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Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
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@Rabbi Mark Re: "...tell me why is He getting angry when the Jews worshiped other gods?"
Because your god's name is Jealous. Just ask him, he'll tell you.
@ Rabbi Mark
Would a Rabbi beleive in the trinity?
I've mentioned in one of my previous posts, it's just my username.
@Rabbi Mark
What are you trying to say here? That your "god" concept is not the creator of earth nor its custodian? How does that work? Are you saying "god" that people worship is a stand in? An impotent that can not do much but get worshipped? I imagine that is not what you meant, but sure comes off that way to me.
Also what about the rest of the universe? Ya know the other 99.999999999(repeat for a while) of everything, the term "world" smacks of bronze age knowledge levels where people generally thought all of the cosmos rotated around THEM, and did not even remotely understand the vastness of space/universe.
Why would I read that highly edited, translated, heavily plagiarized and completely unevidenced pile of trash? That is very loosely based on something written 2000+ years ago? Give me one good reason why I should read it, as it stands now there is just as much (or possibly less) actual helpful information in said book(s) then in a little kids fictional bedtime story. All I see in all religious text I ever punish myself to read is: contradiction after contradiction, lie after lie, known falsehoods, vagueness, with heavy doses of fear and violence. All the while: the book is trying to pass itself off as somehow "divine" enough, (with zero actual evidence!!) that people should base our lives around the books and accompanying religion.
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▮I am an atheist that always likes a good debate
▮Please include @LogicFTW for responses to me
▮Tips on forum use. ▮ A.R. Member since 2016.
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I meant that there is a Creator who must be served as the God but mankind chose to go after different things and made gods for themselves.
Also, there is a good reason for you to read the Bible. The Bible gives us an insight into the history of our world, it provides various cases to study and derive what is good and bad and it also has given laws that help us find the right way. To your complaint that it is corrupted, I can only say from what I have heard from Biblical scholars that the Bible has more manuscripts to back it and the integrity of its preservation is high unless in a few cases. My knowledge about this field is limited but hope it helps you.
Hey Rebbe
Brave man to come to an atheist forum? Perhaps not. A trained rabbi can probably tie most here in knots about anything to do with the Torah. I won't even try to argue with you.
Might I instead please ask a question about the Mitzvot ? . This is for information only, not to debate with you. I understand that the Law of Moses consists of 613 Mitzvah, collectively called "the Mitzvot" .
My question: Are all 613 mitzvot contained in the Torah? From when do the earliest of these laws date? (approx)
I'm asking because I'm having a 'discussion' with a Christian apologist about at which point the small Jewish sect founded by Yeshsua/Yoshua bar Yusuf (?) ceased being Jewish .It is my view this occurred when Paul Of Tarsus abolished most of the mitzvot and allowed gentiles to join the sect which became Christianity .
I need to be as sure as I can about my understanding of the Mitzvot.
Shalom
Cranky, according to his profile, this Rabbi is xtian.
I am not a trained rabbi it's just my username. As for your comments on Christianity, it is not sect that ceased being Jewish but rather is a group of people who believed the fulfillment of the prophesies given to the Jews. Also, Paul had no reason to abolish the mitzvot to allow gentiles to come into Judaism since gentiles can themselves become and have become followers of Judaism as is recorded in the Book of Esther 8:17. The same also happened when the Gibeonites became a part of Israel and when Ruth too became a Jew. The Jews have never had a problem with this unless with some teachers of today as have been in the past that the gentiles are accursed by God to hell and were created for that reason, as they assume. So Paul had no need. Also the new Testament records (Matthew 23:15) that the Jews even proselytized so Paul who was a pharisee already would have had that the knowledge that proselytizing was done and was in no need of inventing a new way.
@ Rabbi Mark
As usual with theists your grasp of 1st century christian origins is faulty.
'Paul' and his abandonment of the requirement to become Jewish to be a christian is exactly what happened and his 'sect/following' abandoned the Law, the need for circumcision and eventually the observance of the Holy Days. The sabbath was changed to Sun day in the 4th century CE which was the final and definitive split from Judaism.
The bishops of the then dominant sect (Pauline) did visit the Temple in Jerusalem in the mid 2nd century and were astonished to discover the Jewish christians were in residence and had their own gospels, and claimed unbroken tradition....Naturally in the 4th century CE the dominant Pauline church had all the Ebionite, Marcionite and competing texts burnt on finding.. Some texts such as the Gnostic gospels have only been discovered since the 1950's.
The early christians were ALL jewish, or converted to Jewry.
Paul discovered that converts were hard to find for several reasons, one is the need for circumcision ( a risky and painful business) and the deep seated hellenic antipathy to marring or disfiguring the human body. He, to preserve his income and influence abandoned the need for circumcision and the the observance of the Law.
It is a fact that early versions of Luke and Matthew did not contain the birth narrative, that appears, to have been interpolated and contradictory stories entered...
I suggest you do some real study before presenting such facile arguments as you have in your post.
The Pauline sect did indeed leave the original Temple traditions.
These are silly reasons to claim Christians left the tenets of Judaism.
First of all understand what Judaism was truly about. The law (the sacrifices and rituals) were meant to guide the people to what is good. The Bible does not imply that only the law can save one. If the Bible would have said so, then it would not have given men the freedom to make different sacrifices. Or would have brought it's righteous men into guilt for not following some of the most important laws as I have presented to you in the following passages.
The first case first, The Bible gives men relaxation in sacrifices. One can sacrifice a bull if he is able, if not a goat, if he can't a goat then a pair of doves and flour. If the Bible meant that only a sacrifice of a bull can save then it would not have allowed for the relaxation. What can we then understand from this? That sacrifices are not important according to the Bible. The same notion is implied in the case of King Saul, he makes a sacrifice but God punishes him Why? He disobeyed God. So the sacrifice is not important but obedience to God and God says the same too. The same things happend in the lives of Cain, King David, God wasn't satisfied that they paid their sacrifices in time. The same applies with every other ritual, its not the ritual that is important but how your heart is before God.
Further, What about the Jews who lived in exile in Babylon they didn't go to the temple once a year as was demanded by the law, they didn't offer sacrifices as was demanded by the law. But yet Daniel is called as beloved by God and so are the Jews. Should the cease of the rituals mean that those people cant be called Jews anymore? Certainly no, even the prophets say that God would make the sacrifices to cease in the land of Israel.
Considering all this, and Jesus Christ said the same thing when His disciples were accused of plucking corns from the fields on a Sabbath day and the Pharisees (Jews) silently approved the accusation of Jesus that they themselves broke the Sabbath when they rescue their lost cattle on a Sabbath day.
With all these facts you cannot say that Paul left out the law for his own comfort. The Old Testament implies obedience is greater than a sacrifice, Jesus implied the same and so did Paul when he wanted the people to leave out following just rituals but missing out their meaning. Thus even the Christians cannot be accused of leaving the rituals, because they hold on to the meaning of the rituals and they cannot be accused of leaving the tenets of the Bible since they follow still what the Bible demands, obedience.
As for the contradictions tell me where they are. The interpolations, Is there any proof to say they are interpolations and not careless mistakes or leaving out carelessly? For the account of leaving out the Birth narrative in early accounts, How do you know that it is the earliest record of Luke and Matthew? How does that mean that Christ was never born of Virgin Mary at the manger in Bethlehem?
@Rabbi Mark
"Thus even the Christians cannot be accused of leaving the rituals, because they hold on to the meaning of the rituals and they cannot be accused of leaving the tenets of the Bible since they follow still what the Bible demands, obedience."
Obedience to what? What laws are there for Christians but the ten commandments if they abandon the old testament even though Jesus said he didn't come to abolish the old laws?
The Commandments are different from 'laws'. Commandments are a must for every Christian. Infact Jesus made the observance of the commandments stricter in His sermons, If one looks at a woman with lust it is as if he is guilty of adultery is one of the examples.
The laws on the other hand are just rituals given to make the people remember what is important, obedience. Law is just as the communion that Christians do, a ritual to remember the Lord's suffering for all mankind. Finally, Jesus did not say don't follow the commandments but said summing it all up, Love the Lord your God and love your neighbour as yourself.
Curious.... Why is it that every time Rabbi Mark makes a post, I hear this in my head while trying to read it?....
https://youtu.be/ss2hULhXf04
@ Rabbi Mark
Regarding your first comments...apologetics at its finest, Unfortunately inaccurate.
As you your last paragraph there are whole volumes written on the contradictions and probable sources of the virgin myth as described in Luke and Matthew.. I suggest you google it.
We know that several very early versions of Luke and Matthew did not contain the Birth Narrative..because your dominant clique tells us so! They hated it so much they wrote letters to each other describing the contents, or lack of...now that IS history....
Documents dating from the very early 2nd Century describe the Marcionite texts as not having the Virgin Birth in its texts, similarly with the Ebionites in the Temple in Jerusalem...whereas the EARLIEST versions of Matthew and Luke your Pauline tradition can muster are dated to the late Second Century and we have no idea of the actual content although much can be guessed at and reconstructed. .
The earliest gospel writer, Paul, does not mention such a stunning idea of a virgin birth at all.....however virgin birth was a common factor for several Hellenic gods around the mid Second Century...see Mithras just for one...then there is Zoroaster and many others in Egyptian and Greek Pantheons...ohh and I just remembered, your Jesus figure was not the first miraculous birth in the bible (not that he ever was of course) there is that famous patriarch Melchizedek, now that's a story!
It means that significant doubt exists that the story related separately in later texts is actually a record of events. We know that both Matthew and Luke are anonymous, largely edited copies of Mark, yet both Matthew and Luke contain radically different accounts of the birth of the Jesus figure. And the most famous of letter writers "Paul" never mentions a virgin birth or many of the other miracles once....and his Epistles predate the gospels by 30 years at least.
Couple that with the fact that there is no contemporary evidence at all for the existence of the Jesus figure as described in the synoptic Gospels would suggest that most of the 'magic' stories in the gospels are much later (probably 2nd Century) interpolations.
Oh and you might want to read up this...a short post on the Jewish Christian Sects visited by the patriarchs of the church in 160CE
https://www.atheistrepublic.com/forums/debate-room/history-food-debate-2...
@rabbi mark
You do realize your god is created by humans? So you are saying that your god is not the creator?
@ Rabbi Mark
"And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness:.." Genesis 1:26
@ Grinseed
Keep reading. In the next verse it is singular.
Gen 1:27
So God created human beings in his own image.
In the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them.
It is the Royal We, or the Plural of Majesty.
A figure of speech. "We have decided" said the King.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_we
He could be referring to the Angels.
You can't take one figure of speech and make it a doctrine that supersedes what is plainly stated over and over again in the text.
@ Jo
Nosism, the use of the royal 'we' if you read further in that reference you supplied (under Non Western Usage - I have been there before) it explains the earliest use is about the 5th century AD and goes on to state none of the authors Jahwist or Elohist writing at least 1000 years before would have known or used the royal 'we'.
So it is still likely the plural was used as a hang over from earlier polytheism.
There is also references to the so called 'divine council' in Psalm 82 where Yaweh claims his diminion over El, Baal etc
Really the entire Hebrew history involves Yaweh trying to convince the Jews he is the one true god which only really happens after the exile to Babylon. Polytheism is popular.
@ Grinseed
I agree that they did not really get it until after the exile.
The question is why did they not get it? The answer is that monotheism was such an unusual idea.
After the book that became Deuteronomy was 'found' by Hilliel prior to the pending exile and all the pagan temples and altars were destroyed as demanded in that book (written by Hilliel's scribes) Isaiah still came across refugee Jewish women in Egypt who complained everything had been fine until the altars to Asherah had been demolished. Historically the exile would have happened anyway demolition of pagan sites or not.
Your view is the one god was always there waiting for the children of Israel to 'get it'.
My view remains that the 'one god' simply evolved out of the theological short comings of polytheism in view of the destruction of the old order that came with the exile.
@Grinseed
Just read the next verse it says "So God created man in HIS image". When you cherry pick the verses you will end up with wrong conclusions. These verses combined with "The Seed of the woman", "The Lord said to my Lord" and with the Messianic prophecies of the Prophets declare the Trinity in the old testament and in no way denote polytheism.
Tell that to Jo. He doesn't believe in the Trinity, maybe he is cherry picking. If so and if there is only one true interpretation, which of you is right?
Rabbi Mark: I can't believe in God because he came to earth and ejaculated down the throats of virgins to increase the population of the planet and of Christians. While Jesus held them down, god impregnated them by feeding them semen. Then they created a magic shower of forgetfulness. That's why you don't remember. You are one of the seeded. The rest of us were born naturally. We know the truth. We feel truly sorry for your ignorance. The proof is the fact that you do not remember. Think about it. You can't remember. God has made you forget.
@JO: God can be proved. Simply produce him. God can not be disproved, the cosmos is a big place and scientists have better things to do. It is the responsibility of the person making the claim to provide evidence for the claim. When you demonstrate your god is real, existent and knowable, then we will all believe that it is real, existent and knowable. We may not worship it as most Gods I know of are complete assholes. But no one will be able to deny that it does not exist. So... we are still waiting for evidence. Humanity has been waiting for 10,000 years for evidence of a god or gods. What-cha got?
@ Cognostic
I have given my evidence many times.
"God can be proved."
"God can not be disproved..."
Right, so if someone tries to do either of those, they look wrong.
But that does not evidence anything.
The theist could not produce his God, therefore....
Whatever you put after the "therefore" is meaningless.
It does not follow.
Your 10,000, or 6,000 years of no evidence or all debunked is just a faulty argument.
(Sorry, I can't figure out how to go back and get the exact quotes, but I hope you know what I mean.)
Appeal to Ignorance
This appeal to ignorance fallacy occurs when someone asserts a proposition as either true or false, solely because of insufficient proof.
The structure of the fallacy looks like this.
http://www.appealtoauthority.info/other-appeals
There is no evidence against p. Therefore, p.
There is no evidence for p. Therefore, not-p.
It is a fallacy in informal logic.
It asserts that a proposition is true because it has not yet been proven false or a proposition is false because it has not yet been proven true. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_ignorance
@jo
Can you prove your god is real? Do you have objective evidence that can be tested? It sounds like all you have is subjective evidence from your mind, that a god is real.
@ xeno
Dead right dear xeno...
He first tried to "history" his pet saviour into reality and failed.
Then he tried to 'logic" his god into life...and failed
Then he tried to apologetic his bible into a less than horrific tome....and yep, failed
Then he tried Bible Hermeneutics...and considering the Royism uses exactly the same techniques to prove HIS shonky book to be true...well it's obviously a fail...
Now he tries to reverse the burden of proof and word twisting to prove he has a right to believe his god is real.
I don't think I would take odds on the outcome.
What theists do not get is we don't give shit about their fantasies until they start forcing them upon us and the vulnerable.
@Old man
"What theists do not get is we don't give shit about their fantasies until they start forcing them upon us and the vulnerable."
The words "I/we don't give a shit" usually is synonymous with "i/we don't care" and your extravagant expressions of hatred, bitterness, mockery, ridicule, shame and ignorance here day after day just doesn't give me the impression you "don't care" - quite the opposite, it seems like you care very much.
@ Leper
Yep you got me. I do care.
I care about people being told they are damned, born in sin, wont get the 72 virgins. I care about the dreadful things that theists seem to find justifiable...for example Rape, Infanticide, Genocide, Racism.
I care that theists with little or no education come onto these forums and re iterate the same callous, ignorant amoral canards time after time, all the time unctuously Uriah Heeping their way into telling me how "saved" they are and their "true way', and (risibly) how they "live in truth'.
I care that thousands upon thousands of children have been murdered, raped and brainwashed by the followers of religions.
Yep you got me I fucking care.
I care that followers of the Abrahamic misogynist, racist, murderous deity preach to me about 'morals' . Yep, I fucking care.
And when a total ignoramus like yourself comes on these forums without even the bare bones of knowledge about ANY of the subjects they spout their hapless apologetics or nonsense over, yes I do fucking care.
You chose to come here and spread your thinly veneered ignorance. Don't like the responses? As they say in the Hong Kong Marines.."Tougho Shitto" little man.
Want to learn about atheists, start asking polite questions, because, little man, you have demonstrated, even for a theist, a dramatic portion of ignorance and mal-information.
@Old man
Since you are an atheist you must be a rational intelligent creature who trusts on evidence alone and can present it when asked - may I ask with what evidence can you claim that :
"dreadful things that theists seem to find justifiable...for example Rape, Infanticide, Genocide, Racism."
I have always found it curious that atheists are so incapable of being rational about historical facts or understanding written texts.
No, I don't want to learn about atheism. It doesn't interest me. I just like to discuss religion.
I don't think polite is the word you should claim to understand. I believe so having read the text on the debates page about being respectful to other posters and you having clearly failed at it. And not just toward me. You are intolerant to anyone who disagrees with you and express yourself like a frustrated 8-year-old. If that's what atheists are like, why should I like to learn more about them?
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