slew all the males.

....And they slew the kings of Midian, beside the rest of them that were slain; namely, Evi, and Rekem, and Zur, and Hur, and Reba, five kings of Midian: Balaam also the son of Beor they slew with the sword.

....And the children of Israel took all the women of Midian captives, and their little ones, and took the spoil of all their cattle, and all their flocks, and all their goods.

....And they burnt all their cities wherein they dwelt, and all their goodly castles, with fire.

....And they took all the spoil, and all the prey, both of men and of beasts.

SORRY for interjecting BUT in Numbers 31:7 it said they "slew all the males".

....And they brought the captives, and the prey, and the spoil, unto Moses, and Eleazar the priest, and unto the congregation of the children of Israel, unto the camp at the plains of Moab, which are by Jordan near Jericho.

....And Moses, and Eleazar the priest, and all the princes of the congregation, went forth to meet them without the camp.

....And Moses was wroth with the officers of the host, with the captains over thousands, and captains over hundreds, which came from the battle.

...And Moses said unto them, Have ye saved all the women alive?

....Behold, these caused the children of Israel, through the counsel of Balaam, to commit trespass against the LORD in the matter of Peor, and there was a plague among the congregation of the LORD.

Sorry for interjecting again BUT this is where it gets really into the atrocity, mass murder and war crime status. I just didn't want you to miss it!

....Now therefore KILL EVERY MALE AMONGST THE LITTLE ONES...(Babies and toddlers), and KILL EVERY WOMAN THAT HATH KNOWN A MAN BY LYING WITH HIM.

.....But all the WOMEN CHILDREN, that have not known a man by lying with him, KEEP ALIVE FOR YOURSELVES.

Cont...

Hang on , I'm still on the first chapter. Slow down.
"Sadducees, and the other Pharisees". What's a Sadducee ?

Self-Op2,

Most of us have probably read all those bits about killing and smiting and hanging from trees and (snigger !) 'enslaving' the women, even the women children, many years ago. All vainglorious boasting, we knew. No, none of it happened. Maybe not. Whatever.

When you get around to the Koran, you will find it all there too, borrowed from the Torah, if in somewhat garbled form - the principles of Islam bear uncanny likenesses to pre-Solomonaic Judaism. Primitive and backward desert cultures after all.

Sternberg has written very copiously on some of this for decades: try this:

https://dspace.lafayette.edu/bitstream/handle/10385/1252/Cohn-HarvardTheologicalReview-vol96-no2-2003.pdf?sequence=1

for a start. He suggests that the Hebrews were, if you like, the rural and peasant brothers and sisters of the urban Canaanites, as part of one society, who rose up, overthrew the city-types and moved in. And of course, within a hundred years, had forgotten all about it, believing they had been distinctly Hebrew for a thousand years. Well, something like that.

Plenty of reading for you to do, Self-Op2 !

Joe