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Author | Topic: Can the Christian God exist without the Bible? | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
jar Member (Idle past 416 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined:
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GOD, the creator, exists or does not exist. The Christian God, or any God, can never be more than some minor reflection of GOD. Religion is no more than a creation of man and can never equal the actuality.
The Map is not the Territory. Aslan is not a Tame Lion
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jar Member (Idle past 416 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
that came to know the Christian (or Jewish in the OT) God without the Bible.
Did Luke read the Bible? Or Paul? Or Mark? Or Joseph of Arimathea? Or John of Patmos? Or Constantine? Aslan is not a Tame Lion
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jar Member (Idle past 416 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
That's pretty much how the Bible came into existence, isn't it? Remember, the Bible (or Canon as it should be noted), as an artificial construct. It(they) was(were) voted on and set in stone. It is but a subset of Scripture.
It also places a limit on GOD. Unless one is careful the Bible says "This is all there is; thus ends God's communication with man." Aslan is not a Tame Lion
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jar Member (Idle past 416 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
If there is a GOD, He exists regardless of Bible or believers or non-believers.
I think that people would go about writing Bibles, starting churches, and doing the same thing at a much faster pace than folk did back in the day before Constantine up till the printing press. Again, the Canon or Canons are artificial constructs. Humans said "These are the books we will include, those are extra credit, this pile will be excluded." And so far, it's been impossible to even determine one single Canon that applies to all Christianity. People have not stopped writing about GOD. All the things you mention exist today. Aslan is not a Tame Lion
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jar Member (Idle past 416 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
If the early canons were artificially constructed, are you suggesting that God is incapable of bringing any form of agreement that can be quantified? I'm not suggesting anything, just presenting the evidence. The facts are that there are several different Canons. While there is commonality among them there is also disagreement that at times makes a major difference. For example, the Samaritans, one of the oldest extant Churches, settled on Scripture being what was accepted as scripture during the life of Jesus, the Pentateuch. They place all of the New Testament as extra-Canon. What is considered Scripture will depend on which sub-set of Christianity you happen to belong to. Again, that has little to do with the existence or non-existence of GOD. This message has been edited by jar, 09-21-2005 08:30 AM Aslan is not a Tame Lion
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jar Member (Idle past 416 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
Of course, Scripture as mentioned in Corithians would not refer to the Bible.
Aslan is not a Tame Lion
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jar Member (Idle past 416 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
At the time Corinthians was written, there was no Bible, none of the Gospels were yet written, it was still hundreds of years before any attempt at a Canon would be made.
Aslan is not a Tame Lion
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jar Member (Idle past 416 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
does so whether or not anyone knows of Her or can describe It. The existence of an object is not dependant on it's being known.
Aslan is not a Tame Lion
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jar Member (Idle past 416 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
Could be.
But IMHO the Bible is but a work of Man, filled with all the imperfections of Man, with all the limits of Man. The Bible itself is not bad, but the interpretations of most Christians are. The limits are not of GOD but of Man. Aslan is not a Tame Lion
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jar Member (Idle past 416 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
I think GOD does. But can mankind understand?
Aslan is not a Tame Lion
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jar Member (Idle past 416 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
Grace and Mercy are things you learn to do.
Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!
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jar Member (Idle past 416 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
People have visions and make radical changes in their lives for many reasons. People also change their loyalties.
Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!
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jar Member (Idle past 416 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
But the only support for the assertion that the Jewish God created the universe are the stories in the Bible.
If those stories did not exist then could that God exist?Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!
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jar Member (Idle past 416 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
The construct you are referring to is irrelevant to this topic.
The "Christian God" is a product of the evolution of the Hebrew God and so exists only as a result of the stories in the Hebrew culture and mythos. If those stories did not exist then the "Christian God" would never have been created.Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!
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jar Member (Idle past 416 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
HUH?
If a human sent an ant to the ants the ants would know another ant.
Assuming, of course, that the Christian God was and is close to GOD in definition. If it were entirely human imagination, I could see your point, but if divine communion and relationship between humans and GOD were possible, the Christian/Jewish God would be close to the reality of GOD. HUH? So GOD is Coyote. Thor is GOD. Ganesha is GOD. What you are claiming is that YOUR divine communion is right and all the other examples of divine communion are wrong. When you try to bring Jesus in, your case gets even weaker since Jesus is based on just a subset of the Bible, the New Testament.Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!
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