Making sense of the NT

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Sherlock Holmes

Making sense of the NT

Post #1

Post by Sherlock Holmes »

Hello,

I've been debating (online) against atheism for many years, I'm very well educated in the sciences and to a lesser degree, philosophy.

However - and I know I'm not alone here - Christianity itself, the New Testament, remarkable and thought provoking as it is, and not questioning the legitimacy of the texts we have access to, I am ultimately deeply puzzled by it all.

Christ revealed some deeply profound things, completely dumbfounding prevailing Jewish beliefs and this goes in its favor, as it's sheer radicality is just not something I'd expect to simply emerge from prevailing ideas.

Yet it makes no sense at the end of the day, for example why go to all this trouble? the entire human race is in a state of anguish, confusion and beginning to collapse, why is that logically necessary as part of creation?

What exactly are humans expected to do? it is far from clear (as is evidenced by the many doctrinal arguments over the past twenty centuries).

So that's my position, I'm interested in hearing some candidate answers!

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Re: Making sense of the NT

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Post by theophile »

brunumb wrote: Fri Dec 31, 2021 4:01 pm
theophile wrote: Fri Dec 31, 2021 3:04 pm If the world is so far gone. If we are so hard-hearted and relentless in our evil. If not a single one existed with the potential to redeem the rest..

What left is there to do but to wash it all away?
I have a lot of trouble with the whole scenario.
Frankly, I think that's the point of the story. We should be troubled by it. I was genuine before when I commented on your initial remark: it is a pity that nobody was there to challenge God / God's plan (like Abraham did re: Sodom, or Moses did re: the golden calf). This is (perhaps) an unspoken failure of Noah to step up. This is (perhaps) why Noah goes on to drown himself in wine after all is said and done...

That's why this troubling story was crafted in the first place, IMHO: to shock and awaken our moral sensibilities and to engage us in the hard work of ruling over the earth / cosmos (i.e., taking up the mantle God gave us in Genesis 1).

So "What about the other animals? What about all the innocent babes?"... We'll never know because Noah didn't say a damn thing! He didn't wrestle with God at all (i.e., Israel) but blindly obeyed God's commands.

I think that was a big failure on his part. It may not have changed anything if he spoke up (just as Abraham failed to change God's course on Sodom), but it was a dereliction of his God-given duty when he stayed quiet.
brunumb wrote: Fri Dec 31, 2021 4:01 pm The entire population (except for a tiny cohort) has become so evil that God's Final Solution is to wipe them all out in an act of extreme barbarism. What benevolent being allows this to happen? We are talking about probable centuries of decline with no intervention. I can't even see how Noah was able to survive in the midst of all this depravity. "Washing away" all the evil is not the benign colouring book picture of cute animals boarding an ark and sailing away while the rain falls. It is a destructive event that would have been catastrophic and involved incredible suffering on the part of all the humans and animals caught up in it. Ironically, this mass slaughter didn't seem to accomplish the desired outcome. Evil persisted in humanity. Did God choose the wrong people to carry on after the deluge? When you add in all of the other problems (thoroughly discussed elsewhere) nothing about the great biblical flood story rings true, least of all God's involvement.
Some of it is just good story telling, right? And did God ever say it was meant to be a final solution to evil? ...

But look, I think we view this story from completely different angles. You look at God and all the things God did wrong or could have done better. That's great (per my comments above). The problem is you stop there and walk away concluding God is barbaric and unworthy of our time.

For me, these stories are reminiscent of Einstein's thought experiments. They create an impossible situation (e.g., a train moving at the speed of light; a thoroughly corrupted world...) to help push our thinking and engage our moral / theoretical sensibilities. (Debating whether God was right or wrong is supplementary to this broader purpose...)

So again, we can keep throwing rocks at God and what God did (or didn't do) but the real question this story poses is what we would have or should have done about it. We are complicit in it and can't just turn all of our ire onto God. (Again per Genesis 1, God left ruling the earth to us, so this is really our problem to deal with, not God's!)

To that end, how do we prevent such a situation from happening? What do we do if we encounter such a situation? What would we have done differently if we were Noah or God, looking down on such a terrible, wicked place? Where (at the most impossible limit) even the babies and animals are corrupted to the bone?...

That's what our focus should be. And if throwing rocks at God helps us answer these questions and grow in wisdom, then that's great. The purpose of the story has been fulfilled :)
Last edited by theophile on Sat Jan 01, 2022 12:14 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Making sense of the NT

Post #72

Post by theophile »

benchwarmer wrote: Fri Dec 31, 2021 9:00 pm
theophile wrote: Fri Dec 31, 2021 3:04 pm
benchwarmer wrote: Fri Dec 31, 2021 10:18 am Different, more sensible (IMHO) solutions:

1) Directly communicate with each person being 'wicked' and explain if they don't change their ways immediately they will be removed from the planet. If the person continues their ways, they are instantly vaporized. Point this out to the next person you are confronting. "Hey, stop doing <x>. See what I just did to Bob after I warned him and he didn't listen?"
Sure. But we're talking intractable evil here. We're talking the hard-heartedness of someone like pharaoh in the exodus story. Talk to them all you want but it probably won't make a difference.
First, why was pharaoh's heart hard?
Yah I knew you would go there. This risks opening a can of worms, but we have different views on how pharaoh's heart is hardened.

Just to be clear, I don't subscribe to classical theism and God as some sort of omnipotent being (which a lot of your response implies). I think there are 'secular' (let's call it) lexicons or explanations for everything in the bible (including God). As such, I tend to bristle at any appeal (by theists or atheists) to divine (/magical) power plays to resolve conflicts or to create them.

A good example, how God hardens pharaoh's heart.

On this, ask yourself this simple question: what generally happens when you try to take something away from someone?

Heck, I can even use my dog's chew toy as an example! The answer: She clamps her teeth and locks her jaw... She pulls back! My action, in effect, hardens her heart and increases her resolve to not let go. To keep what is hers... (The fact that this is play with her makes no difference. It would be even worse if we were out in the wild and it was a haunch of meat I was trying to take!)

No different with pharaoh and the slaves that God / Moses try to take. The very act of trying to take the slaves away causes pharaoh to clench up. This simple (secular) 'mechanism' is all the bible is describing here. (It is not some magical God act to control pharaoh's will.)
benchwarmer wrote: Fri Dec 31, 2021 9:00 pm Anyways, you seem to have missed my point - perhaps because I didn't fully flesh out the idea.

If this plan was "pleasing to the Lord", then I assume it would be implemented right from the start. Every human that refuses to stop being 'wicked' after having a direct talking too would instantly be vaporized. I'm not talking about a planet wide, one time vaporization - though that still would have been cleaner than killing everything in sight for no apparent reason.

Anyways:

1) Fred slaps his wife silly. God appears to Fred and gives him a talking to with a final warning. The next day Fred punches his wife instead. Later that day there is a small pile of dust where Fred once stood.

2) Bob likes stabbing people. God appears to Bob and gives him a talking to with a final warning. He also points out what happened to Fred. Bob ignores God. Bob becomes a small pile of dust.

Eventually, word gets around that people who do bad things are found missing and strange, small piles of dust are appearing. After some time, I think people might get the hint that God is in charge, means business, and follows through after giving a fair warning.

Yet a global flood wiping out EVERYTHING except for a few people who keep sinning anyways was 'better'. Sure.
I would duplicate my above response to brunumb here. To recap, debating details such as this is a good start, and fulfills the purpose of the story to shock our moral sensibilities and grow our wisdom (i.e., debating a better course of action and challenging God's / each other's ideas on the matter).

Even better though is if we turn our criticism of God onto ourselves. That is, instead of self-righteously concluding that God is barbaric and moving on, we should ask where Noah's outcry was, whether against the wickedness of the world before God saw it, or against God's plan to deal with it after the fact. Furthermore, we should look at the world around us today and ask what needs to be done to prevent our times from taking a similar course...

Again, we keep throwing stones at God, but God left the earth to us (Genesis 1). As such, evil is our problem to deal with. So you can cry foul at God all you want for not doing more to prevent it, but that's just avoiding who is really to blame and missing the call to human responsibility that this story represents.
benchwarmer wrote: Fri Dec 31, 2021 9:00 pm
theophile wrote: Fri Dec 31, 2021 3:04 pm
benchwarmer wrote: Fri Dec 31, 2021 10:18 am 2) If God felt all warnings had already been issued and couldn't be bothered with the one on ones, just vaporize every offender. No need to kill off babies, animals, and orchestrate the entire ark adventure.
Sure. But this isn't radically different from what God did. I'm sure brunumb would still have made their comment, and instead of the 'great flood' atheists would point to the 'great vaporization' as a sign of God's barbarity.
Yet it is radically different. God killed EVERYTHING except for what was on the ark. And those humans on the ark did what afterwards? Yep, kept sinning. Fantastic plan.

My plan (if 1 was too much work for an almighty god), do a one time mass vaporization then explain to everyone left what happened. Explain that from now on, any further wickedness will result in the same fate. Instant feedback that God is there and paying attention. No dead panda bears, babies, or a pointless flood. Just instant death for those who won't listen. My guess is if anybody remains, word will get around that you better stay in line.
No, it's not radically different. You're missing the impossible situation that Genesis 6 sets up. The world is thoroughly wicked and corrupt. Intractably so. You have to enter into that as the starting point. So let go of what's possible for a second (or how things got that way) and imagine that you're witnessing a world where even the babies are corrupt to the bone. Even the innocent little lambs!

It's a situation as impossible as Einstein's train moving at the speed of light, but no less valuable as a thought experiment to push our thinking because of its impossibility. And once we enter into this impossibly extreme situation, the only difference I see in your 'humane' approach is the method of destruction that you call for. The scope stays the same. (Hence not radically different at all, so far as I can tell. It's just a question of vaporization versus drowning.)
benchwarmer wrote: Fri Dec 31, 2021 9:00 pm
theophile wrote: Fri Dec 31, 2021 3:04 pm
benchwarmer wrote: Fri Dec 31, 2021 10:18 am I'm sure there are many other sensible solutions than an almighty god could use that actually make sense and actually work.
I appreciate the thoughts, but I'm not sure of a better answer.

If the world is so far gone. If we are so hard-hearted and relentless in our evil. If not a single one existed with the potential to redeem the rest..

What left is there to do but wash it all away?
Well, for starters, don't let it get out of hand. Was God sleeping until the Earth fully populated up until the flood? My solutions would have nipped the problem in the bud right away and keep things fresh. My plans are not about a one and done. They are a direct response to the actual issue, rather than a tantrum that destroys EVERYTHING.

The Bible paints God as a toddler knocking over poorly built sand castle. I would be offended if I was God and read the Bible.
Yah, God is literally resting per Genesis 1, right? And the earth is given over to us to rule... As such, we are the ones who let things get so far gone. We are the ones responsible for the mess God sees when God wakes up... (Yet all we want to do is blame God for everything!)

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Re: Making sense of the NT

Post #73

Post by JehovahsWitness »

benchwarmer wrote: Sat Jan 01, 2022 8:54 am Apparently instant death is no different than a painful, panic filled drowning in front of your children
Why are you mentioning DROWNING if you have no issue with it? If you mention drowing (imply it is usually cruel )why object when you are challenged ? Do you expect to criticise the method of execution (as you have just done) and then have your criticism unchallenged ?

When asked for alternatives and you suggest instant vaporisation or sterilization, do you want that to remain unchallenged? Why do you cry foul that we shouldn't be talking about the method or speed of execution when you yourself keep bringing it UP?

benchwarmer wrote: Sat Jan 01, 2022 8:54 am Now we have devolved into debating why MY suggestions are not perfect. Well, I'm not a god, yet seemed to have come up with at least one more humane, less unnecessarily destructive method.
Nobody has demanded perfection but was it not you that said ....

benchwarmer wrote: Fri Dec 31, 2021 10:18 amSorry, but that's baloney. Atheists (including me on this very site) have offered lots of alternate solutions. Different, more sensible (IMHO) solutions:...
Emphasis MINE

Did you think your claim that your solutions were {quote}"more sensible" was above criticism?
Could it be the execution method is only irrelevant and a distraction from the main issue, when YOU are challenged?




JW



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Re: Making sense of the NT

Post #74

Post by TRANSPONDER »

I'm appalled by the lack of morals shown by out Bible apologists here. 'Why now, wouldn't you destroy all these babies if you knew they were rotten to the core?' 'Why, if you are ok with having to vaporize the guilty why would you object to God drowning them all and innocent creation with it?'

Aside that none but Bible - literalist believers would think that all humanity (but Noah and his family) down to babies that were rotten to the core before they had learned how to walk, were really bad enough to merit extermination, that they see no difference between doing it humanely (if there was no alternative) and doing it in the clumsy and vindictive way it was done and which God supposedly repented afterwards.
is, as I said, appalling.
The blinkered apologetics entered into to try to excuse evil and incompetence is appalling not only because of the shameless evasions entered into but the embrace of evil rather than admit that the Bible has any problem.

I have no doubt these are really good people, but refusal to entertain doubt and question so easily leads these people to accept wickedness in implication and one fears in actuality if it came to it.

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Re: Making sense of the NT

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Post by theophile »

TRANSPONDER wrote: Sat Jan 01, 2022 12:10 pm I'm appalled by the lack of morals shown by out Bible apologists here. 'Why now, wouldn't you destroy all these babies if you knew they were rotten to the core?' 'Why, if you are ok with having to vaporize the guilty why would you object to God drowning them all and innocent creation with it?'

Aside that none but Bible - literalist believers would think that all humanity (but Noah and his family) down to babies that were rotten to the core before they had learned how to walk, were really bad enough to merit extermination, that they see no difference between doing it humanely (if there was no alternative) and doing it in the clumsy and vindictive way it was done and which God supposedly repented afterwards.
is, as I said, appalling.
The blinkered apologetics entered into to try to excuse evil and incompetence is appalling not only because of the shameless evasions entered into but the embrace of evil rather than admit that the Bible has any problem.

I have no doubt these are really good people, but refusal to entertain doubt and question so easily leads these people to accept wickedness in implication and one fears in actuality if it came to it.
I think you're mischaracterizing a bit (insofar as this is directed at me). Do you honestly think I believe that babies are capable of being evil or that they should ever be destroyed?

My line so far has been pretty supportive of the fact that someone (Noah) should have said something. That someone (humankind) should have done something to prevent all this mess from getting so bad in the first place. Yes, I have tried to refocus attention from God to us (because I think we are the truly responsible ones in all this and the ones who should be put on the spot), but none of that is to "excuse" God or "evade" the seriousness of all this. To the contrary, I'm trying to enter into the full seriousness of it.

And again, I said like 10x it was an impossible situation. A thought experiment. It is not something that would ever or can ever happen (just like there will never be a train that travels at the speed of light). If you can't enter into that same (impossibly) extreme starting point, that's fine. You don't need to go all moral high-horse because of it.
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Re: Making sense of the NT

Post #76

Post by TRANSPONDER »

theophile wrote: Sat Jan 01, 2022 12:31 pm
TRANSPONDER wrote: Sat Jan 01, 2022 12:10 pm I'm appalled by the lack of morals shown by out Bible apologists here. 'Why now, wouldn't you destroy all these babies if you knew they were rotten to the core?' 'Why, if you are ok with having to vaporize the guilty why would you object to God drowning them all and innocent creation with it?'

Aside that none but Bible - literalist believers would think that all humanity (but Noah and his family) down to babies that were rotten to the core before they had learned how to walk, were really bad enough to merit extermination, that they see no difference between doing it humanely (if there was no alternative) and doing it in the clumsy and vindictive way it was done and which God supposedly repented afterwards.
is, as I said, appalling.
The blinkered apologetics entered into to try to excuse evil and incompetence is appalling not only because of the shameless evasions entered into but the embrace of evil rather than admit that the Bible has any problem.

I have no doubt these are really good people, but refusal to entertain doubt and question so easily leads these people to accept wickedness in implication and one fears in actuality if it came to it.
I think you're mischaracterizing a bit (insofar as this is directed at me). Do you honestly think I believe that babies are capable of being evil or that they should ever be destroyed?

My line so far has been pretty supportive of the fact that someone (Noah) should have said something. That someone (humankind) should have done something to prevent all this mess from getting so bad in the first place. Yes, I have tried to refocus attention from God to us (because I think we are the truly responsible ones in all this), but none of that is to "excuse" God or "evade" the seriousness of all this. I'm trying to enter into the full seriousness of it.

And again, I said like 10x it was an impossible situation. A thought experiment. It is not something that would ever or can ever be the case (just like there will never be a train that travels at the speed of light). If you can't enter into that same (impossibly) extreme starting point, that's fine. You don't need to go all moral high-horse because of it.








Strip all the context away for a minute. Remove the name of God and all the other biblical terminology

You encounter a world and observe nothing but evil. C
:P Maybe I overreacted. Yes, it is 'thought experiment' going on. The whole idea is pretty horrible even for humans let alone a supposedly superior god. It still strikes me that unless a god was evil, incompetent or stupid, none of Genesis could happen. Trying to explain it to be acceptable if not credible, just grated on me, even as a hypothetical. Or mythological.

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Re: Making sense of the NT

Post #77

Post by benchwarmer »

theophile wrote: Sat Jan 01, 2022 10:15 am
benchwarmer wrote: Fri Dec 31, 2021 9:00 pm First, why was pharaoh's heart hard?
Yah I knew you would go there. This risks opening a can of worms, but we have different views on how pharaoh's heart is hardened.
I get that. I'm just reading the text in the Bible, not trying to make it fit a God that can do no wrong. Trying to interpret things so it sounds like it's always the humans fault is common Christian apologetics. To each their own.
theophile wrote: Sat Jan 01, 2022 10:15 am Just to be clear, I don't subscribe to classical theism and God as some sort of omnipotent being (which a lot of your response implies). I think there are 'secular' (let's call it) lexicons or explanations for everything in the bible (including God). As such, I tend to bristle at any appeal (by theists or atheists) to divine (/magical) power plays to resolve conflicts or to create them.

A good example, how God hardens pharaoh's heart.

On this, ask yourself this simple question: what generally happens when you try to take something away from someone?

Heck, I can even use my dog's chew toy as an example! The answer: She clamps her teeth and locks her jaw... She pulls back! My action, in effect, hardens her heart and increases her resolve to not let go. To keep what is hers... (The fact that this is play with her makes no difference. It would be even worse if we were out in the wild and it was a haunch of meat I was trying to take!)

No different with pharaoh and the slaves that God / Moses try to take. The very act of trying to take the slaves away causes pharaoh to clench up. This simple (secular) 'mechanism' is all the bible is describing here. (It is not some magical God act to control pharaoh's will.)
Well, I can see what you are saying, but it's not God talking to pharaoh. It's Moses. So maybe Moses is hardening pharaoh's heart in your analogy? Why mention "The Lord" doing it?
theophile wrote: Sat Jan 01, 2022 10:15 am Even better though is if we turn our criticism of God onto ourselves.

[snip]

Again, we keep throwing stones at God
This is not what is happening. I'm not throwing stones at God, being mad at God, etc. Common apologetic arguments that seem to always creep in.

What I'm saying is that we can tell this is not a god acting because it reeks of bad human solutions to problems a god would not let happen or drag out to such a length it required a mass extinction event. And even if a god somehow was busy somewhere else and discovered all the wicked humans, the solution proposed by the authors, is ludicrous.

The only thing I'm throwing rocks at are the authors of this story (and perhaps those that think this is 100% accurate history because their religious faith compels them to that conclusion).
theophile wrote: Sat Jan 01, 2022 10:15 am I appreciate the thoughts, but I'm not sure of a better answer.
I also appreciate your (and everyone's) input. The most simple answer is that the story is just that. A story. How we come to this realization is that it seems humans can think of 'better' ways to either avoid the whole mess or at least deal with it more humanely (in a loving way as it were).
theophile wrote: Sat Jan 01, 2022 10:15 am If the world is so far gone. If we are so hard-hearted and relentless in our evil. If not a single one existed with the potential to redeem the rest..

What left is there to do but wash it all away?
Don't let it get that far? If it does get that far, only 'wash' what's necessary. How are children in their formative years 'relentless in their evil'? Come on, if they are inherently evil somehow, it would have been the god that made them that way. Their parents haven't had the chance to fully corrupt them yet. The story just keeps falling apart the farther we dig.
theophile wrote: Sat Jan 01, 2022 10:15 am We are the ones responsible for the mess God sees when God wakes up... (Yet all we want to do is blame God for everything!)
Umm, "God wakes up?". Ok, that's a new twist. It says God rested for a 'day', not went to sleep and ignored the planet for a long period of time. If that's the explanation to make the story work... Ok... Not biblical at all.

I'm not looking to "blame God for everything". I'm simply pointing out that a good reason to suspect these stories are myth is precisely because a god would not be this daft.

Basically, I'm defending the honor of God if He happens to actually exist. i.e. these ridiculous stories seem patently not of a god. It's actually somewhat ironic. An atheist asking theists to stop painting God in such a bad light. If the stories are true and God is actually this daft then what can I do? Repent when we meet I guess. I had the best intentions.

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Re: Making sense of the NT

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Post by theophile »

TRANSPONDER wrote: Sat Jan 01, 2022 1:13 pm :P Maybe I overreacted. Yes, it is 'thought experiment' going on. The whole idea is pretty horrible even for humans let alone a supposedly superior god. It still strikes me that unless a god was evil, incompetent or stupid, none of Genesis could happen. Trying to explain it to be acceptable if not credible, just grated on me, even as a hypothetical. Or mythological.
Of course it's horrible. The whole situation presented in Genesis 6 sucks. And similarly any proposed solution to its problem is going to be bad. (Vaporization? Sterilization?! I still think these are marginal improvements at best and lose the forest for the trees.)

Where I was starting to go (where my last post had some scribbles at the end that in my haste I neglected to remove), is that if helpful we should strip all the biblical context away. Remove God (and any presuppositions we have about God) for a moment. Simplify things down to the essence of the problem that Genesis 6 is presenting.

i.e., Imagine you encountered a world (in your sojourns through space), and all that you saw in its inhabitants was evil. Pure wickedness and corruption through and through. No rational distinction to be made between babies and adults, humans and animals. Just corrupted life everywhere. All rotten to the core.

What would you do?

That (IMHO) is what Genesis 6 is getting at. It is meant to cause a moral (over)reaction. We can throw stones at God's response, but that doesn't relieve us of the need to personally answer, or to personally account for our own complicity in it all.

Throwing stones at God and leaving it at that (IMHO) is the true moral outrage and evasion of our role and responsibility to fix it.

So I have to disagree with your point. The final analysis is not that God is either evil, incompetent, or stupid. It's that human beings thoroughly failed at their job.

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Re: Making sense of the NT

Post #79

Post by TRANSPONDER »

theophile wrote: Sat Jan 01, 2022 3:17 pm
TRANSPONDER wrote: Sat Jan 01, 2022 1:13 pm :P Maybe I overreacted. Yes, it is 'thought experiment' going on. The whole idea is pretty horrible even for humans let alone a supposedly superior god. It still strikes me that unless a god was evil, incompetent or stupid, none of Genesis could happen. Trying to explain it to be acceptable if not credible, just grated on me, even as a hypothetical. Or mythological.
Of course it's horrible. The whole situation presented in Genesis 6 sucks. And similarly any proposed solution to its problem is going to be bad. (Vaporization? Sterilization?! I still think these are marginal improvements at best and lose the forest for the trees.)

Where I was starting to go (where my last post had some scribbles at the end that in my haste I neglected to remove), is that if helpful we should strip all the biblical context away. Remove God (and any presuppositions we have about God) for a moment. Simplify things down to the essence of the problem that Genesis 6 is presenting.

i.e., Imagine you encountered a world (in your sojourns through space), and all that you saw in its inhabitants was evil. Pure wickedness and corruption through and through. No rational distinction to be made between babies and adults, humans and animals. Just corrupted life everywhere. All rotten to the core.

What would you do?

That (IMHO) is what Genesis 6 is getting at. It is meant to cause a moral (over)reaction. We can throw stones at God's response, but that doesn't relieve us of the need to personally answer, or to personally account for our own complicity in it all.

Throwing stones at God and leaving it at that (IMHO) is the true moral outrage and evasion of our role and responsibility to fix it.

So I have to disagree with your point. The final analysis is not that God is either evil, incompetent, or stupid. It's that human beings thoroughly failed at their job.
That particular thought experiment must assume my having the same powers as God and thus assumptions have to be made about what powers God has. Given the ability to do everything I'd find a more humane way to do it than drowning, and I wouldn't take the rest of creation down with Man.

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Re: Making sense of the NT

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Post by Tcg »

benchwarmer wrote: Sat Jan 01, 2022 8:54 am Apologetics on display. Always fun to watch. How this gains converts I'm not sure.
I'm not convinced that it does except perhaps in rare circumstances. It seems that the main consumers of apologetics are those that are already convinced that what it pushes is true.


Tcg
To be clear: Atheism is not a disbelief in gods or a denial of gods; it is a lack of belief in gods.

- American Atheists


Not believing isn't the same as believing not.

- wiploc


I must assume that knowing is better than not knowing, venturing than not venturing; and that magic and illusion, however rich, however alluring, ultimately weaken the human spirit.

- Irvin D. Yalom

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