Why worship a "god" that threatens you?

[OpiatefortheMasses]

I'm reasonably sure that to extort something from someone else would constitute a sin of some kind according to most Christians but why is it OK when the very religion itself employs it? Most of the Christians I've talked to over the years would describe their "god" as fair, just, loving etc. but extortion (among other things) really strikes me as cruel and manipulative. Is this a "god" that's truly worthy of a person's worship or adoration?

[Thatguy]

Tiger Story

(Ok, that's not a direct quote but a paraphrase. I just wanted to make clear what i was responding to and who said it.)

I think the story might raise more questions than it clarifies. But taken at face value, I'd say the man in the tree is behaving boorishly.
If I know there's a tiger waiting to kill people who take the left path, I might very well find a tree stand and wait to warn pedestrians coming to the fork in the road. What would be a reasonable price to ask for doing so? I would probably ask them if they'd voluntarily give me some food. I'm sitting up there for their protection. If I get down to find food of my own, I might not be able to warn each traveler. So i stay up there and personally warn one and all. It would be reasonable to ask people I'm helping to support me in this project.

But my help would be unconditional. I'd warn everyone without expectation of reward and certainly without expectation of worship. In fact, I'd probably put a big tree across the left path with an unmistakable sign warning in words and pictures. I would not worry about their right to self determination as to which road to walk down as I would worry about protecting them from being eaten alive by a huge tiger.

If someone thanked me for the warning and gave me a sandwich, I'd be gratified. But if I could protect people from the tiger I'd do it whether they were nice or whether they were jerks. If they told me not to protect them from any tigers I'd still protect them. Let them be angry that I didn't honor their mistaken or peevish instructions, at least they are alive to feel aggrieved.

As a traveler, anyone who demanded that he wouldn't protect me from a threat he perceived and I didn't unless I surrendered my will to him and became his disciple would be behaving so far at odds from how a person worthy of following would behave that I'd have enough evidence right there that he was a sub-par human, not an all good deity. I'd probably opt to take the path to the right but would not become his disciple or ask others to do so.

If someone told me, though, that before I was born someone told me to avoid the left path because it was tiger infested, we all got this message but we more or less forgot it, I'd look within myself for a moment to see if I felt some innate knowledge to avoid tigers on the left but I'd not be any less likely to take the path to the left because of such an unlikely warning.

[MyReality]

I am generalizing but anyone who thinks this story correctly explains the validation of a deity's love is already deeply indoctrinated into said religion.

Replace the man with a confusing book with a sociopath as the narrator, replace the tiger on the left path with a pit of eternal torment, replace the right path with invisible stairs. That would be a more accurate story.

[dusk]

Of course I think this happened in Christian creation terms in the spirit world before we came to earth.

God, while hiding His divine nature, offered us an invitation to join His church and we learned in full and perfect detail the consequences of accepting (election and the gospel promise) and rebelling (becoming His eternal enemis who will be damned).

But no proof was offered, so we were free to talk it over, decide if we trusted this God who looked the same as everyone else or if He was a liar, a false god with no power and whose love was no better than what we already had.

Since the scriptures are clear that we are born on earth as sinners and cannot choose good, it is obvious this happened before we are born and we became sinners then. Therefore any argment against it using earthly experience as a proof it didn't happen that way, is suspect.

Peace to all, Ted

And this is how Christianity is supposed to work like? Never heard of any Christian something as weird. Sound like a new kind of religion.
Assuming I was in this spirit world and completely aware of the consequences and made my decision. What do I do from here? It is already done I am condemned and will never receive gods grace and thus are unable to reach him. He already condemned me and thus he doesn't reach out to me either. It is quite opposed to the stuff christians teach.
And as soon as you take it out of the spirit world and put it into the life we live in, you face all the problems again.
Maybe I cannot dispute the spirit world theory but it is entirely pointless if true and very unappealing religion besides. I doubt that you can convert a whole lot of believers to that religion.

The whole problem ist hell. Christians say gods love/grace... is a gift. Yet he expects something in return which makes it a bargain not a gift. A gift is given and later I may hope for something in return but I do not expect it. Thus as a potential believer I'd first have to feel this "love" in order to receive it as a gift. If god just gives stores his love in some coffin and I don't notice a thing I never actually got it. If he wants something first by wanting me to believe in him and be his disciple, it is a bargain and a bad one considering I don't know beforehand if I get anything.
And once you add hell and eternal life into the mix it becomes extortion.

If you removed hell and said all the unbelievers just go to nirvana, you'd fix one problem at least. Eternal life would be a take it or leave if gift. "love and stuff" would stay a bargain but at least not such a bad one.
Without hell Christianity would be different. Many Jews I have heard actually do away with the whole hell concept and replace it with something more similar to nirvana.
Me personally I don't see any point in eternal life. It is just the problem people that are too full of themselves have with death. They just cannot imagine that once they are dead and gone things will just go on and therefore there has to be something after death. What would I do in my eternal life in heaven? It seems even more meaningless than life on earth. I am not going to become a Jew either but the Christian theology is entirely too weird.

[Moses Yoder]

Just as a side note, do atheists realize how much bullying and threatening they do? For example, in this thread. We who believe are told our God is an extortioner. (This appears to be bullying to me). That can only be true if God does not deserve our worship. If He ahsn't earned it. For instance, if God created us, then He would deserve our recognition and worship. If God is powerful enough to breathe stars out of His mouth, He deserves our worship. If He deserves our worship and we don't worship Him, He would have the Right to punish us for that wrong. How would this then be extortion?

Bully #2. We are told God is demanding us to love Him in the same way a person would hold a gun to our head and demand we love him. This is only true if God is a person. If He is our creator, it would be a whole different story.

Bully #3. We are told there is no God by atheists constantly. My whole life revolves around God. If it weren't for my belief in Him, I would be dead. Just by listing the Atheist group under their avatar, they are threatening my way of life. I understand I am doing the same by being a Christian. But why not lay off calling each other bullys?

[OpiatefortheMasses]

Of course I think this happened in Christian creation terms in the spirit world before we came to earth.

God, while hiding His divine nature, offered us an invitation to join His church and we learned in full and perfect detail the consequences of accepting (election and the gospel promise) and rebelling (becoming His eternal enemis who will be damned).

But no proof was offered, so we were free to talk it over, decide if we trusted this God who looked the same as everyone else or if He was a liar, a false god with no power and whose love was no better than what we already had.

Since the scriptures are clear that we are born on earth as sinners and cannot choose good, it is obvious this happened before we are born and we became sinners then. Therefore any argment against it using earthly experience as a proof it didn't happen that way, is suspect.

Peace to all, Ted

And this is how Christianity is supposed to work like? Never heard of any Christian something as weird. Sound like a new kind of religion.
Assuming I was in this spirit world and completely aware of the consequences and made my decision. What do I do from here? It is already done I am condemned and will never receive gods grace and thus are unable to reach him. He already condemned me and thus he doesn't reach out to me either. It is quite opposed to the stuff christians teach.
And as soon as you take it out of the spirit world and put it into the life we live in, you face all the problems again.
Maybe I cannot dispute the spirit world theory but it is entirely pointless if true and very unappealing religion besides. I doubt that you can convert a whole lot of believers to that religion.

The whole problem ist hell. Christians say gods love/grace... is a gift. Yet he expects something in return which makes it a bargain not a gift. A gift is given and later I may hope for something in return but I do not expect it. Thus as a potential believer I'd first have to feel this "love" in order to receive it as a gift. If god just gives stores his love in some coffin and I don't notice a thing I never actually got it. If he wants something first by wanting me to believe in him and be his disciple, it is a bargain and a bad one considering I don't know beforehand if I get anything.
And once you add hell and eternal life into the mix it becomes extortion.

If you removed hell and said all the unbelievers just go to nirvana, you'd fix one problem at least. Eternal life would be a take it or leave if gift. "love and stuff" would stay a bargain but at least not such a bad one.
Without hell Christianity would be different. Many Jews I have heard actually do away with the whole hell concept and replace it with something more similar to nirvana.
Me personally I don't see any point in eternal life. It is just the problem people that are too full of themselves have with death. They just cannot imagine that once they are dead and gone things will just go on and therefore there has to be something after death. What would I do in my eternal life in heaven? It seems even more meaningless than life on earth. I am not going to become a Jew either but the Christian theology is entirely too weird.

Good points. That was another thing I was going to bring up. The "gift" in lieu of the threat of hell isn't a particularly appealing one in my opinion. It seems as though "god's love" is highly conditional upon the obedience of his followers and not whether they are genuinely good people. Also, if "god" truly loved people he wouldn't be sending them to a place to be tortured forever. On the flipside I think that followers would only love "god" out of fear so very conditional love going both ways.

Now the other part of the "gift", being eternal life, seems more like a punishment as well. What's life without death? The reason life is so precious is the fact that it's finite. If you take away death it becomes practically meaningless. Also, the description of heaven in the bible sounds pretty awful with the whole eternally praising "god" non stop bit. So it's either you're subjugated forever or you're tortured forever. Both of these options come across as threats so "nirvana" would be infinitely more appealing at this point.

[OpiatefortheMasses]

Just as a side note, do atheists realize how much bullying and threatening they do? For example, in this thread. We who believe are told our God is an extortioner. (This appears to be bullying to me). That can only be true if God does not deserve our worship. If He ahsn't earned it. For instance, if God created us, then He would deserve our recognition and worship. If God is powerful enough to breathe stars out of His mouth, He deserves our worship. If He deserves our worship and we don't worship Him, He would have the Right to punish us for that wrong. How would this then be extortion?

Bully #2. We are told God is demanding us to love Him in the same way a person would hold a gun to our head and demand we love him. This is only true if God is a person. If He is our creator, it would be a whole different story.

Bully #3. We are told there is no God by atheists constantly. My whole life revolves around God. If it weren't for my belief in Him, I would be dead. Just by listing the Atheist group under their avatar, they are threatening my way of life. I understand I am doing the same by being a Christian. But why not lay off calling each other bullys?

1) This is simply a critical analysis of the salvation scenario as depicted in the bible and it clearly is comparable to extortion. Whether or not a person believes someone deserves praise or worship does not that someone from using extortion to gain followers. Example: a team of doctors find a cure for AIDS (which would be something worthy of praise, right?) and tells people to worship praise them or they'll destroy all the research pertaining to the cure. The whole world would have every right to call them out as extortionists because that's exactly what they are.

2) Why should it only be true if "god" is a person? As a mere mortal he'd have at least some excuse in the sense that he's only human and by that prone to mistakes. As "god" well, there are no excuses. He's an omnipotent being with unlimited knowledge and power so he has the ability to change this at any time but doesn't. That tells me either "god" has no problem with extortion or he's just ambivalent. I've always believed that with great power comes great responsibility as well as a higher degree of accountability for one's actions.

3) I'm speaking for myself here, but when I say "I don't believe in god" I'm simply stating my lack of belief in "gods" and not bullying anyone. If that offends people then that's their problem. After all, atheism wouldn't exist without theism. We're all entitled to believe what we want just as we're all entitled to be critical other beliefs. Honestly, I don't see any form of theism "threatening my way of life" so I don't see why you should see atheism as threatening yours. Again, this isn't bullying, but rather just a debate. I'm sorry if the subject matter bothers you but it was something I wanted to bring up.

[dusk]

Just as a side note, do atheists realize how much bullying and threatening they do?

This is your perception but not what is happening. Where did I threaten anybody? If I point out inconsistencies in a belief framework I threaten only those who are afraid to be wrong, in which case they should find a hole and hide in it. Everybody else can come up with counter arguments which I do not regard as bullying or a threat towards me either.

For example, in this thread. We who believe are told our God is an extortioner. (This appears to be bullying to me).

I would say I suggested that given the mentioned believes I would classify that specific god an extortioner. I think it is not fair to simply state that I come here and say "Your god is an extortioner." If I hit your definition of god spot on argue against it or admit your belief irrational. But what do you think complaining about it means?
Do you suggest anybody is entitled to any however ridiculous believe and nobody should be allowed to say anything against it. If I believe all Christians are evil and they should be burned because in a dream I dreamt something about a cross and I reasoned out that everything affiliated with this cross will bring about the apocalypse. Now I demand of you to keep your mouth shut and don't you dare say anything is wrong with my interpretation of my dream.

That can only be true if God does not deserve our worship. If He ahsn't earned it.

I don't see who good having earned it really changes anything in my argumentation. Can you elaborate on that?

For instance, if God created us, then He would deserve our recognition and worship.

Not necessarily. Maybe I never asked to be created. Maybe I would rather have a better life. Maybe my life sucks do I still need to thank him for it. If a god breeder "creates" a pug dog, many animal lovers would argue it that this kind of breeding is cruelty to animals. If a gentic scientist in a lab creates some abomination of a creature that cannot walk, not breath and is every minute in pain. Is he supposed to be admired and worship by its creation.
I am not saying that we humans are such an awful creation, just that the act of creation itself is not enough IMO.
And next there is the problem of how I am supposed to know God that it. Maybe there are other gods and this one just takes credit.

If God is powerful enough to breathe stars out of His mouth, He deserves our worship. If He deserves our worship and we don't worship Him, He would have the Right to punish us for that wrong. How would this then be extortion?

That is really one I have the biggest problem with. It might just be me and many religious people just take this for granted but my subjective morality being powerful does in no way make one deserve worship. This is the double standard that religious people use towards their god in modern days. It worked better in the old days of monarchies where deference to superiors was "more" natural. Just because there is a powerful monarch doesn't make him deserve my worship. Is definitely doesn't give him the right to punish us. This argument makes your god look even more like some despot.
IMO a king does not have the moral right to punish and behead everybody just because they do not worship him well enough. Kings, Queens and despots demanded it and took that right but they did not deserve it, at least not judging by my subjective moral standards and I think they are aligned with the great majority of people on this planet in this case.

Bully #2. We are told God is demanding us to love Him in the same way a person would hold a gun to our head and demand we love him. This is only true if God is a person. If He is our creator, it would be a whole different story.

How?
Or do you suggest again that like before when he behaves like a despot he also has the right to do so because he makes the rules, that now because he is a different "thing" we are not even allowed to judge him by the moral standards we hold to ourselves. If he cannot hold up to them why are we supposed to? If he does not why should we assume him to be benevolent still? Does benevolence not loose all meaning if he is judged by a different moral standard.
Your reasoning may be sound in these arguments (if one understands god in a certain way) but I am not sure you are aware of what it all implies.

Bully #3. We are told there is no God by atheists constantly. My whole life revolves around God. If it weren't for my belief in Him, I would be dead. Just by listing the Atheist group under their avatar, they are threatening my way of life. But why not lay off calling each other bullys?

Sorry but I cannot help it. I don't see it as bullying. I see it as pointing out implications that you may or may not have been aware of. I don't see it as an evil act. In my world view I am helping you to come to a better understanding and in reverse hope to come to a better understanding of some concepts myself but I need some rebuttals for that. Please don't regard it as bullying that helps you not and me neither. It is simple debate. I do not attack you personally I just argue about a belief framework you might share. If you are so closely entangled with it that you are afraid a needle might break it, that really is not my fault and I would again point to the implications of such a dependency on a belief.
I also doubt that it actually is a bubble that simple breaks. In the majority of cases believers only end up refining it and changing it slightly. In order to go from a 10 year old child in a catholic school to a priest that studied theology for 4 years. Trust me there is loads of refining and very different concept of god.
My father studied theology and he has lots of very religious brothers and some sisters. The things some of them believe and he believes are IMHO so little alike that they should be considered different denominations. (All Catholics btw)

Just by listing the Atheist group under their avatar, they are threatening my way of life.

Okay that does frighten me a little. If it was standing by itself I would think that sarcasm.

I understand I am doing the same by being a Christian.

Do you honestly believe that?
No Christian can threaten my way of life just by being Christian. Unlike some muslims in a village somewhere in Pakistan I did grow up among Christians.
They only threaten my way of life if they impose laws on the entire society which I am part of because of their believes that I do not agree with at all. Like the ban of various stuff and practices. For example if because they condemn suicide they forbid a potentially hazardous sport like white water canoeing. Missing that and similar sport would seriously threaten my way of life. I couldn't care less if the pope like canoeing himself though.

[pax]

Of course I think this happened in Christian creation terms in the spirit world before we came to earth.

God, while hiding His divine nature, offered us an invitation to join His church and we learned in full and perfect detail the consequences of accepting (election and the gospel promise) and rebelling (becoming His eternal enemis who will be damned).

But no proof was offered, so we were free to talk it over, decide if we trusted this God who looked the same as everyone else or if He was a liar, a false god with no power and whose love was no better than what we already had.

Since the scriptures are clear that we are born on earth as sinners and cannot choose good, it is obvious this happened before we are born and we became sinners then. Therefore any argment against it using earthly experience as a proof it didn't happen that way, is suspect.

Peace to all, Ted

And this is how Christianity is supposed to work like? Never heard of any Christian something as weird. Sound like a new kind of religion.
Assuming I was in this spirit world and completely aware of the consequences and made my decision. What do I do from here? It is already done I am condemned and will never receive gods grace and thus are unable to reach him. He already condemned me and thus he doesn't reach out to me either. It is quite opposed to the stuff christians teach.
And as soon as you take it out of the spirit world and put it into the life we live in, you face all the problems again.
Maybe I cannot dispute the spirit world theory but it is entirely pointless if true and very unappealing religion besides. I doubt that you can convert a whole lot of believers to that religion.

The whole problem ist hell. Christians say gods love/grace... is a gift. Yet he expects something in return which makes it a bargain not a gift. A gift is given and later I may hope for something in return but I do not expect it. Thus as a potential believer I'd first have to feel this "love" in order to receive it as a gift. If god just gives stores his love in some coffin and I don't notice a thing I never actually got it. If he wants something first by wanting me to believe in him and be his disciple, it is a bargain and a bad one considering I don't know beforehand if I get anything.
And once you add hell and eternal life into the mix it becomes extortion.

If you removed hell and said all the unbelievers just go to nirvana, you'd fix one problem at least. Eternal life would be a take it or leave if gift. "love and stuff" would stay a bargain but at least not such a bad one.
Without hell Christianity would be different. Many Jews I have heard actually do away with the whole hell concept and replace it with something more similar to nirvana.
Me personally I don't see any point in eternal life. It is just the problem people that are too full of themselves have with death. They just cannot imagine that once they are dead and gone things will just go on and therefore there has to be something after death. What would I do in my eternal life in heaven? It seems even more meaningless than life on earth. I am not going to become a Jew either but the Christian theology is entirely too weird.

Good points. That was another thing I was going to bring up. The "gift" in lieu of the threat of hell isn't a particularly appealing one in my opinion. It seems as though "god's love" is highly conditional upon the obedience of his followers and not whether they are genuinely good people. Also, if "god" truly loved people he wouldn't be sending them to a place to be tortured forever. On the flipside I think that followers would only love "god" out of fear so very conditional love going both ways.

Now the other part of the "gift", being eternal life, seems more like a punishment as well. What's life without death? The reason life is so precious is the fact that it's finite. If you take away death it becomes practically meaningless. Also, the description of heaven in the bible sounds pretty awful with the whole eternally praising "god" non stop bit. So it's either you're subjugated forever or you're tortured forever. Both of these options come across as threats so "nirvana" would be infinitely more appealing at this point.

You guys are free to go and write your own bible and start your own religion.

[OpiatefortheMasses]

You guys are free to go and write your own bible and start your own religion.

[/quote]

Maybe the bible just needs a newer testament that addresses all these issues.

All kidding aside though, I don't think religion is very necessary aspect of our existence and I think the fact that more people are openly criticizing it demonstrates that. Besides, I think the Scientologists would probably try to sue us.

[wonderer]

I'm reasonably sure that to extort something from someone else would constitute a sin of some kind according to most Christians but why is it OK when the very religion itself employs it? Most of the Christians I've talked to over the years would describe their "god" as fair, just, loving etc. but extortion (among other things) really strikes me as cruel and manipulative. Is this a "god" that's truly worthy of a person's worship or adoration?

You're right. It's hard to love someone who's cruel and intimidating. It's hard to love someone you fear. Personally, I think it's impossible. As far as God being 'worthy' of worhip and adoration, some people say he is because of the fact that he created us. However, a being who wants to do to the things mentioned in Revelation doesn't inspire love but terror. I don't think the two can go hand in hand.