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Author Topic:   Why Creationism
Charles Munroe
Member (Idle past 3634 days)
Posts: 40
From: Simi Valley, CA USA
Joined: 09-07-2003


Message 1 of 4 (54508)
09-09-2003 2:08 AM


Posted a message recently and got a garbled response to the question asked. Why do we need Creationism, or for that matter Genesis? The New Testament functions quite nicely without the Old Testament and avoids all the controversial materiel. Example : God created everything and that must include the devil. God wanders off leaving his creations in the company of a being God knows is evil, leaves a deadly fruit tree where naive Adam and Eve can eat thereof and when these two innocents are duped into eating the fruit what odes God do? Throws them out of paradise. What does God do to the evil one? Commands him to crawl on his belly which, if I recall, is what the serpents did prior to the so called punishment.
Q. Why, if God loved his creation, could he act so carelessly?
A. Why he was testing humankind.
R. Really. I only count two that were tested. The rest of us weren't born yet and I don't see the logic of my suffering for the mistakes of people long before I came on board.
A. Well, it was passed down genetically.
Q. Well, if so then why didn't God sterilize one or both to stop the spread of evil?
A. Oh, God couldn't do such a terrible thing.
Q. But he could drown most all life on earth in the flood of Noah? Maybe fundamentalist should consider circular filing the Old Testament and concentrate on the words of Jesus Christ. Jesus said "all have sinned" and I think it is a very poor showing of faith when one has to resort to the Old Testament to confirm what Jesus said.

Replies to this message:
 Message 2 by judge, posted 09-09-2003 2:12 AM Charles Munroe has not replied
 Message 3 by Eximius, posted 09-09-2003 4:35 AM Charles Munroe has not replied

judge
Member (Idle past 6443 days)
Posts: 216
From: australia
Joined: 11-11-2002


Message 2 of 4 (54509)
09-09-2003 2:12 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by Charles Munroe
09-09-2003 2:08 AM


Yeah...life is pretty bad.
On the other hand though, life is pretty good.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by Charles Munroe, posted 09-09-2003 2:08 AM Charles Munroe has not replied

Eximius
Inactive Member


Message 3 of 4 (54525)
09-09-2003 4:35 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by Charles Munroe
09-09-2003 2:08 AM


Charles Munroe writes:
Why do we need Creationism, or for that matter Genesis? The New Testament functions quite nicely without the Old Testament and avoids all the controversial materiel.
The following is taken from "God" by Alexander Waugh:
Christians give two reasons for holding on to the Old Testament. The first is that these books predict and promise things about Jesus Christ. Biblical scholars and many Christians now agree that this is not accurate, that the New Testament gospels were written to make it look as though Jesus' coming had been foretold by the older scriptures. For instance when Jesus ordered his disciples to fetch a colt for his ride into Jerusalem (Luke 19:30) this was supposed to fulfil the prophecy of Zechariah (9:9), 'Behold thy king cometh unto thee having salvation, lowly riding upon an ass and upon the colt of a foal of an ass.' With many such examples it is held that the Evangelists invented the stories in order for it to look like a case of divine prophecy.
The gospel writers of the second century certainly knew their scriptures; Matthew pointed to twenty examples of scriptural fulfilment, Luke to twenty-five. In order to persuade Jews to join the new cult of Christianity, they had to show that the Messiah, who was promised by the Hebrew Bible, had indeed materialised in the form of Jesus 'Christ'. There can be little doubt as to what end the gopels were written or which way around the New Testament prophecies occurred. But for those Christians who fervently believe in the Old Testament prophecies, an important questions remains: Is it still worth holding on to the Old Testament (for the sake of the prophecies) when keeping it means continuing with the brutal, embarrassing Old Testament God of Israel?
But there is another reason why Christians need to retain the Old Testament which has nothing to do with prophecy. Christianity teaches that Christ was the saviour, he came down to the world to show people how they might be saved from the stigma of original sin. Because of Adam's behaviour God is displeased with the lot of us. By adhering to the doctrines of Jesus, it is believed that God will overlook the inherited disgrace of a chosen few, granting them happiness at a future date. Because of this Christianity needs the story of Adam and Eve and the doctrine of original sin more that Judaism or Islam do; for if Adam had not taken the apple, or worse still if Adam had never existed, Jesus' whole raison d'tre would disappear in a puff of smoke. If mankind had not been tainted by Adam's petty misdemeanour, none of us would need to be saved, and would hence see no poiint in a saviour. This simple fact chains the Christian to the whole Bible not just his beloved New Testament, and the God of Israel has to come along for the ride.
A few pages later it says:
Marcion's contention was that the God of Israel, as represented by the Old Testament was a wholly imperfect being, yet the Christian schema required God to be perfect. From this, Marcion deduced that the God who created Adam and Eve, the one who threw hailstones at the Israelited in the time of Moses, could not be the same God as the one represented by Jesus.
To get around the problem of Adam and Eve Marcion suggested that the real reason mankind needs Jesus the saviour has nothing to do with original sin, but is due to the fact that the Creator God, who made heaven and earth, was himself imperfect. Jesus' function, according to Marcion, was to rescue manking from the imperfect creative effort of this Old Testament demiurge.
.....
Marcion's 'new Christianity' appealed to those wishing to detach themselves from the cruel God of Jewish scripture; however, it made Marcion many enemies...None of Marcion's writings have survived destruction...
------------------
"Ah, there's nothing more exciting than science. You get all the fun of... sitting still, being quiet, writing down numbers, paying attention... Science has it all."
- Seymour Skinner, The Simpsons
[This message has been edited by Eximius, 09-09-2003]

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by Charles Munroe, posted 09-09-2003 2:08 AM Charles Munroe has not replied

Adminnemooseus
Administrator
Posts: 3974
Joined: 09-26-2002


Message 4 of 4 (54641)
09-09-2003 9:50 PM


Thread copied to the Why Creationism thread in the Faith and Belief forum, this copy of the thread has been closed.

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