Origins of the Judeo-Christian god and religion

ah, ok. yes, i had forgotten that the genealogies contained references like this. (cause, frankly, i don't read them too closely)you win this round.

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yes, you mentioned that before. it's a little questionable, in my opinion. it doesn't say that ALL other gods are demons, just those particular ones.from the other message: the commandment simply says that they will have no other gods in the presence of yahweh. it says nothing about how true or false those gods are, just that they are not to worship any other god. let's stick to the bible, though.

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this argument works exactly as well for the bible as it works for microsoft. in other words, tell that to my 20 year old macintosh, that has a copy of microsoft word on it.This message has been edited by arachnophilia, 05-05-2006 11:40 PM

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it is a great irony that counter-culture is part of the culture.we can't look back on the psychadelic movement of the 60's and say "that doesn't count, it's counter-culture." nor can we say the same of the punk movement, or the underground rap movement.

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but the Blue Screen of Death will come as a thief in the night; in which Microsoft Windows shall pass away with a great noise, and the Hard Drive shall melt with fervent heat, the RAM also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.

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yes, there certainly is not. that would take evidence, and reasoning, and logic, and most importantly effort and a will to explain yourself.this is the sign of a weak position, and a troubled belief. the faith that turns away does so for fear that its weakness might be exposed. but the faith that cannot stand up to questions should not stand at all.why else would an evangelist resist the opportunity to evangelize? this is a cop out if i have ever heard one. why be here if not to argue? it can't be encouraging to your faith, not when you feel the need to sheild it from argument.

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convincing of truthfulness is a measure of belief -- but you mean to indicate that there is something factual about your belief. that is based on evidence. it's not belief, it's a matter of evidence.of what meaning is "faith" if it's based on evidence?religion is a matter of faith, and it should never be any different. faith is a beautiful thing, but to demean it to fact does nothing but damage the meaning of belief, the meaning of fact, and the key to our salvation.

you said this before.tell me, have you read much ancient literature? have you read gilgamesh, or any other literature of the area and era? have you read the bhagavad gita, or the upanishads? have you read the norse epics? beowulf?

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no, faith, not bible-study-books-about-other-cultures. ancient literature. not interpretative works that attempt to apologize for and explain away the blatant similarities, the original works themselves. are you capable of forming a thought yourself? or does some person you consider an authority have to think it for you first?surely, you remember the thread where we compared the wordings of gilgamesh and genesis, to determine why one was being called history and the other myth? surely, you must remember how blatantly similar to two texts were in that particular story. the arguments on your side have always been unsubstantiated empty prejudice. that's the point you don't seem to get -- you believe in your god. not allah. you are looking at the same evidence two different ways, and your "facts" boil down to a difference of opinion.

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a solid grounding in denying the obvious? when one reads the bible as literal fact, the word of god, because they see it as special and set apart -- and then they come upon another dozen books that read exactly the same way, it can cause problems.the solid grounding should be in a rational, realistic reading of the bible. i don't think hinduism and buddhism count as cults, but i'm not sure that's what you mean. not equivalence. similarities where there are similarities. no one is maintaining that islam is the same thing as judaism. they're not. clearly, they believe differently. ...and if this argument is valid for christianity, it's valid for islam. they believe they have the "Real Thing" and that everything before was at best half-right conceptualizations. you see their belief as invalid, because you believe differently.

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people like to say this for hard-to-defend propositions. now, a change in the personality of god takes the whole bible to see the picture -- but you can defend it with specifics. can you defend this with (multiple) specifics? except for the earlier parts of the bible, which we've already quoted, that portray him as a localized god. whether or not he is (and i don't believe he is) that's how he's portrayed by a few passages. to say that some other passage or interpretation changes the meaning of that is to say the bible contradicts itself, and you like one particular section better than another. are you willing to do that? i'm fine with gods being false. i'm just curious where the "demonic" bit comes from. simple question. was there a demon behind the three golden calves? or the bronze serpent? i think these are the most prominent idols early judaism fell prey to.you might be able to argue that ba'al is a demon -- but it never shows ba'al having any power at all. it'd be easier to argue that he doesn't really exist.This message has been edited by arachnophilia, 05-06-2006 10:34 AM

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your arguments are not honest. there is no way that i can deal honestly with dishonest arguments -- they are based entirely on your subjective opinion and belief. no, faith, it's not that. gilgamesh is a pretty available book. go down to barnes and noble and buy a copy. or go to the library and borrow one. it's not difficult to read for yourself.this is the same kind of argument that brought on the dark ages. how would you react if someone told you "don't read the bible, just trust what we have to say about it?" because he's very obviously writing with an agenda, from the title. i can't think of any time i've heard the word "pagan" applied to other semitic religions -- it usually connotates greek and roman pantheons, not the religions of places like ugarit and samaria, and it's barely applicable to babylon. only someone with a christian agenda calls these religions pagan, because to them everything but their particular sect is pagan.and anyone who can write a book with chapter headings on egyptian religion, and greco-roman religion should not be trusted. my mother got her masters in classics -- so she has entire bookshelf relating to greco-roman mythology and literature. even some of the books on it are condensed overviews.would you trust someone to tell you all about the entire history of christianity and judaism in one chapter of one book written to explain why islam is superior? or would you want to read the bible, the talmud, the midrashim, augustine, aquinas, etc?

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and the earlier revelations, being told in terms the crude polytheists could understand, are less accurate then? well, evidently, we ran into one in this thread. you say seth's line is called "godly" but joshua says they were idolators. do you see this as a problem? (i don't, btw. i believe in a forgiving god, and i think it's rather consistent with the mood of the old testament) anyone who reads it in context will realize that it's a book composed of fragments. between the henotheistic tendencies of the patriarchs (no challenges to the local authorities of other gods) and the polytheistic-sounding reference in deuteronomy, and the comparison of god's council in job to the, well, exact same thing in ugarit, and the fact that israelites are commanded by god to give sacrifice to something other than god -- i don't think you overlooked it. you said "i don't understand" a few times and then kind of forgot, or waved your hands and didn't listen.and if you don't see a marked shift the portrayal of the characteristics of god, especially just how jealous he is, between genesis and any other book, you're just not reading very closely. faith is by definition irrational. that's what separates it from knowledge, or trust, or understanding. it's belief -- it's emotional. i understand, from the evidence, that judaism is closely related to (and probably derived from) the religions of the neighbouring tribes and city-states. however, i also believe that the god of the hebrews is the true god, and they were the closest to getting it right at the time.i don't see a problem with this. you may think it's a contradiction, but it doesn't bother me in the slightest. i justify it just the same way you do -- those other tribes may have had a hint of truth to their religions, but they were innaccurate renderings. no, faith, the difference here is that i AM reading in context. you're just reading the bible, in isolation. you refuse to read anything about the surrounding religions. you do not acknowledge the cultural context the bible was written in, nor do you acknowledge the context of the family of religions related to the bible. instead, you contend that the bible is the 100% inerrant word of god, directly dictated to some scribes and totally unlike anything anyone else has ever written. and this claim is patently false -- to even suggest requires a gross, gross ignorance of everything surrounding the history of the bible, and the location and culture it was written in. i see nothing problematic about the bible. examined from your perspective, inerrancy, i see lots of problems. but as a human document, a collection of 1000 years worth of writing, culture, history, and literature, i see no problems whatsoever. it looks and reads exactly how i would expect it to read. reasoning and evidence don't work. don't get me wrong, faith. i'm not trying to be insulting or condescending. we are more alike than you would care to think. when i talk of faith, and fear of questioning, these are things that i have learned in my personal walk with christ. i have seen attitudes like yours cripple people emotionally, and spiritually, and result in terrible, terrible fallings out of faith. once this weakness is exposed, and the assumptions fail, the faith comes toppling down from on top of them. few ever regain it. i have seen it happen, and i've heard of it happening numerous times.the faith you need to protect with dishonesty and sheild from question is a weak one -- i would rather have a strong faith, and i would rather you have a strong faith.christ said "seek and you will find, ask and it shall be given." i don't think he meant us to hide from questions. in the bible, god appears to moses from a burning bush. then, he kills every first born in egypt, and leads the israelites through the desert with a pillar of fire and smoke. when they get to a certain mountain, god personally delivers his commandments, audibly, to every man woman and child in the israelite encampment. then he leads them on a holy war to conquer the promised land.and we're not ready to hear about a few measly pitiful demons? surely, you can find more than one then?

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The power of this book is that it isn't aimed at proving a connection between paganism and Judeo-Christianity -- so you're sure the author isn't skewing things to fit that argument. Yet you'll read about flood and creation myths paralleling Noah and Adam, about pre-Christian ideas of the immortality of the soul and life after death, and about lots and lots of Gods who die and are reborn.

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i find it highly ironic and amusing when a book sets out to prove its point, sticks to its guns, but accidently proves the other guy's point in the process to any reader with a brain. this only seems to happen in religious debates and apologistics -- when fact doesn't matter; only belief.once, i saw a webpage explaining why leviathan had to be a dinosaur -- but it spent most of the article comparing leviathan to lothan/tiamat, and other mythical dragons. the conclusion came as complete non-sequitor; like whoever wrote it hadn't even read the rest of the article.

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yes, i know it's not in the book. i just find it funny when someone presents all of the overwhelming evidence for the other side, makes a weak argument, and declares victory even though it's very apparent they failed to make their case. that seemed to be what this review was saying the book did. i've seen one camp of fundies turn against another camp's books. i saw a book once about dinosaurs in the bible -- and the review on amazon lambasted it because it wasn't young-enough earth creationism.but honestly, it does not sound like a pure academic work, it sounds like a book written to further an agenda.

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