Why Christianity is Likely Ficticious

[Rational Atheist]

When evaluating whether the claims of Christianity are true or fictional, it's important to take a step back and think about what is typically seen with regard to true beliefs and false beliefs. And, one of the most important characteristics of true beliefs is the fact that they are often independently discovered by multiple people. For instance, pulmonary circulation was discovered/theorized independently in Egypt by Ibn al Nafis and later in Europe by Michael Servetus and later still William Harvey. Calculus was independently discovered by both Isacc Newton and Gottfried Leibniz, evolution was discovered independently by Charles Darwin and Alfred Russell Wallace. There are countless other examples of "multiple discoveries" of facts that can be found here. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_m ... iscoveries

The point is that rational people, who objectively search for truth, will often independently discover facts about the universe. So if Christianity and the existence of the Christian god is a fact about the universe (and we could apply this argument to any other religion/god as well), then we would expect that sincere theologians around the world dedicated to the search for God would independently discover Jesus Christ/Yahweh/Holy Spirit, and thus become Christians. As a result, we would not expect it to take 1500 years for Christianity to reach North America, for instance. If Christianity is true, then it is an objective fact and should thus be discoverable by anyone searching hard enough for the truth about the universe. So, why don't we see Christianity emerge in North or South America, Africa, or China, prior to the arrival of Christians into these parts of the world? One would expect that if Christianity were an objectively true fact, it would be independently discovered in multiple regions of the world. But, it wasn't. Quite the opposite. Prior to the invention of technologies that allowed world travel and communication, every culture had its own version of God, and its own religion. While some of these gods and religions had slight similarities, none of the matched exactly. This is strong evidence that all of these gods and religions are manmade constructs that only exist in the imaginations of humans.

So, my question for Christians is, if your religion is a fact, why was it never independently discovered by anyone? Bear in mind that not only is Christianity supposed to be an objective fact, the god is supposed to want people to know and worship him, meaning that it should be even MORE LIKELY for Christianity to be independently discovered if it is a fact than scientific and mathematical facts are to be independently discovered.

[nobspeople]

[Replying to 1213 in post #78]

I think all lives have always mattered, but God doesn’t allow unrighteous and evil people live forever.

Then those lives didn't matter at all - God at least.
Or they mattered only to 'a certain point' - they're not worth 'living forever'. Which seems to be the case if you read the bible. God protects certain groups and not others. It takes scary blind faith to accept that no where in any of the cities or cultures that God leveled there wasn't one righteous person.
A culture or city of two people? Maybe.
Hundreds? Thousands? Hundreds of thousands? Come on now....

But whatever it takes to swallow the 'God is always right' pill (and that's on enormous pill!)

[William]

I think....

This is where you lose us if you care.
(If you can show that what you think is real, you would do so and we would care).

I could ask my 9 year old what she thinks, but that is not a way to arrive at truth.

Sure. I Understand. So what is is about what I said I think, that you think I should be able to show you is real?

[1213]

I think.... And I think....

(Copy/paste as this is the same phenomenon)
This is where you lose us if you care.
...

I would like to see you giving something more than your own thinking. But, don’t worry, it is not necessary. The reason why I think righteousness is what matters to God are these:

These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.
Mat. 25:46

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 6:23

Surely the righteous will give thanks to your name. The upright will dwell in your presence.
Ps. 140:13

Does that make any difference to you, probably not?

[1213]

If other nations would have been righteous and not evil, they would have the same promises as Jews have and God would not reject them.

Did God talk to them and say as much?

I believe the other nations have rejected God, so He probably have not spoken as much to them.

[Purple Knight]

If other nations would have been righteous and not evil, they would have the same promises as Jews have and God would not reject them.

Did God talk to them and say as much?

I believe the other nations have rejected God, so He probably have not spoken as much to them.

How can you reject someone who doesn't speak to you? God has some very specific laws that go beyond what the conscience of man teaches to man. Pre-Adamic man literally didn't know any better unless they were told better.

Let's say I'm God, and I don't want you to, for example, eat fish on Tuesday. But I don't tell you that. I do tell the People I created (called the Bolokians). Now I say, look how good the Bolokians are, not eating fish on Tuesday, and looks how evil the pre-Bolokian man is, gobbling up all the fish he likes, even on Tuesday! What heretics! They reject me, clearly.

Could it be that God loves the Jews specially because he created Adam specially? Saying he loves everyone equally is like saying you love some rabid stray mutt as much as your own dog that you ordered from a breeder, watched grow up, and play with every day.

I'm not saying you shouldn't love your own dog more. I think you should. Your own dog is special to you and that's not only permissible, but I actually believe to do otherwise would be impermissible. I am saying people who are not Middle-Eastern should take it with a grain of salt when a worshiper of a Middle-Eastern god tells them that such a god will save them, or loves them as much as His Chosen, which he admits he has.

Now, I'm an atheist and I don't think any of this is real. But it could be. In the unlikely event that it is somehow all real, I'm fairly certain that everyone who is not a Jew is throwing worship at a god that hates them, or at least, doesn't love them, or intend to put them in Heaven. To be honest, if this is all true, I'm convinced that pre-Adamites (non-Middle-Easterners) simply don't have souls, and that Canaanites are destined for Hell no matter what they do. Eve's sin was atoned for by Jesus. Nobody sent anybody to make up for anything else.

[1213]

... I'm fairly certain that everyone who is not a Jew is throwing worship at a god that hates them, or at least, doesn't love them, or intend to put them in Heaven. To be honest, if this is all true, I'm convinced that pre-Adamites (non-Middle-Easterners) simply don't have souls, and that Canaanites are destined for Hell no matter what they do. Eve's sin was atoned for by Jesus. Nobody sent anybody to make up for anything else.

I would like to know, what do you think “worship” means and why would God require it? Bible tells about worshiping:

The God who made the world and all things in it, he, being Lord of heaven and earth, doesn't dwell in temples made with hands, neither is he served by men's hands, as though he needed anything, seeing he himself gives to all life and breath, and all things.
Acts 17:24-25

Pure religion [religious worship] and undefiled before our God and Father is this: to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.
James 1:27

And about who can be righteous and therefore have eternal life, Bible tells:

For as many as have sinned without law will also perish without the law. As many as have sinned under the law will be judged by the law. For it isn't the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law will be justified (for when Gentiles who don't have the law do by nature the things of the law, these, not having the law, are a law to themselves, in that they show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience testifying with them, and their thoughts among themselves accusing or else excusing them) in the day when God will judge the secrets of men, according to my gospel, by Jesus Christ.
Romans 2:12-16

It is possible that “gentiles” have the law written in their “heart” and so they can be counted righteous and can have eternal life, by what the Bible tells. I don’t see any reason to add or remove anything about that.

[Purple Knight]

I would like to know, what do you think “worship” means and why would God require it?

I thought about this a long time and came back to it.

My answer is that worship involves deification, which to me is about giving the deity special moral authority. The deity, and not others, may dictate morality and have its word become morality. The deity, and not others, has special moral privilege to do certain actions that would be immoral if others did them, but remain moral if the deity does them.

It's simple.

Would I be justified in making my own moral rules, whatever I wanted them to be, and imposing them on others? Do I get to tell people what to do? Do I get to do things others may not and have it still be moral? How about if I'm omnipotent? How about if I'm omniscient?

No, no I don't have special moral privilege, no matter how powerful I am, because I'm not a deity.

Why am I not a deity? Because no one has deified me. No one worships me.

[Clownboat]

I think....

This is where you lose us if you care.
(If you can show that what you think is real, you would do so and we would care).

I could ask my 9 year old what she thinks, but that is not a way to arrive at truth.

Sure. I Understand. So what is is about what I said I think, that you think I should be able to show you is real?

To answer your question. If you are doing nothing other than thinking something into existence, I wouldn't imagine you would have anything to show.

I don't think you have anything to show, but what we think is irrelevant as far as arriving at truth is concerned.

Like I said and am curious for you to address:
I could ask my 9 year old what she thinks, but that is not a way to arrive at truth.

Do you not agree with the part in bold? Does what anyone thinks about the Tooth Fairy or Allah etc. matter in reality?
Now let's examine what you said: "I think it is reasonable to understand that these imagined things do exist in some other universe".


You sir, at least for me will need to do better if you want to be taken seriously about your thoughs. Why would anyone want to think thoughts about imagined things that may exist in some other universe in the first place? How would knowledge ever be aquired about such being/things? If you had a reason for introducing these imagined things that you think exist in some other universe, that would be much more then just thinking it to be the case.

Again my point, thinking something to be the case is not a way to arrive at truth. I could think a specific god concept is real or I could think there are numerous human races and some are more evolved then others. I argue that more needs to be done then to just allow people to think something and then be expected to take them seriously.

[Clownboat]

I think.... And I think....

(Copy/paste as this is the same phenomenon)
This is where you lose us if you care.
...

I would like to see you giving something more than your own thinking. But, don’t worry, it is not necessary. The reason why I think righteousness is what matters to God are these:

These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.
Mat. 25:46

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 6:23

Surely the righteous will give thanks to your name. The upright will dwell in your presence.
Ps. 140:13

Does that make any difference to you, probably not?

It would make a difference to me if you could show that the Bible informs us about the thoughts a god is having or has had? The Bible is persons (for the most part) thinking something to be the case and then writting it down on behalf of said god concept? Surely you can do better then your competing religions?

But you cannot. Therefore your thoughts are on an equal playing field when compared to the religious ideas you compete with.

Why were you unable to address the questions I posed to you? I think you don't have a god helping you, but again, what I think wouldn't affect reality.

In hopes of finding some common ground as to why thoughts alone don't cut it:
- I think that Allah is the one true God. Convinced much?
- When it comes to the Christian god, one god concept, yet we have millions of humans thinking mutually exclusive ideas on its behalf.
- I think the gods want us to attack our neighboring tribe. I think they wants us to kill everyone of them, except for the virgin girls. Those I think the gods wants us to keep for ourselves.

Could you imagine such a thing and where it could lead? Oh wait.... Humans have been thinking on behalf of god concepts for thousands of years already. Even explains why virtually all humans throughout all know human history have thought god concepts into existence.

Care to address any of these points?

I think you would slay me with your reply if you had a god on your side. Instead I got a verse threatening me with eternal punishment. Lets leave the scare tactics to the terrorists shall we? A real god could surely do better then a terrorist.

[1213]

...Surely you can do better then your competing religions?

Even if I would, I don’t think it would make any difference in this case. “Better” seems to be just a subjective opinion and you apparently like something else. It is not a problem for me. But I hope you have enough information to make good choice.

...- I think that Allah is the one true God. Convinced much?

It depends on what are your reasons for thinking so. And also about, what do you mean with Allah.

...Care to address any of these points?....

It would still be my thinking, which obviously for you would be nothing. So, I don’t see any point in that. For me, it is enough if you know the reason why I said what I said earlier (about righteousness).