Killer

[Wordleymaster1]

If you're to believe the bible, God kills. God also creates.
If you're a Christian, you love and follow God (or are supposed to at least).
Why do you follow a god that kills?
Charlie Manson has his followers. And he has killed (in one way or another - guilty enough to get jail time). Are Christians to be considered like his followers?
Or do Christians overlook God's killing and accept if as justifiable? Well I guess the answer is YES, so maybe the question should be WHY

Why do Christians overlook God's killing (the worst murdere in human history it would seem)?
Is it the same reason why Charlie's followers overlook his past?

Or will Christians take offense at the comparison?

[Wordleymaster1]

[Replying to post 25 by dianaiad]

If God is real, then you need to examine Him according to what He has done...including the afterlife thing.

Yup
God has killed human beings
God has killed animals and plants
God created us
God allowed us to sin and created death as punishment
Now as a Mormon you may not believe this. If so, than that's that - no other reason to continue

If He is fictional, you need to examine Him in the context of the story told about Him...including the afterlife thing.

I can't examine what's not real. Can you examine purple people eater from Neptune? If anyone can, they might want to see a mental health professional
If God's not real, there's nothing to examine beyond the story of paranoid uneducated men that is the bible

and frankly, I'm tired of pretending that this is not exactly what is happening.

So what? You can be tired of anything you want. It doesn't matter

I'm the only one who might be able to say 'I told you so."

And that's all that matters isn't it? If that's all that matters, I would question you motives. IF that is

I promise, should this actually happen, to be a great deal more gentle in my language regarding your mistaken beliefs than you are now, with what you view as mine.

Don't make promises you can't keep
But the last parts of your post appear troublesome to me. It's almost as if you're flaunting the possibility you may be right and I'm wrong. That's not very Christian. YOu should be SAD that I'm wrong but it doesn't seem that way in what you wrote. I'm sure someone will report this and it will be struck as a PERSONAL COMMENT but nonetheless, I'm sadden with your apparent lack of empathy here. Not toally unexpected but still....sad.
OH well, huh? Yeah oh well.

[Wordleymaster1]

[Replying to post 30 by 1213]

I think the comparison is not correct, Manson has not given life.

If that's the comparison you drew: It's not about the result but the ACTION.

If we think God should not kill anyone, would it really mean that all should live eternally?

YES we ere all set to live forever before God condemned us to death as punishment of sin.

I would like to know also, do you accept abort or euthanasia?

I'm not God or a god so my view on this doesn't matter.

Personally I think God has every right to decide how long people live, because he has given life.

I don't subscribe to the 'we are owned by God' concept that you seem to be. I prefer not to be hindered by a bully threatening eternal damnation for not being his spiritual slave.

And if we really believe what the Bible tells

And Moses walked across a dry lake bed. And his staff turned into a snake and ate the other snakes. And that a woman turned into a pillar of salt because she looked back. And that there is a multi-headed beast meandering around. And a god-man healed an ear that was cute off and he walked on the water (well, depending on what storied account of his life you read I guess).
If we are to believe in the bible, we are to live in fear of a supreme monster that can create and destroy at its whim. That sounds like a life to live? Really? Wow (smh)

[Wordleymaster1]

It comes down to this:
Reasons = excuses and God has a bunch of 'em
Murder is wrong by most people's standards
God (for whatever reason that we have NO way of knowing about) has murdered human beings - more than all the murderers in human history probably.
Convicted murderers alone have by in large done the same thing.
God is a murderer not much different in that regard than any human murderer. But we make excuses for GOd.
Why?
Because we BELIEVE he's a supreme deity? Because a book tells us to believe?
A deity whose own believers can't all come to a agreement on?

Bow down to a murderer all you want, believers.
Don't be surprised when others dont' follow your lead of worshipping such a 'thing'.

[dianaiad]

[Replying to post 2 by Overcomer]

Because of sin, humankind was separated from God.

But didn't God let Satan in the Garden so He could tempt them? Surely free will blah blah blah but there would be no need to exercise this free will if God wouldhave stepped in before the whole mess started. Or, better yet, not allows it to start to begin with

There are those of us who think that 'free will' is rather important; that we should guide our own lives, make our own decisions, and learn from our own mistakes.

I, for one, am not at all fond of the idea of being a puppet with absolutely no control over my own life, thoughts and actions. I mean...what would be the point?

[Clownboat]

Consider this:

Because of sin, humankind was separated from God. The Bible is the story of what God did to bridge that separation and bring us home to him.

God chose to implement his plan to bring us back to him through the nation of Israel. He sent Jesus to this earth as a Jew, a descendant of Abraham, the patriarch of the Israelites. Jesus is the means of bringing us back to God. Therefore, he is all-important and, because he came through the nation of Israel, the Israelites were all-important.

Unfortunately, the Israelites were always chasing after the false gods of the nations that surrounded them. God would tell them not to, but they would disobey him and enter into the practices of other nations. And we're not talking about nice practices. Take the god Molech to whom heathens sacrified their own babies by throwing them in a fire. We're not talking about nice people here.

I just about threw up when I read this.
Are you trying to tell us that if your god appeared to you and ordered you to kill your first born, that you wouldn't do it?

"If", the Molech worshipers did this because they believed their god demanded it, how is it any different than what you would do or what Jephthah (Judges 11:29-39) did in your Bible (sacrificed his daughter to god)?

Are we to really believe that Bible followers are not "nice people" because of the god they believe in?

All you are doing IMO is pointing out the dangers of believing in un-evidenced god claims. Doesn't matter if the god is Molech or the Christian god. I don't believe that either group is evil, they just believe in false claims about god concepts.

It's as if you are saying, "how dare they believe in Molech" when the same could be said of you about your god. You probably don't feel threatened by this fact, but either would these "not nice people" you refer to if they truly believed that they were doing what a god wanted them to do.

People did evil acts and justified it with a belief in Molech.
If Christianity is false, can you imagine the list of harm done in the name of Christianity? It would be long.

Don't worry, just continue to believe that your religion is true and then you don't have to worry about being like the Molech worshipers (harming others in the name of a religion). At least your not killing babies, right?

[Wordleymaster1]

[Replying to post 44 by dianaiad]

There are those of us who think that 'free will' is rather important;

What thest people THINK is irrelevant to what God COULD have done, but decided against.
Of course, you can say 'I believe God knows what He's doing' and that's fine to believe that - just as fine as it is to believe the God you worship has less than no clue about what He's doing because HE'S NOT REAL.

I, for one, am not at all fond of the idea of being a puppet with absolutely no control over my own life, thoughts and actions. I mean...what would be the point?

THen your god is limited. Any god I would choose to believe in would be able to not create Hell for those not worshipping Him AND allow free will. My God would be able to make black white and white black; make YES NO and NO YES.
Maybe my God is just better and more able than yours?

[Clownboat]

I have already defined death. It's to stop the function of a persons body. It may be more than at as well but dying means your body stops functioning at the least. Killing means making it stop. Murder means making it stop without consent or necessity.

The morality of killing simply does not necessarily depend on what happens after death. Even if I knew absolutely there was afterlife I wouldn't have the right to cause another persons body to cease.

Agreed, but what terrifies me is the slippy slope here.

All it takes is for a believer to think they are doing the work of a god to feel justified for their actions. God can move people from one existance to another and who is anyone to argue that he can't use people as his tools to do so. This can and often times does include murdering others. God leads by example in the Bible, and this includes murder and rape. Not much of a stretch for some to think they are doing someone a favor by sending them into an afterlife, especially if they feel a god is ordering it.

I'm not sure why a god would not understand this.

[Clownboat]

Or will Christians take offense at the comparison?

I think the comparison is not correct, Manson has not given life.

If we think God should not kill anyone, would it really mean that all should live eternally? If not, what would you think is the correct time to end someones life?

I would like to know also, do you accept abort or euthanasia?

Personally I think God has every right to decide how long people live, because he has given life. And I dont see any reason why God should give eternal life for all. Would it be good for example if people who want to do evil to others would live forever to torment others?

And if we really believe what the Bible tells, the death of body is not the end. Soul or spirit can live forever, even if the body dies. Therefore I dont see any problem, if body dies, like most bodies actually do. I wouldnt for example see those deaths in great flood any more wrong than common deaths that God allows to occur every day. Death is not bad or wrong in my opinion. Murder is, because it is unjust kill. I think God dont murder, because in my opinion he has right to decide how long people live.

In hopes to check for consistency:

My wife and I created the life of two beautiful girls, in your opinion, I assume I should be allowed to take it from them. If not, at least decide how long they are allowed to live, right?

I'm trying to decide if "giving life" should really be a deciding factor for being able to "take" said life. So are I remain unconvinced.

[Clownboat]

<snip to here>

Absolute knowledge is about what is, not what we believe...even if our belief is rock hard concrete and based on extremely good evidence.

I was saying that people could be absolutely certain, not that they were certainly correct, just that they thought they were.

OK....but thinking that you are correct, no matter how justified that belief, is not the same thing as the absolute knowledge that you are correct.

God, should He exist, has that absolute knowledge that no mortal has.

It seems plausible to me that someone could be absolutely certain that their belief is correct. Whether or not this certain belief is fact or not doesn't affect their moral culpability. (And imho, I use knowledge to mean well justified belief, not justified 'true' belief)

Why would someone have to have absolute knowledge anyway?
If I was extremely sick and you were almost certain stabbing me repeatedly in the chest would heal me instantly, sure, you'd be wrong but I don't think you'd be morally wrong - just missing important details.

When talking about whether God is committing murder, those details are important, indeed.

I don't see how this addresses what I've said, you've just repeated the claim I oppose.
I don't think someone would be acting immorally to stab me if they were as certain that it would heal me, as you are currently certain that it would harm me. I think they would be acting virtuously, wrongly as in incorrectly not as in immorally.

The point is, if God is, and everything that comes with Him also is...like an afterlife, absolute knowledge IS absolute knowledge. Not 'absolute trust,' or 'not recognizing the existence of an alternative," but knowing that there isn't one. Not recognizing doesn't mean that it's not there. Knowing it's not there is very different.

Are you saying that how accurate someone's perception of reality is matters as to whether or not they are culpable or guilty?

For mortals, you and me...I'm not absolutely certain what you are talking about here, but...

Are you talking about the difference between an ER surgeon stabbing you in the neck to get an airway going, and the average guy on the street who saw the procedure in an episode of "Emergency" forty years ago and thinks he can do it too?

I'm not certain what you are alluding to here.

But you and I are not God. We didn't create the universe. We didn't make it possible for us to live on this planet. We didn't create life. God, should He exist, DID. He's the only One who does have the absolute knowledge that there is an 'afterlife,' and that physical death doesn't mean complete non-existance, and He knows this because He created it.

None of us have those qualifications.

This should be a familiar idea to folks who do hold people to different standards and allow different levels of behavior according to what they know....

Like allowing a doctor to stab you, but that guy on the street had better not, because the doctor knows what he's doing and the rest of us don't.

In this case, the Only One Who knows what He is doing would BE God.

erm....yeah....but that's a bit of a side track, don't you think?

Now we are talking about responsibility, not fact, and it certainly doesn't help your argument.

We were talking about morality, and morality often involves culpability, and I don't think that someone is morally wrong or culpable for simply being wrong or even crazy (to put it one way).

Morality and culpability are different ideas. "Killing," in the terms most of those who accuse God of being a killer, means 'destroying all conscious existence.'

It's a most circular bit of reasoning.

There is no afterlife therefore
God is evil because He kills people and
Therefore there is no God.

But if there is an afterlife, and 'killing' means 'ending existence,' then God isn't killing anybody.

If there is no afterlife, then God (as described by most Christians) doesn't exist either, and therefore He still isn't killing anybody.

there is no scenario in which God may be accused, accurately, of killing anybody. Moving them from one state of existence to another? Certainly...but of ending existence? No.

And that is compounded, in the eyes of some folks (like me) who believe that we gave permission for this whole shebang in the first place, both birth and death.

Responsibility doesn't enter into it. OF COURSE God is responsible for death. The question isn't 'responsibility,' it's whether, when He does it, it's a bad thing to do in the first place.

You know, like the ER doc is absolutely responsible for stabbing someone between the ribs and sticking a hose in there, it's going to hurt like hell...and the guy he stabbed is going to thank him for it?

If someone was delusional, but they still chose to save everyone and tried to make everyone as happy as possible... but in their delusional state ended up making everyone's lives worse, I wouldn't say they were morally wrong. I would say that they were factually wrong.

OK....and your point is?

A Creator God would, of course, be factually NOT ending life, simply moving it.

That's what absolute knowledge means.

Whether people are responsible for their choices is a whole 'nuther topic.

IF the FACT matters, then murder isn't wrong

It is if you know know that life does not end...as in 'absolute knowledge."

Only God knows that,

Just as only a fully trained ER doc knows when it is appropriate to stab someone between the ribs.

Anybody else trying it is going to get arrested...and hopefully only for assault. Motive matters, though, even for people.

IF one's CERTAINTY matters, then it doesn't matter whether or not you're God.

Certainty and absolute knowledge are not the same thing. One can be completely certain of something...and be wrong. If one has absolute knowledge, there is no chance that he is wrong. Absolute is absolute.

The only distinctions I can see in the scenario, are:
1) if you continue to argue for a ~100% (100ish) belief vs 100% certainty in knowledge difference (which seems to have a range of weird outcomes, e.g. God can only be certain in belief, without begging the question he can't ever know that belief is knowledge)
2) if you make special exceptions for God

You still aren't understanding the difference between belief and absolute knowledge.

belief and certainty are what we think about fact. Absolute knowledge is what IS fact. I don't care how 'certain' one is about something, if there is even the most infinitesimal chance that you are wrong, it's not knowledge.

There is a spectrum of belief, I suppose, that ranges from "I don't think this is true but there is the tiniest of chances that it could be" to "I am absolutely, rock hard certain, that this is true."

Absolute knowledge isn't on that spectrum at all. It's an entirely different concept.

It doesn't matter to me whether or not an afterlife exists with regards to whether or not I want to stay in this one.
It seems to me that you're just trading murder for kidnapping.

that's quite a trade. Kidnapping ain't murder.

Yeah, but when there's no such thing as death, murder is pretty hard.
God could always trade murder for kidnapping for public transport to and from this afterlife, or even just disclosure.

Huh?

"No such thing as death?"

Define 'death' for me, please.

death: the action or fact of dying or being killed; the end of the life of a person or organism

life:the condition that distinguishes animals and plants from inorganic matter, including the capacity for growth, reproduction, functional activity, and continual change preceding death; the existence of an individual human being or animal.

(more the latter I emphasise)

What I mean is, it's not really death if you're just being moved.
Death is the final part of life, 'afterlife' implies your life after life.
To be more specific, when I say life with regard to the latter definition I think I'm talking more about continued experience/sensation, that to me seems to be what it is to be alive. If that carries on after "death", then you aren't really dying.

OK.

So you think that God kills people according to your definition of dying?

That is fairly typical...and you are correct. If your definition, which is fairly standard especially for non-believers, is true, then there is no death.

Except that, of course, we mere mortals don't KNOW that, do we? WE don't have the absolute knowledge required to act on it. We could be wrong. Ending a life could be, y'know, ending the life.

But God, should He exist, knows it's a move, not life ending. Ergo, He doesn't kill anybody.

Either way, murder certainly isn't as bad if there's an afterlife.

It is if someone who doesn't have absolute knowledge does it, and no mortal human has that.

But that isn't relevant, what's relevant is that a murderer does the same thing as God, so when you say "kidnapping is better than murder", the same thing applies to actual murderers. They're just kidnappers.

Like that guy who tried to murder his wife but ended up saving her life, instead?

Well, true...but he wanted to kill her, the motive was to get rid of her and to end her existence, so he went to jail. He IS guilty of murder.

Oh, as to having your permission?

You are talking to someone who honestly believes that you gave that permission before you got here. Sorry about that. Death is a part of this experience we are all going through.

(edit to fix the quotes...whew..)

Wouldn't you assume that god has absolute knowledge that we would see the killing done in the Bible and equate it to murder? Did he not intend the book to be a guide for us?
If so, it's not logical that he would have committed murder in the book the way he did (with or without absolute knowledge) knowing full well that humans would understand it to be unjustified murder and then come to understand that the book cannot be a guide. What you propose he did is counter productive, whether a person is being moved or murdered, the act we read about is still there, and the book leaves it at murder. No talk about what happened to the souls of the Egyptian babies or to the souls of the flood victims. He, with his absolute knowledge should have known that many would struggle with this.

This leads me to believe it cannot be an instruction book/guide due to being a very poor one while at the same time being credited to an all powerful god with absolute knowledge of the struggle he would be causing.

At the very least, what you propose should be spelled out in the Bible clearly to prevent people from losing their belief. What all to many see is rape, genocide and murder along with some good aspects too. As a whole, it's really not that much of a guide, but hey, at least it's not claimed to be the words of a god. Wait...

[Clownboat]

Well, nobody can prove that God exists, either, but that doesn't stop 'em from deciding that He is an evil so and so anyway.

This decision is not based off of there being no evidence for any gods. The decision gets based off of the book that is said to be written and in fact by many, inspired by him.

You would only have a point if the Bible did not exist. After all, you could not hate Sauron in the Lord of the Rings if you had not read the book (or watched the movies). Once you have, you can decide if he is evil or good regardless of him being believed to be real or a human invention. The same goes for god concepts.