The Atheist thread

[tblaxland]

What happened Rich, your wife look over your shoulder?

 

[RichWall]

What happened Rich, your wife look over your shoulder?

I'm afraid so. Nice couch. Nice couch.

 

[bujin]

It has always struck me as odd that people who believe no one will have the capacity to remember that they existed will bother doing these things, such as advertising on buses and starting their own threads. I'm not trying to step on any toes, I'm just sayin'. It doesn't make a lot of sense in the grand scheme of things.

Makes perfect sense. There are millions of Christian adverts all around the world. Why shouldn't atheists (and humanists) put their own adverts up?

As for their own threads - I agree that an "atheist thread" is pretty pointless, but I do enjoy threads discussing religion.

 

[jedidia]

OK, You have my attention. And, I am open...

The Hebrews were already saved? Or did they provide the platform for the saving act? Philosophy? Or Person?

The definition of "sin" I know of is comes from an archery term meaning "off the bullseye" or "close, but no cigar" or "in error" or "not perfect".

I guess you misformulated. It's not the "definition" of sin what you explain, it's the root of the word from which it is derived. The hebrew khaw-taw means indeed "to miss" literally, and is also used figuratevly for failing, offending etc.
The substantiv Khaw-taw-aw means an offence.

Anyways, the definition of sin comes out of the context, not of the linguistical root.
common christian doctrine is that jesus came to save mankind from original sin, but original sin is not a very jewish concept. And Jesus was, after all, a jewish theologian. He was NOT much of a philosopher, as becomes clear when you look at the jewish traditions such as e.g. the Mishna. Jesus did not introduce teachings into the jewish religion that wouldn't have been discussed before.

Agreed, Jesus was a very good scholar with the ability to get to the core of the Torah, but he did NOT really teach much new concepts. What he did do was teaching them on his own authority, while rabines traditionaly had to refer to predeceeding rabines and their teachings. Jesus could do so because he was the Messiah.

This just to clear up the common misconception that Jesus introduced a whole new teaching into Jewism. Allmost all of his techings can be found at one place or the other in the Mishna. What the people couldn't cope with was not his techings, but his messianic claim. And the role of the messiah, as described in the old testament, is to redeem mankind with god as a final and powerfull sacrifice.

To understand this better, I will go a bit into the definition of Sin now, from a Jewish pov: The Jewish spirituality was radicaly separated into pure and inpure, holy and profane. These were thought not only as behaviour rules, but as actual domaines of power. When being in the domain of the impure, the domain has power over oneself. Getting back into the domain of the holy was thought to be impossible. The power of the impure domain had to be broken, lest it would lead into more impureness. The thing most impure is death. So impure that priests usually were not allowed to touch a dead body, lest it be the closest relatives, or he would loose his job.
So, getting more and more into impurity means getting closer and closer to death.
Thus came the very detailed sacrificial rules. They are not "pay-offs" int he sence that they were trying to make good for something. The Sin (impureness) was transfered onto the sacrifice, which was then killed, thus the fulfilling the logical tendancy of impureness towards death. The one commiting the sacrifice was then free from the power of the impure domain draging him towards death and could reenter the domain of the holy. Of course, another sin would drag him out again into the realm of the impure. The whole thing was thought like a hill, with death being at the bottom and (eternal) life at the top. So it would allways be easier to get down then up.

This did not mean that they thought that the realm of the profane was stronger than the realm of the holy. In the contrary, the day would come when the realm of the holy would devour the realm of the profane. This was foretold to be the job of the messiah. And that's what Jesus did. First by loading all the impureness of the world upon himself and fulfilling the tendency it has towards death. That was the substitutional sacrifice for the sins of mankind. Second, by coming back to live, that was the ultimate victory of the holy (god) over the impure (death). As a neat side-effect, this opened the door for the not-jews to come to God. Christianity was the result. To say Jesus was a christian, however, would be a very daring assumption.

Of course all of this is pure theology, and most of it is not even christian, but jewish theology, and there are other aproaches to the topic. However, this is stable theology, that redeemes the new as well as the old testament and considers the cultural context in which the events took place. The teaching you mentioned earlier does none of this, and with a bit of study into jewish theology it becomes very clear that compassion was not a new concept at all. Jesus mission was not a moral one. His mission was to bring God to the humans, the holy into the profane. This concept is called "the kingdom of God" or "the kingdom of heavens", and it wasn't a new concept either. Actually Jews bothered a lot more about kingdom-theology than christians did.

erm... how comes I'm discussing pure theology in the atheist thread anyways? :threadjacked:

 

[RichWall]

erm... how comes I'm discussing pure theology in the atheist thread anyways? :threadjacked:

I appreciate your time and thought on this. I will take some time to think on it.

I certainly do not want any atheist to be dissuaded from comment.

I know for myself, to get a grasp on certain concepts, is to try to see both sides of the issue and to see if there is a center (common ground), or not.

 

[Juanelm]

As for their own threads - I agree that an "atheist thread" is pretty pointless.

THEN JUST LEAVE, DONT POST HERE, OUT!!!!




Just kidding.

 

[Urwumpe]

I don't believe in Atheists.

 

[bujin]

THEN JUST LEAVE, DONT POST HERE, OUT!!!!




Just kidding.

What I meant by that was that a thread for atheists wouldn't really achieve a great deal. There isn't much discussion to be had when everyone agrees with each other!

Not that all atheists agree on everything, of course... :lol:

 

[Andy44]

I don't believe in Atheists.

I dreamt last night that I was abducted by ahteists and they did experiments on me.

 

[eveningsky339]

I guess you misformulated. It's not the "definition" of sin what you explain, it's the root of the word from which it is derived. The hebrew khaw-taw means indeed "to miss" literally, and is also used figuratevly for failing, offending etc.
The substantiv Khaw-taw-aw means an offence.

Anyways, the definition of sin comes out of the context, not of the linguistical root.
common christian doctrine is that jesus came to save mankind from original sin, but original sin is not a very jewish concept. And Jesus was, after all, a jewish theologian. He was NOT much of a philosopher, as becomes clear when you look at the jewish traditions such as e.g. the Mishna. Jesus did not introduce teachings into the jewish religion that wouldn't have been discussed before.

Agreed, Jesus was a very good scholar with the ability to get to the core of the Torah, but he did NOT really teach much new concepts. What he did do was teaching them on his own authority, while rabines traditionaly had to refer to predeceeding rabines and their teachings. Jesus could do so because he was the Messiah.

This just to clear up the common misconception that Jesus introduced a whole new teaching into Jewism. Allmost all of his techings can be found at one place or the other in the Mishna. What the people couldn't cope with was not his techings, but his messianic claim. And the role of the messiah, as described in the old testament, is to redeem mankind with god as a final and powerfull sacrifice.

To understand this better, I will go a bit into the definition of Sin now, from a Jewish pov: The Jewish spirituality was radicaly separated into pure and inpure, holy and profane. These were thought not only as behaviour rules, but as actual domaines of power. When being in the domain of the impure, the domain has power over oneself. Getting back into the domain of the holy was thought to be impossible. The power of the impure domain had to be broken, lest it would lead into more impureness. The thing most impure is death. So impure that priests usually were not allowed to touch a dead body, lest it be the closest relatives, or he would loose his job.
So, getting more and more into impurity means getting closer and closer to death.
Thus came the very detailed sacrificial rules. They are not "pay-offs" int he sence that they were trying to make good for something. The Sin (impureness) was transfered onto the sacrifice, which was then killed, thus the fulfilling the logical tendancy of impureness towards death. The one commiting the sacrifice was then free from the power of the impure domain draging him towards death and could reenter the domain of the holy. Of course, another sin would drag him out again into the realm of the impure. The whole thing was thought like a hill, with death being at the bottom and (eternal) life at the top. So it would allways be easier to get down then up.

This did not mean that they thought that the realm of the profane was stronger than the realm of the holy. In the contrary, the day would come when the realm of the holy would devour the realm of the profane. This was foretold to be the job of the messiah. And that's what Jesus did. First by loading all the impureness of the world upon himself and fulfilling the tendency it has towards death. That was the substitutional sacrifice for the sins of mankind. Second, by coming back to live, that was the ultimate victory of the holy (god) over the impure (death). As a neat side-effect, this opened the door for the not-jews to come to God. Christianity was the result. To say Jesus was a christian, however, would be a very daring assumption.

Of course all of this is pure theology, and most of it is not even christian, but jewish theology, and there are other aproaches to the topic. However, this is stable theology, that redeemes the new as well as the old testament and considers the cultural context in which the events took place. The teaching you mentioned earlier does none of this, and with a bit of study into jewish theology it becomes very clear that compassion was not a new concept at all. Jesus mission was not a moral one. His mission was to bring God to the humans, the holy into the profane. This concept is called "the kingdom of God" or "the kingdom of heavens", and it wasn't a new concept either. Actually Jews bothered a lot more about kingdom-theology than christians did.

erm... how comes I'm discussing pure theology in the atheist thread anyways? :threadjacked:

I agree on many of your points. The true "break" from Judaism came when Paul and the apostles introduced a new covenant and a new theological system in the New Testament, Jesus having fulfilled the old covenant through his sacrifice.


-----Post Added-----

:mellow: Didn't get what you mean.

Well according to one who believes there is no afterlife, everyone will have level of conscious. We will not be able to remember that we existed. No consequence of our actions. The royal king is the same as the homeless schizophrenic.

 

[Urwumpe]

I dreamt last night that I was abducted by atheists and they did experiments on me.

Creepy. I have heard, the US government hides the bodies of dead atheists in Area 51.

 

[landon2006]

There's a pretty silly video where a guy tries to prove that God doesn't exist because Universal set paradox. Of course proving that the Universal set doesn't exist is pointless, because its quite obvious that it does exist (and the real Universe exists as well).

I've heard a moral argument for religion. That is that it imparts certain morals on society and gives another reason to do the right thing when nobody is looking.


Been years since I've seen a ghost. Shade or shadow person is a pretty good description of what I've seen.

I'm puzzling over your term, is it more that you don't care that you don't know?

If your referring to me, its that I don't know. It would be nice to believe there is a god, and that I would go to heaven when I die. I just cannot believe in two conflicting stories at the same time... One of them has to be right, it just h appends that science can explain to me how Earth and the planets where formed. They can show me visual images and proof of how the big bang happened, and they have proof that the earth is billions of years old.

All Religion can offer is a person who was suppose to exist, written about in a book a few thousand years ago, no physical proof the person ever existed, and no scientific proof of how one man created an entire universe.

To me, its a matter of which one do I believe more... At this time, It's the Science explanation, because they can show and tell me exactly how it happend, religion can't.

However, at the same time, I don't "disbelieve" in a god either. I would like for there to be one and all, I just can't bring myself to understand how its possible.

PS) I do go to Church every once in a while. I hold my beliefs as "Agnostic" because I can't really give a 100% sure answer on which really happened. While I don't pray every night and go to church every Sunday, I try to live my life as good as I can, and stay out of trouble.

If there really is a god, then that should be good enough for him to allow me into heaven, I hope... If not, me n' the Devil will be roasting marshmellows someday...

 

[eveningsky339]

Creepy. I have heard, the US government hides the bodies of dead atheists in Area 51.

No, the government had to dispose of them after the Atheist Roswell Incident in order to make room for the studios in which the Atheist Moon Landings were faked.

Along those same lines, I heard a rumor that the Moon is an atheist.


-----Post Added-----

If your referring to me, its that I don't know. It would be nice to believe there is a god, and that I would go to heaven when I die. I just cannot believe in two conflicting stories at the same time... One of them has to be right, it just h appends that science can explain to me how Earth and the planets where formed. They can show me visual images and proof of how the big bang happened, and they have proof that the earth is billions of years old.

Surely you wouldn't stake a belief/disbelief in God on a book written in the Bronze Age containing Hebrew mythology (the Old Testament is more poetic than "scientific"). I am very much a believer in the God of the Bible and evolution, abiogenesis, etc.

The Bible is not infallible, nor does it claim to be. One cannot read the four stories of Jesus' resurrection and then try to tell a single account of all the events without contradicting themselves. The resurrection stories are quite contradictory due to the fact that different authors penned them, but they were quite accurate by the standards of the day.

 

[Juanelm]

Well according to one who believes there is no afterlife, everyone will have level of conscious. We will not be able to remember that we existed. No consequence of our actions. The royal king is the same as the homeless schizophrenic.

Well not exaclty. For these reasons:

*Living is valuable in itself: I dont live to obtain something after I die; I live because living is good in itself, therefore living has sense
*I have empathy for other people; I value their life, health, happiness, prosperity, etc. Therefore i want to do good things for other people.
*Since I have empathy for other people, I desire their good, even after I'm dead.
*I value their well being as I value my own, therefore doing something for other people is worthwile; knowing I'm going to die does not change anything

I think you are viewing the issue as thinking that after I die I'm going to be there on the tomb all lonely thinking that noone remembers me anymore and all was a waste. What is really going to happen is that when I die simply I dissapear, there is no I, I wont lament anything because I wont exist, no suffering no thinking no nothing. However, when I'm alive, life is valuable, happynes is valuable, other people's lives an happynes are valuable for me.

 

[Eagle]

Correction has been made delete this post.

 

[Moonwalker]

Well according to one who believes there is no afterlife, everyone will have level of conscious. We will not be able to remember that we existed. No consequence of our actions. The royal king is the same as the homeless schizophrenic.

That there is no afterlife is not even a disbelieve because it is still obvious. The claim that there is an afterlife or a level of conscious is a believe, which is not based on any evidence. It is just a wishful thinking of people who are afraid of finiteness.

 

[Juanelm]

I think the word you're looking for is empathy. Apathy is not caring.

Thankyou for that correction Eagle.