God or Not

[tsafficianado]

A United States Marine was attending some college courses between
Assignments. He had completed missions in Iraq and Afghanistan. One
of the courses had a professor who was a vowed atheist and a member
of the ACLU.
One day the professor shocked the class when he came in. He looked to
the ceiling and flatly stated, "God, if you are real, then I want you
to knock me off this platform. I'll give you exactly
15 minutes."
The lecture room fell silent. You could hear a pin drop. Ten minutes
went by and the professor proclaimed, "Here I am God. I'm still
waiting." It got down to the last couple of minutes when the Marine
got out of his Chair, went up to the professor, and cold-cocked him;
knocking him off the platform. The professor was out cold.
The Marine went back to his seat and sat there, silently. The other
students were shocked and stunned and sat there looking on in
silence.
The professor eventually came to, noticeably shaken, looked at the
Marine and asked, "What the hell is the matter with you? Why did you
do that?" The Marine calmly replied, "God was too busy today
protecting America's soldiers who are protecting your right to say
stupid shit and act like an asshole. So, He sent me."

[trish]

"God was too busy today
protecting America's soldiers who are protecting your right to say
stupid shit and act like an asshole. So, He sent me.”

So let’s get the Marine’s logic straight. Had God been there, He would’ve protected the professors right to say stupid shit. But not being there, He sent the Marine to NOT protect the professor’s right to say stupid shit. In the mean time U.S. soldiers DID get killed and wounded in Iraq. About four U.S. soldiers are killed there everyday. So God’s NOT doing such a good job in Iraq. Neither is He omnipotent, if He had to send a marine to ACLU on a mission to protect freedom of speech. Moreover, either the marine got the mission twisted, or God’s an inconsistent arse.

[LG]

What a silly and obviously untrue little story (I first heard it with a Navy SEAL in place of a Marine). Rather than pointlessly wasting our time, you of all people should have known that the best way to counter the fictional professor's argument would not be by punching his lights out, but by quoting from the New Testament, specifically Matthew 4:7 (look it up).

I won't go any further into your sad little urban legend. It's not worth it.

[chefmike]

What's up, TFool?

Is that BS you posted what they indoctrinated you(and the other zombies) at jesus camp with today? :P

'Atta girl, chickenhawk!

http://www.hungangels.com/board/viewtopic.php?t=19028&start=0

[LG]

"God was too busy today
protecting America's soldiers who are protecting your right to say
stupid shit and act like an asshole. So, He sent me.”

So let’s get the Marine’s logic straight. Had God been there, He would’ve protected the professors right to say stupid shit. But not being there, He sent the Marine to NOT protect the professor’s right to say stupid shit. In the mean time U.S. soldiers DID get killed and wounded in Iraq. About four U.S. soldiers are killed there everyday. So God’s NOT doing such a good job in Iraq. Neither is He omnipotent, if He had to send a marine to ACLU on a mission to protect freedom of speech. Moreover, either the marine got the mission twisted, or God’s an inconsistent arse.
:lol:

I kinda like God. Can't we just say that tsafficianado is an inconsistent arse and leave it at that? :lol:

[White_Male_Canada]

I kinda like God. Can't we just say that tsafficianado is an inconsistent arse and leave it at that?

Your god is not mine and your verse was about Jesus being tempted, not followers being mocked.

As for being mocked you may want to start at Gal.6:7-8, then Isa54:17/Ps140/Deu30:7 and this one,

" And he went up from thence unto Bethel: and as he was going up by the way, there came forth little children out of the city, and mocked him, and said unto him, Go up, thou bald head; go up, thou bald head.
And he turned back, and looked on them, and cursed them in the name of the LORD. And there came forth two she bears out of the wood, and tare forty and two children of them "

[Oli]

Matthew 4

7 Jesus said unto him, It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.

I think LG's was correct as it pertains to the web fable.

[LG]

Matthew 4: 7 Jesus said unto him, It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.

I think LG's was correct as it pertains to the web fable.
Thank you Oli.It seems some people need the obvious pointed out to them.

Annoying_Canuck said:


I kinda like God. Can't we just say that tsafficianado is an inconsistent arse and leave it at that?

[b] Your god is not mine and your verse was about Jesus being tempted, not followers being mocked.

Wrong. The urban myth of the Marine is about testing God to prove himself, not about mocking God's followers.Do you have comprehension problems?

As for your god not being my God, I never realised you believed there was more than one god. So what god do you worship: mammon, Dick Cheney or the flying spaghetti monster?

I go to church, WMC. I've read the New Testament several times over. I know my stuff on this. And even though I lapse occasionally on some issues, you have no right to question my beliefs. I will not discuss religion with you any further.

[White_Male_Canada]

I go to church, WMC. I've read the New Testament several times over. I know my stuff on this. And even though I lapse occasionally on some issues, you have no right to question my beliefs. I will not discuss religion with you any further.

And your "church" is not mine either. You know jackshit junior, quoting from Matt in reference to the temptation of Jesus, and had little to nothing to do with being mocked and derided.

From reading what you quoted, I don`t have to question you.

[LG]

I go to church, WMC. I've read the New Testament several times over. I know my stuff on this. And even though I lapse occasionally on some issues, you have no right to question my beliefs. I will not discuss religion with you any further.

And your "church" is not mine either. You know jackshit junior, quoting from Matt in reference to the temptation of Jesus, and had little to nothing to do with being mocked and derided.

From reading what you quoted, I don`t have to question you.

If I met you in church I'd be looking for another congregation.

You failed to understand the issue completely. Deuteronomy 30:7? You mean "Then the Lord your God will put all these curses on your enemies, on those who hate you and persecute you". Please! You believe that being punched in the face was divine retribution? So the Marine was what? An angel of God? And who gave him that right? Jesus didn't advocate punching people in the face.

Is that why you like guns? Do you dream of going out to shoot all the atheists. Are you thinking "if only it was legal...they're asking for it...they'll reap what the sow..." and drooling at the very thought?

What's that? Will you smite me? What with? Your enormous scientific brain or your sound understanding of theology?

Read the text again. The text I quoted (from the New Testament and based on the word of Christ rather than the words of some old man who instructed us not to eat shellfish or pork) is very, very clear and relates perfectly to the bullshit story given by your conservative buddy. But we've already established you have comprehension problems.

Look, I know you don't want to admit you're wrong. But just leave it alone becuase you're making a fool of yourself and pissing me off.

In any case, I thought you believe there is only one God. Seeing as I believe in this and you don't, I really don't know what you're on about. "Your god is not mine"? So who is your god, laughing boy?

[White_Male_Canada]

You failed to understand the issue completely. Deuteronomy 30:7? You mean "Then the Lord your God will put all these curses on your enemies, on those who hate you and persecute you". Please! You believe that being punched in the face was divine retribution? So the Marine was what? An angel of God? And who gave him that right? Jesus didn't advocate punching people in the face.

Is that why you like guns? Do you dream of going out to shoot all the atheists. Are you thinking "if only it was legal...they're asking for it...they'll reap what the sow..." and drooling at the very thought?


That`s rich coming from the moron who doesn`t understand the context of Matthew. Just how fucking stupid are you sport? Deut. was written by Moses. But he was "just some old man", implying Moses just made all that shit up out of his head.

As for the right to bear arms, that`s explicit in Lk- 22:36. Why would I want to murder anyone, you`re fucked anyway. When you morons slip your coils the next thing you`ll hear is the voice saying, " Yo, this is my `hood what are you doin` trying to get in here? You never knew me so I don`t know you bro. Get the fuck outta here." Our job is to warn you morons, but one thing we won`t do is cast pearls before swine and waste our time.



Read the text again. The text I quoted (from the New Testament and based on the word of Christ rather than the words of some old man who instructed us not to eat shellfish or pork) is very, very clear and relates perfectly to the bullshit story given by your conservative buddy.

Try comprehend the difference between cultural laws and the universal ones moron.

Just how fucking ignorant are you? For one you worship the created and secondly, in the same book you idiotically tried to qoute from, He clearly states, " Think not that I am come to destroy the law...I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil"

So try argue against the Law and some old man who told them not to eat shellfish all you like.

[trish]

implying Moses just made all that shit up out of his head.

what...he made it up in somebody else's head?

[LG]

Nobody has accurately determined who wrote Deuteronomy.
Whoever wrote this particular book and others was writing it in a specific time. This is why books in the Old Testament forbade the eating of pork and shellfish.

My comment on old men writing the Old Testament is valid. They were, indeed, old men. This does not invalidate their writing, but it is clear to me that the Old Testament was meant as an instruction manual rather than the absolute truth. If it is accepted as the absolute truth, then one must also believe that the world is only a few thousand and not a few billion years old.

The text in Luke on the right to bear arms has been covered before and your claim is bullshit. The text, in Greek, refers to a dagger that can be used against thieves in self defense by travelers. It does not refer to semi-automatic handguns.

As far as Matthew 5:17 is concerned, I believe the Greek text, which seems to be the original language refers first to "nomos" (law) and then to "entolai" (commandments) making it unclear what Jesus was referring to. The differences in meaning are very specific. Did Jesus mean the whole body of law or not? Looking at Luke 16:16 suggest one might suggest the latter.

We have also Galatians 6:2- "carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.

Then there is Romans 7: 1-6, which ends with "But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code" (NIV).

So if you wish to believe that Matthew 5:17-19 places Christians under the Torah, why don't you fuck off to a burnt sacrifice and leave us in all peace?

Thank you and goodbye.

[White_Male_Canada]

Nobody has accurately determined who wrote Deuteronomy.
Whoever wrote this particular book and others was writing it in a specific time. This is why books in the Old Testament forbade the eating of pork and shellfish.

Where does one even begin with this new-age jesus freak. I think someone did accuarately describe who wrote Deut. in Matt 19:7-8, 22-24, Mk 7:10, 12-24, Lk24:44, John1:7,5:46, 7:23, Acts 26:22, etc,etc. So if Jesus thought Moses wrote parts of the Pentateuch and you disagree then that`s your problem.



My comment on old men writing the Old Testament is valid. They were, indeed, old men. This does not invalidate their writing, but it is clear to me that the Old Testament was meant as an instruction manual rather than the absolute truth. If it is accepted as the absolute truth, then one must also believe that the world is only a few thousand and not a few billion years old.


Once again, you fail to comprehend the difference between cultural laws and the universal ones.


The text in Luke on the right to bear arms has been covered before and your claim is bullshit. The text, in Greek, refers to a dagger that can be used against thieves in self defense by travelers. It does not refer to semi-automatic handguns.

Bullshit, you`re a liar and deciever. Why do I know? Because Peter pulled out a sword you moron and Jesus told him to put it away. Peter was clearly aiming for the artery and neck but got the ear instead. Add to that Samuel and the unarmed, Ex. and the right to self-defense,1Tim. for those who don`t provide for their own,etc,etc.
So if Romans could carry swords and spears then why couldn`t the Apostles, or maybe Jesus talked about sword confiscation as was described by Samuel,Gad and Nathan. So today`s sword is the firearm dufus, or maybe God spoke of rock control when Cain cracked his brothers skull open.


As far as Matthew 5:17 is concerned, I believe the Greek text, which seems to be the original language refers first to "nomos" (law) and then to "entolai" (commandments) making it unclear what Jesus was referring to. The differences in meaning are very specific. Did Jesus mean the whole body of law or not? Looking at Luke 16:16 suggest one might suggest the latter. We have also Galatians 6:2- "carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.
Then there is Romans 7: 1-6, which ends with "But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code"

I witnessed that the other day, a hearse was speeding to the cemetary. A cop pulled it over, opened the back door and gave the dead man a ticket for speeding.

The written laws and prophets ended at John does not, never was, interpreted as the literal end to the laws and what the prophets said. Only a new age nut would propose such a silly notion.

You still have no grasp of ceremonial, cultural and universal laws and who it applies to. Law can only define, not save. Paul stated the" the law is holy",naturally. But since Calvary both lawlessness and law-keeping as a way of life are not the complete paths.


So if you wish to believe that Matthew 5:17-19 places Christians under the Torah, why don't you fuck off to a burnt sacrifice and leave us in all peace?

If you think there are no more laws and you can do whatever you feel like then go right ahead you new-age bullshitting tree hugging moron.

[trish]

So today`s sword is the firearm Gee, and I would've bet you subscribed to the literal interpretation of the Bible. Live and learn.

[LG]

WMC,

Your misappropriation of the Bible to suit your own political agenda is- in my opinion- unacceptable. Your use of the dagger quote in Luke to justify ownership of semiautomatic assault rifles upsets me. Your inability to understand that in "he who lives by the sword, dies by the sword", Jesus refers to a metaphorical sword is also upsetting.

I also cannot understand how you could even say "your god is not mine". I for one only believe in one God. How many do you believe in?

Finally, I cannot understand why you criticized my comment that was aimed at tsafficianado and his silly little piece of fiction (and punching someone for being an atheist is not something Jesus would recommend, I think- then again, you claim to know better), when it obviously did not involve you. You then went on to attack me in a very vicious and pretty un-Christian way, I would say. It is obvious you have something against me, whereas I have tried to avoid getting into arguments with you because I find it a waste of time.

I was considering answering you on your points (if you want to call them that) and I do have my references, then I figured: what for? As such, I do not think I will continue further with this pointless thread. I have more interesting things to do with my time. You are entitled to your method of worship and I to mine. If you think I'm wrong then fine, but remember that Jesus told us not to judge.

Have a good day and please don't get back to me on this one. It's not worth my time.

[White_Male_Canada]

This is precious coming from a buffet table "christian" who pick and choose not only books, but sentences on which to either observe or ignore.



Your misappropriation of the Bible to suit your own political agenda is- in my opinion- unacceptable. Your use of the dagger quote in Luke to justify ownership of semiautomatic assault rifles upsets me. Your inability to understand that in "he who lives by the sword, dies by the sword", Jesus refers to a metaphorical sword is also upsetting.

What don`t you get? Those who live by the sword are war mongers such as Mohammed who said he`d convert by the sword. Jesus told Peter to sheave his weapon, not discard and be defenseless sheep. Only left-wing liberation nutjobs could even attempt to argue Christians be defenseless.

More nonsense from your liberation theology. I`ve dealt with you christ coated marxists my whole life so don`t try me boy.

[LG]

I thought I told you not to reply...


You then went on to attack me in a very vicious and pretty un-Christian way, I would say. It is obvious you have something against me, whereas I have tried to avoid getting into arguments with you because I find it a waste of time.

I was considering answering you on your points (if you want to call them that) and I do have my references, then I figured: what for? As such, I do not think I will continue further with this pointless thread. I have more interesting things to do with my time. You are entitled to your method of worship and I to mine. If you think I'm wrong then fine, but remember that Jesus told us not to judge.


This is precious coming from a buffet table "christian" who pick and choose not only books, but sentences on which to either observe or ignore...
...More nonsense from your liberation theology. I`ve dealt with you christ coated marxists my whole life so don`t try me boy.

I won't even bother. The content and tone of your reply has just proven that my comments were probably correct.

[ezed]

Stop quoting the "Books". They were written, translated, edited and published by men. Religion is not something from God. You're brains, spirit, and ability or lack thereof are from God. All these books were written when men were battling with spears and sword.

We've evolve to bombs, guns and nuclear weapons but still take the words of the sticks and stones guys as gospel and use them to justify our failings.

Daily, we are stating God is an idiot, and can only see him as one of us.
Look up at the stars, and ask yourself do we really have the right to declare we are the authority on anything. As a race, are we that egotistical. Are we God's drinking buddy and know his grand plan.

We don't know shit. Use the brains he gave you to the best of your ability. I THINK that's what he likes. To see his creation do the best they can with the tools in their bag.

The books? Imagine if Quentin Tarentino was alive at Niccia and was one of the writers or editors. What would be the face of religion.

It's time to evolve or evaporate. :twisted:

[trish]

Last night at got out my binoculars, relaxed in a lawn chair and searched the milky way. In Sagittarius I found the Lagoon Nebula and the Trifid Nebula, both in the same field of view. There both on the order of 2200 to 2500 light years away. The Lagoon is about 30 light years across. Imagine, I was gazing at light that was emitted more than 22 centuries ago! Now the center of our galaxy (Sagittarius A*) is in roughly the same direction but about 26000 light years away (it’s visible light is obstructed by intervening dust and gas clouds, so you won’t find it with ordinary binoculars). So the Lagoon and Trifid Nebulae as so fucking close you can reach out and touch them! Well, relatively speaking. And still the center of OUR galaxy is just a LOCAL “land”-mark. Even the Andromeda Galaxy (which is 2000000 light years away) is in our local cluster; close enough to be gravitationally bound to our galaxy. In fact the two are racing toward each other at 300 kilometers per second (a thousandth of a light year per year…so we’re safe for now).

So reading Ezed’s remark, I think there certainly more in the heavens then those old sexually repressed story tellers dreamt of. Looking up at the stars certainly gives me a sense of “where fuck am I? and what the fuck am I?? and what the fuck is all that out there??? and how fucking small can a thing like me be????” Still, we can do pretty well in figuring out some pieces of the puzzle. We know more about our neighborhood than anyone two thousand years ago would’ve have guessed we could know.

Now I know Ezed was joking when he suggested how different the Bible might look had some of its books been written by Quentin Tarentino. Actually I think a great deal of the Bible is Tarentinesque. I prefer the stories told by Newton, Einstein, Hubble, Darwin, Gould, Watson, Crick…etc.

[LG]

"We have lobbed verses of Scripture, like hand grenades, into the camps of others, convinced we only have truth."
George Carey, Archbishop of Canterbury

"The fact is that more people have been slaughtered in the name of religion than for any other single reason. That, THAT my friends, is true perversion."
Harvey Milk

"It was Christians, you know, not Pagans, who were responsible for the Holocaust. It was Christians, not Pagans, who lynched people here in the South, who burned people at the stake, frequently in the name of this Jesus Christ"
Archbishop Desmond Tutu

"Religious belief is a fine guide around which a person might organize his own life, but an awful instrument around which to organize someone else's life."
Professor Richard Mohr

"What is intolerable is that the world's religions -- founded on the values of love and compassion -- should provide a pretext for the expression of hatred and violence."
Federico Mayor, former Director General of UNESCO

[trish]

I read recenly, I think in Christopher Hitchens' new book, that "taking the Lord's name in vain" (i.e. blesphemy) did not originally refer the verbal act of swearing and cursing; rather it refered to the act of using His word and name to support an falsehood and promote an ungodly action. Anyone else ever come across this?

[LG]

I read recenly, I think in Christopher Hitchens' new book, that "taking the Lord's name in vain" (i.e. blesphemy) did not originally refer the verbal act of swearing and cursing; rather it refered to the act of using His word and name to support an falsehood and promote an ungodly action. Anyone else ever come across this?

Yes, very often. The reformer Martin Luther had this to say:

If, then, it be asked: How do you understand the [Third] Commandment, or what is meant by taking in vain, or misusing God's name? answer briefly thus: It is misusing God's name when we call upon the Lord God no matter in what way, for purposes of falsehood or wrong of any kind. Therefore this commandment enjoins this much, that God's name must not be appealed to falsely, or taken upon the lips while the heart knows well enough, or should know, differently; as among those who take oaths in court, where one side lies against the other. For God's name cannot be misused worse than for the support of falsehood and deceit...

...From this every one can readily infer when and in how many ways God's name is misused, although it is impossible to enumerate all its misuses. Yet, to tell it in a few words, all misuse of the divine name occurs, first, in worldly business and in matters which concern money, possessions, honor, whether it be publicly in court, in the market, or wherever else men make false oaths in God's name, or pledge their souls in any matter...

...But. the greatest abuse occurs in spiritual matters, which pertain to the conscience, when false preachers rise up and offer their Lying vanities as God's Word.

Of course Luther was far from perfect and may have been an anti-Semite, but his ideas on religion and his unwillingness to accept Catholic dogma paved the way for Protestantism.

[muhmuh]

Looking up at the stars certainly gives me a sense of “where fuck am I? and what the fuck am I?? and what the fuck is all that out there??? and how fucking small can a thing like me be????”

the strange bit is that our entropy defying existance has a much higher complexity than anything youll ever see through those binoculars


and may have been an anti-Semite

which would at the least mean he understood more about reflected sounds of underground spirits than any of the words politicians :wink: (ok this might be a bit to controversial even for my standards but its still true when viewed from the right angle)

[trish]

I like to think of the 2nd law (of thermodynamics) as a phenomenon associated with hierarchies of scale. To be very simplistic, we could imagine the cosmos is just a collection of particles distributed in space and that everything anyone could ever want to know about the past or the future is encoded in the positions of these particles and their momenta. This would be Laplace’s view of the universe. On this scale, information is never, ever lost. Of course one could never in practice determine all those positions and momenta. So we content ourselves with higher scaled descriptions of the universe. Instead of giving the position and momenta of each constituent particle of the planet Mars, we just give the position and momentum of Mars. The higher scale description ignores a lot of information (that we don’t have anyway). But if that isn’t bad enough, the second law predicts that the information we do have at that level of description degrades over time. If you fix a scale of description and then watch a portion of the universe at that scale over time (perhaps you’re watching two different colored liquids in a glass beaker), eventually you will be able to describe what you see using fewer and fewer words, or bits of information.

In fact, biological systems are no exception. The metabolic processes within a cell (which are temporally directed to be sure) rely upon the second law.

Some cosmologists tell us that the entropy of the early universe had to be extremely low. Every particle had to be within a very tiny region of space and every particle had to have a velocity close to that of light in the direction of the expansion. The claim is (at the risk of over-simplification): there’s a lot of information packed into this large scale description. These cosmologists contend that if you look up into the night sky, into the past, you observe a universe where/when entropy was lower than it is here and now. I’m not sure, personally, to what extent I buy into the conclusions of this last paragraph...but I do find them arresting.

muhmuh writes:

the strange bit is that our entropy defying existance has a much higher complexity than anything youll ever see through those binoculars

I would say our existence is not entropy defying and it's complexity is in fact expected (since we evolved via random mutations constrained by natural law...a randomly drawn hand of cards is usually more complex than one that is carefully selected to amaze). The trouble with binoculars and even with the Hubble and Chandra telescopes is the scale of observation. One never gets to see the beautiful and the incredible small scale processes (such as life) that going on out there. But one can still think about them while relaxing on that lawn chair under the stars.

[Quinn]

A United States Marine was attending some college courses between
Assignments. He had completed missions in Iraq and Afghanistan. One
of the courses had a professor who was a vowed atheist and a member
of the ACLU.
One day the professor shocked the class when he came in. He looked to
the ceiling and flatly stated, "God, if you are real, then I want you
to knock me off this platform. I'll give you exactly
15 minutes."
The lecture room fell silent. You could hear a pin drop. Ten minutes
went by and the professor proclaimed, "Here I am God. I'm still
waiting." It got down to the last couple of minutes when the Marine
got out of his Chair, went up to the professor, and cold-cocked him;
knocking him off the platform. The professor was out cold.
The Marine went back to his seat and sat there, silently. The other
students were shocked and stunned and sat there looking on in
silence.
The professor eventually came to, noticeably shaken, looked at the
Marine and asked, "What the hell is the matter with you? Why did you
do that?" The Marine calmly replied, "God was too busy today
protecting America's soldiers who are protecting your right to say
stupid shit and act like an asshole. So, He sent me."

Are you attempting to tell us, in a roundabout way, that you ate lead paint chips as a kid or something? If so, mission accomplished...

-Quinn

[qeuqheeg222]

where oh where did i read that christ only had a disdain for hypocrites and lenders...the same people we seem to have leadin the world today...

[TJT]

I'm an Atheist but I don't make a big deal out of it.