Then they're insulting me through her and are not insulting her. The insult against me does not apply to her. If instead they expand their insults to the both of us, then sure I would aim to defend my sister if she were present. Insults against me don't bother me in the slightest, and so long as they're just words then there's no reason to get worked up about it. "Let every man be... slow to anger." One of the good bits from the Bible, and not surprisingly it comes from James.


And an all-loving god would have loved every single person that was filled with wickedness. Not only that, but it would have at LEAST given laws to people so that they might know what actions that the god finds wicked. The Flood happens before any proscriptions are handed down. So God looks down and thinks "I don't much like that, I'd better kill them all and then tell Noah to actually give his descendants some laws."


Breaking down people's self-image in order to make them love someone (in this case, God)? Sounds an awful lot like an abusive relationship to me. And I feel justified in saying that given God's track record for murder.


So then the children mauled by the bears were rewarded with heaven (I still don't buy the apologetics that they were actually much older, unless you're saying that the perfect, inerrant Word of God is full of errors caused by translation... omnipotence combined with omnibenevolence would make sure that His Word remained preserved as-intended no matter the translation). That seems... nice of Him?


Wouldn't it have been great if God sent messengers to tell them that what they were doing is wrong so that they might stop? After all, He's all-loving, right? So shouldn't He give them a chance to change their ways? Coincidentally, that's the First Century apologetic response to why the Second Coming of Christ hadn't yet happened in their generation. 2 Peter 3:9 "The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance." Apparently God changed His mind somewhere along the way so that everyone might be saved instead of just His own little tribe of Israelites. The evolution of a tribal god into the God of the World is apparent.


Actually I'm thinking it's funny that as an atheist I'm never asked to justify the murder of anyone, especially children and babies. And babies literally lack the ability to sin until a certain age. The only sin they can be considered guilty of is non-belief (and a blank slate baby cannot be blamed for being born an atheist). You would think a person who believes in an all-loving God would never be forced to justify baby-killing, but that's one of life's little ironies.


Oh, I'm aware of the examples of God killing entire populations. God personally kills or orders the killing of at least two million people in the Old Testament, and that does not count the people who lived in towns that were ordered killed but no population was given.

You know why it's called apologetics? Because people have to apologize for the things contained in their holy book.

This post was edited by bentherdonethat on Aug 7 2011 06:45am

He does give them time, but they can only do wickedness in his sight for so long.

We're lucky he hasn't killed us off as a nation already.

Perhaps you need a refresher on why it is that Peter had to reassure the members of the Church the way he did. See Mark 13


Notice this is the parallel story to the Matthew 24 verses you frequently suggest that people read. I chose a parallel story so that you might actually read it instead of thinking "Oh, well I already know this one."

Did the Son of Man come back in clouds with great power and glory? Did the angels gather his elect (i.e. Christ's followers) from the ends of the earth to the ends of the heavens? The answer to both questions is clearly No. Now ask yourself if that generation to whom Jesus was directly speaking had passed away before those things had happened. Unless one of Jesus's disciples somehow has survived this long, then the answer is Yes, and Jesus made an incorrect prediction. Now, Biblically speaking if a prophet makes a prediction and it doesn't come true, then you know that prophecy did NOT come from Yahweh. Deut 18:22


Kind of makes your repeated doomsaying look silly, doesn't it? Jesus was wrong and so the End Times verses are to be ignored.

This post was edited by bentherdonethat on Aug 7 2011 09:24pm

@ bold: Just like in 2 Kings those youths were expanding their insults to Elisha and God. Just like you would defend your sister if she were present, so shall God would defend Elisha or allow Elisha to defend himself and the image of God. You do understand afterall.



Well Noah had favour with God and if Noah had favour with God he knew what to do. If he knew what to do there is no reason at all whatsoever why anybody else at that time shouldn't know what to do. They all merely chose NOT to do whatever they had to do.



I just don't see where you got the idea of an abusive relationship from upon reading that.



We can be fairly sure and almost certain where they would have ended up but that is beside the point. They were mocking not only Elisha but God himself.



Somebody else already replied to this.



You've murdered people have you? Sorry just you make it sound like you have when you say you are never asked to justify the murder of anybody. Anyway you agree that we are all born into a sinful world and that is all we know. It is impossible for any of us to try and imagine what a perfect world would be like. These babies that God may have been responsible for killing, like I said before he can do whatever he wants. Those babies would grow up to be sinful as well and those babies are also part of the population.

You know how suicide bombers are usually little kids who have been taught to hate their neighbours and to give up their life to take away the life of a couple of hundred? They have been brainwashed and all traces of such wicked people must be killed



You don't seemed as concerned about the entire population of a city being wiped out as you do about a mere 42 youths. I'm sure there are more than 42 youths in an entire city.

I don't see why because those people of now didn't write it. Besides there is nothing to be sorry about.

section one of zeitgheist ftw.

Its the end of the "age" they're talking about, not a geneological generation. Its this generation or "age" of mankind.

Its almost time now.

This post was edited by Torm1 on Aug 8 2011 09:13am

I'll address your post later tonight, CPK. This reply went on longer than I had intended it to.


You're wrong. The Ancient Greek word translated as "generation" is genea and can mean age, but I challenge you to find a SINGLE translation of the Bible that does so in this verse. There are 42 total occurrences of "genea" in the New Testament. 37 of them were translated as generation in the KJV. 2 were translated as "time", 2 as "age", and 1 as "nation". None of the alternate translations are used in apocalyptic prophecies.

The translations available on BibleGateway.com that do not translate it as generation include:
Good News Translation (Remember that all these things will happen before the people now living have all died.)
New Century Version (I tell you the truth, all these things will happen while the people of this time are still living.)
New International Reader's Version (What I'm about to tell you is true. The people living at that time will certainly not pass away until all those things have happened.)
Worldwide English (New Testament) (I tell you the truth. The people who are living then will not die before all these things happen.)

That's 23 translations that do not agree with your explanation and one that might, but those two that might exist solely to simplify the English language to make it easier to teach to non-native English speakers. Between the two versions there is only one instance of the word "generation", compared to there being 37 instances in the King James. Neither of these versions are aimed at native speakers.

HOWEVER, even if that one word truly should have been translated as "age" that does not solve your problem.

Matthew 10:23 But when they persecute you in this city, flee into the next, for most certainly I tell you, you will not have gone through the cities of Israel, until the Son of Man has come.
Jesus was telling his disciples that they would be persecuted in Jesus's name, and that they would run away to another city to avoid it. They would not have made it through every city of Israel before the Second Coming. It doesn't take 2000 years to travel across Israel fleeing persecution. 25 out of 25 translations agree.

Matthew 16:28 Most certainly I tell you, there are some standing here who will in no way taste of death, until they see the Son of Man coming in his Kingdom."
25 out of 25 translations agree. Some of the people that Jesus was talking to right then and there would witness the Second Coming.

Matthew 26:63-64
63 But Jesus held his peace. The high priest answered him, "I adjure you by the living God, that you tell us whether you are the Christ, the Son of God."
64 Jesus said to him, "You have said it. Nevertheless, I tell you, after this you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of Power, and coming on the clouds of the sky."
Jesus was speaking directly to the High Priest, saying that the High Priest himself would see the Son of Man's return in glory.

Perhaps you should look into the Preterist perspective, which argues that the events of Revelation have already taken place. Because the Futurist perspective has some serious problems.

I'd say he was talking about a time or age. Since for example, there have been ages where massive events have occured, wiping out entire civilizations.

Obviously the stars or "meteors" didn't fall from the skies, etc... so Jesus must have been talking about a point in the future.

This is also re-affirmed in the book of Enoch, where he speaks of a time when crops would not come in their time and in fact the entire course of the moon & planets would be altered.

And you are simply wrong. That's all there is to it. There are other verses that I cited stating very clearly that Jesus was telling people it would happen in their lifetime.

Either you are wrong about those events needing to happen in the future, or Jesus was wrong about those events happening during his lifetime. And if Jesus was wrong, then Deut 18:22 kicks in and those prophecies are to be completely ignored.

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I wouldn't murder people for insulting my sister. There's no justification for that.


God hadn't told anyone what to do. Noah didn't know what to do either. He just happened to be doing something "right". God murdered nearly the entire human race (really, he murdered nearly all life on Earth even though animals can't sin and plants REALLY can't sin) without even letting them know that they had done anything wrong in the first place.


In an abusive relationship, the abuser breaks down the victim's self-worth. Christianity aims to do exactly the same thing by saying that everyone has sinned so everyone is completely vile in the eyes of God and that everyone deserves to be tortured for eternity.


Torm1 did not reply to that. He quoted it, but did not address it in the slightest because anything other than arguing for the End of Days through a narrow reading of the Bible is completely beyond his abilities. I'll repost it here so you don't have to scroll back up and quote more than one post in your reply.

"Wouldn't it have been great if God sent messengers to tell [the people killed in the flood] that what they were doing is wrong so that they might stop? After all, He's all-loving, right? So shouldn't He give them a chance to change their ways? Coincidentally, that's the First Century apologetic response to why the Second Coming of Christ hadn't yet happened in their generation. 2 Peter 3:9 "The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance." Apparently God changed His mind somewhere along the way so that everyone might be saved instead of just His own little tribe of Israelites. The evolution of a tribal god into the God of the World is apparent."


Because of your beliefs, you just found yourself having to justify the murder of children. Since I do not subscribe to a religion, I don't have to justify the "rightness" of those, or any, murders.


I do not agree that we are born into a sinful world. I'm clearly only arguing within the constructs of Christianity. And again, you just justified baby murder because God can do whatever he wants. Well that's bullshit. An all-loving God would not murder. That flatly contradicts the idea of being all-loving.


An all-loving god would have created ways for those "wicked people" to be redeemed instead of just Etch-A-Sketching the entire planet. A fat lot of good Jesus did for the countless number of people that came before him.


"The death of one man is a tragedy, the death of millions is a statistic." -Joseph Stalin

Of course all of those murders are equally antithetical to the idea of an all-loving God. The bear story is just one where rather than sending an army of Israelites to do the job, God sent bears. Fucking bears. It's one of those ridiculous "Did I just read that right?" moments in the Old Testament, sort of like the story of Balaam and his magical talking donkey.

This post was edited by bentherdonethat on Aug 8 2011 08:51pm

This kind of stood out. If I recall correctly, God gave Noah the blueprints for the ark, the exact sizes, the types of materials, etc...

This was planned.

And as for "wicked people" being redeemed. Everyone has the chance, its just that they despise it.

This post was edited by Torm1 on Aug 8 2011 09:34pm