I'm not saying I agree with him, but Omega in this thread has been far better than Omega in the gun thread. Let him and First carry on, and post if you have a point. If you don't like the thread, don't post saying "I don't like the thread". Because it's weeny bit pointless.

Certainly doesn't sound like that from scripture.
ANYway, there was something that could have negated God's will, and that bothered Him. So to ensure that He got His way, he expelled people from Eden. Sounds like the guy who disowns his son, and later refuses to see his grandkids, because he doesn't like the kid's choice of wife. Thanks, dad! Pride is bad, even in deities.

How unfortunate for the serpent that he didn't think of that and get them to eat from the TOL first, since there was no prohibition against that. THEN God woulda been screwed.

>"Your parents made you. Does that mean that they would be responsible if you decided to go on a killing spree? A positivly... liberal viewpoint."

_I_ wouldn't think so. However, if one knows about a tragedy in advance, and is capable of stopping it, then one has a RESPONSIBILITY to others to do so. If my parents knew that I had gone round the bend and was planning to do something horrible, I would hope that they would have the courage to do whatever it took to stop me BEFORE I did any damage. If my brother told me he was going to take out a busload of schoolchildren with an Uzi, I'd feel obligated to stop him. Just because the bad guy has free will doesn't mean you shouldn't DO SOMETHING about him.

Stopping/preventing the crime by any and all means.
That's not liberal, it's conservative.

>"Look: you're in a condemned building. That building's existance poses a threat to others. The building will be destroyed. You have two choices: leave the building, or stay there and be killed when it collapses around your ears. Pick one."

_I_ wouldn't have been in the building in the FIRST place. Unfortunately, _I_ wasn't ALLOWED to make THAT choice. So much for 'free will.'

>"The general idea is that God wants the maximum number of people to be saved. If he'd demolished the building at the end of Genesis, EVERYONE would go to Hell, because no one would have come to show them the way out. Everything is designed around the concept of the most possible peopole coming to know God, right down to the Tribulation in Revelation."

In THAT case, the greatest number would have been saved, once again, if the building had been destroyed BEFORE the end of Genesis. If the Architect had been eliminated before he built it.

As for Job, I can give you an explanation for its inclusion... but it's a literary one, not a theological one.

You see, in the old days before the Bible was 'written down,' there were many more stories about God and the Devil and such. Many of them are now in the 'Apocrypha,' the Quabbala, etc. Most of them were very much like Kipling's 'just so' stories or Aesop's fables: means of telling why things were as they were. Most of them were patched together from stories borrowed from nearby tribes. Other stories like this include the dualism of Ahura Mazda and Ahriman in God and Satan, Noah's flood, and the use of "El" to mean the word "God," even though we know God as "YHWH" (El was the god of Northern Israel for some time, and many of the angels include El in their names)

JOB was an explanatory fable meant as an attempt to answer the most troublesome of theological questions: "Why do bad things happen to good people?" (Hence its inclusion in the Bible. The early church NEEDED an explanation of that desperately, especially in times overrun by philosophers. Having that explanation attracts followers.)

The problems of Job are manifold, though.
1st, God, being at that time the wrathful old codger of the OT, comes off an an arrogant jerk through most of it. "Where were you when I made the mountains and valleys?!??" What RELEVANCE does that have??

2nd, and more troubling for today's 'evil can't exist in God's presence' Christian, is the character of Satan as someone who is still permitted, even welcome, in God's sight. The reason for this is that the concept of Satan as prime evildoer did not come into existence until after the rise of Christianity. Satan in the OT meant 'adversary,' and he was seen as a tempter, and a pointer-out of man's foibles and fallibility, sort of a 'devil's advocate' if you will. More of a 'trickster angel' than a force of evil. You'll note that in Job Satan says he can get Job to curse God.. but NOT that he cold get him to join Satan. Back then, there was a difference.

It's just like when the Nazis were burning the Bibles. To me (card-carrying atheist) the Bible is just another book, and burning it, while an utterly pathetic and useles gesture, isn't wrong in and of itself.

What angers me is that people are capable of such stupidity that burning books makes them feel that they are accomplishing something. I fart in their general direction.

As for the whole God-Satan-who-built-hell thing, well, the fact that you guys are actually arguing over that kind of stuff tells me I've probably got nothing to contribute.

Other than to say "It's a loada bollocks".

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"If you can't beat your computer at chess, try kickboxing."

Same thing the Soviets did with anything that went against Socialism/Communism.

Or the Islamic Fundamentalists with anything that disturbed their ideas about the Koran and Allah.

etc.

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"Well if it's gonna be that kind of a party, I'm putting my dick in the mashed potatoes!"

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Star Trek Gamma Quadrant
Average Rated 8.32 out of 10 Smileys by Fabrux (with seven eps posted)
***
"Oh, yes, screw logic, let's go for a theory with no evidence!"
-Omega 11:48am, Jan. 19th, 2001

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The negotiations have failed. Shoot him!
~ C. Montgomery Burns

It WAS rthe Church that was majorly responsible for keeping records and some literature alive during the Dark Ages.

(Of course, they mostly confined that to Church-related stuff, and they torched the Library of Alexandria, and contributed to the plague years by killing cats (which would have killed the rats that carried the fleas that transmitted the plague that God built) , and resisted the spread of literacy and the translation of the Bible, etc, but we won't hold THAT against them... they hope.)

And they do keep the religious folk off the streets, where who knows what mischief they might get into otherwise, requiring as they do the fear of God to keep them in line. AND they keep them together so that the rest of us can identify them.

And it WAS the 'Great Awakening' in religious areas first, that eventually led to the concept of 'all men being created equal,' which led to the societal movement (albeit then largely stripped of its religiosity) that created the Revolutions in America and France.

So it's not ALL bad. As long as you keep it at a healthy distance.

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Star Trek Gamma Quadrant
Average Rated 8.32 out of 10 Smileys by Fabrux (with seven eps posted)
***
"Oh, yes, screw logic, let's go for a theory with no evidence!"
-Omega 11:48am, Jan. 19th, 2001

Omega, I don't love you, in fact, I HATE you. I wouldn't walk across the street to piss on you if you was on fire. Hell, in fact, i'd bring some gasoline. So let that be a deep warning to you, should we ever cross paths that I am NOT someone whom you trifle with lightly.

So, save your so called "Christian" love for someone else. And do jam it up your jacksie, kay? (That one was from Mark, BTW)

We don't need radical atheism any more than we need christian fundamentalism, thanks.

People who keep hate in their throats will eventually choke on it.

Beware. It's time for some good old fashioned Christian persectutin'!

*tweety-bird voice*
He don't know me vewwy well, DO he?

Oh, pish tosh. I've had worse than that. How about a five-on-one fistfight? I've got a nice scar on my hand from where I punched one right in the teeth. And a couple of markes where they got me.

I had people, FAMILY, even, tell me I was going to hell, my gf who'd died was going to hell because she wasn't Christian, et cetera ad nauseum. I've got relatives who won't speak to me or visit my family because of what I've said about certain parts of their religion.

Now, I don't like many of these people. And I have, as my posts have shown, some serious disagreements with Judeo-Christian mythology and practices.

However, I also know that people must be judged as INDIVIDUALS, not groups. My maternal grandmother was a Methodist-type Christian, and was one of the kindest, most non-judgemental people I ever met. And I was her favorite grandchild. And I still miss her.

It's alright to hate individual people, once you've gotten to know them or experience their behavior. It's another thing entirely to hate groups of people you've never really met. In fact, that makes you into EXACTLY what you hate, if you do that.

So hate that minister. Hate 'im GOOD. Put a bumper sticker on his car that says "Cops SUCK" or "Free Mumia." But don't hate people you don't know. It's a waste of your energy.