The serpent being on the belly is a judgement, this is pretty clear.
13 Then the Lord God said to the woman, What is this you have done? And the woman said, The serpent deceived me, and I ate. 14 The Lord God said to the serpent, Because you have done this, Cursed are you more than all cattle, And more than every beast of the field; On your belly you will go, And dust you will eat All the days of your life; 15 And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her seed; He shall [d]bruise you on the head, And you shall bruise him on the heel.
I am not sure why we are continuing this conversation we are just going into circles.
I've stated my argument, and it is pretty well accepted in Jewish and Christian communities. IT is also very apparent in the old testament that the Jew was well aware of the evil being Satan (Ezekiel 28, Job 1). I will also say they were well aware of the christian practice, at the time a Jewish practice, of an internal adversary.
His opinions on the matter are far more valuable than yours, especially considering that you incorrectly think that Ha-Satan is a name instead of realizing it is a title.
No he has an opinion due to an interpretation, which all people living have to interpret it. Further trusting his vantage is just that, trust. He could be just as wrong as I am. There is no more likelihood that he is right and that I am wrong, or vice versa. Further a billion/billions of people agree with my vantage as there are 2.3 billion Christians on earth.
Really? Is that the relationship you see in Job? What I read sounds more like a wager in which Satan goes only as far as God allows.
I agree. It is a wager. Satan is doing God's bidding. This is perfectly fine especially since it does fit within both of their desires. Satan wishes to convince God is not all powerful, and God wishes to convince God is all powerful. AT this point, it is a matter of the human being tempted. You just have to realize that freely choosing God is a big deal. This is how God is CHOOSING to destroy Evil. Personally I think it is because God is creating a eternity in which people freely choose to be with God. Those that choose not to be with God, they will get just that...
The question is whether the Jews believed Satan to be a personification rather than an actual being. You cannot determine this by whether or not Satan actually does things in the scripture because a given story may or may not have been interpreted literally.
I am arguing that ancient Jews believed in both. They believed in "the satan" within their mind (internal struggle) and they believed in the "evil being of satan" as a deceptive being. The word satan has different meanings depending on the context of the scripture, hence the debate.
Ref my prior post and the posted link.
I prefer the argument that fits and answers all issues. God creating Evil as per in ringo's argument would most definitely argue God does not exist. IT does not make sense for God to create evil, and then turn around and command the created beings that he is seeking to be with eternally to not be evil (especially when you add Christ to the context). IT does make more sense that God created beings to be free, and beings of freedom make evil or good choices. And through that process evil will be destroyed. And in the end, those good beings as per God's law will live eternally with God.
Ask the person choosing to commit suicide. Further it is not reasonable to presume merely insane people commit suicide. We can compare this to serial killers. Maybe it is better to think that people who choose to live are insane?
We are continuing this conversation because Bible literalists have a lot of misconceptions about the Bible - conflating snakes with Satan, conflating Satan with evil, etc. - and they often assume that their interpretation is the only one. It's to your benefit to know what the alternatives are.
I have not been made aware of anything new in this forum. I am not arguing certain points because I am not aware of the other points. As you probably are aware of the points I am arguing. Further, what is the point?
No they don't, creationists like Faith make up their own sciency sounding language.
Actually creationist accept modern science including evolution, the bb, string theory, and so on. I personally prefer the electric universe model, at thunderbolts.info which refutes inflation, dark energy, black holes, and bb thought in that the universe is filled with electric currents. Ultimately it depends on the creationist. Further creationist work jobs within all sorts including all fields of science. We permeate all parts of society. One example is Dr Hugh Ross.
That's just bizarr.
I thought you just pointed out that Science says nothing about atheism and God?
Ignoring the grammatical problems with that sentence, morality IS decided by man.
We are not writing a essay. Typically discussions don't follow exact grammatical law. Further didn't you learn in college that you can BREAK grammatical law as long as you KNOW grammatical law? I am guessing you never went to college. Probably why you have to derail the discussion with insults. ALSO there is no fact that man should decide what is moral. It is also a argument that "MAN" does decide morality. We could argue there is no evidence that God does exist and that ultimately the sum of all human thoughts and decisions are completed by man concluding man decides morality. The other argument is that God does exist and love only flows from God and that LOVE can't flow without God. We tend to argue everything came from SOMETHING instead of EVERYTHING came from NOTHING, as the atheist does argue. IT is pretty clear that in science "nothing" can't make something thus the process of science does suggest something created everything. IF you read Gen 1:1, as the first verse of creation prior to verse 3 or day 1, we see that God created the universe with all things in it including the earth. Then day 1 in verse 3, is what happened on the earth after it was created. This argument is actually being argued by Hugh Ross, and millions of others, who is a physicist.
FYI: I don't give a fuck if I am using correct grammatical rules on this forum. IF you get the point great if you do not get the point, then argue the point.
What an odd thing to say; I don't have to believe in nature, I can see and touch it.
IF you don't understand the argument than ask the question. Nature has no proof in that it created itself. When I say YOU believe in nature that is meant as YOU believe that NATURE produced itself. Especially if we have in mind the full discussion. Duh.
I was not planning on responding because I honestly feel like it's pointless. However, you are asking a question so I will respond. I apologize in advance if I am coming off like I think I know-all. I just feel convinced of my arguments. Why else would I argue them, right? Lol.
The argument that God did not create evil is based on free agency. The creator can't be held responsible for the acts of the created, in fairness, if the acts of the created were due to their freedom. God has no control over free thinking beings or their actions (God does not want to force you to choose God's laws). The best example I can give you is in relation to a computer. If I created a computer that was able to think freely. Then during the computer's existence it chose to kill somebody, would that be my fault? Why would it be my fault even if I knew it could kill somebody? The only responsibility, in fairness, I would have in the computer killing somebody is that I created something that could choose to do evil. However it would not mean I created evil. I just created something that could commit evil acts. You also have to remember the computer could have chose to help the person it killed, which is precisely why I created the computer. I want it to choose freely to do good. I don't want to exist with a bunch of programmed computers. I would rather exist with free thinking computers that choose to love however the only way to achieve this goal is by creating beings that can freely commit evil acts. Now you are probably thinking, we'll you are God, can't you do anything? This is when I ask a question. What other way can free thinking beings be created to choose good vs evil? Any reduction in free agency would mean less ability to choose to do good.
I don't expect to convince you because I'm sure you have already thought about my argument above. The argument above I feel strongly about and it is logical. I honestly feel people choose to be atheist or theist based on desires. There is no amount of evidence that will convince an athiest God exists even if I was able to raise the dead. They would think of some natural process that brought the person back to life. Another point, within the above argument, if God appeared to prove God exists, it would result in a forced choice to follow God's laws. Do you really think if God showed up people wouldn't feel forced to choose to follow God's laws? Even if God was able to communicate choose freely? I think not.
The idea is we are judged by God when God's plan is completely played out. I also think it is important to realize there may be certain limits, in fairness, to knowledge with regards to free agency. God can most definitely predict precisely but actions must be acted out to be judged for them, in fairness.
There is always limits such as with free agency that can't be changed even if one is omniscient omnipotent and omnipresent. Essentially those phrases have a maximum in which nothing else is above you in those meanings. However it doesn't mean you know what choice a being is going to make before they make it in free agency. Even if you can predict it, to judge them the evil has to be played out.
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