Jesus/God the same?

I think we also have to remember that the creation stories are Hebrew myths whilst the Trinity is a Christian myth.The OT makes no references to the Trinity, the trinity is totally alien to Judaism.Therefore you are correct, these two concepts could indeed stand or fall by themselves.There are Christians of course who state that if even one syllable of the Bible is untrue then they reject it all, a bit silly really given the nature of the transmission of these beliefs.Brian.[This message has been edited by Brian, 12-09-2003]

Hi,I'd like to say something about: Can you tell me how you come to the assumption that 'very good' is the same as perfect? Very good is not the same as perfect, it is less than perfect, that is why it is only very good. You are adding to the text here, God never ever claims that He made a perfect creation. Seen any unicorns?However there are references to the nephilim after the flood:Numbers 13:33 ' We saw the Nephilim there (the descendants of Anak come from the Nephilim). We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same to them .It seems to me that God has always been pretty hopeless, is there anything that He can do?Brian.

Hi,Thanks for your reply, it is interesting.I still do not see where the word 'perfect' comes in, wmscott has added this to the translation that he is apparently quoting from, I have bever read in any bIble that I have used any claim that God said all his creation was perfect.If Adam and Eve were perfect then they couldnt sin, even the free will (yawn) excuse doesn't make sense here. For Adam and Eve to be able to choose to commit a sin there needs to be the existence of sin in the first place. So God must have created sin, and therefore He created imperfection.It is amazig that anyone over the age of 5 takes the Bible literally, some people are so afraid of reality.Brian.

Hi, thanks for the reply Come one wmscott you can do much better than this, you have simply done a search at an e-bible and posted the first verse that mentions the word ‘perfect’ or is this just coincidence?So could you perhaps tell me where God said that His creation was perfect? It is fine and dandy to say that God is perfect and therefore his creation is perfect but this is inadequate. But what you appear not to consider is that God cold be perfect and create imperfection if it was in his plan to do so. So God may have intentionally produced an imperfect creation because He had to in order for His plan to work. By definition God is perfect yes, but if He wants to produce a flawed creation then He is entitled to do so, and this must be what He must have done. Here you expose another example of the folk tale nature of the Old Testament. You claim that the Flood was to eradicate the Nephilim but then you assume that the entire Israelite nation has no clue that this had happened. Surely out of two or three million people someone would be aware that the Nephilim all died in the Flood. Surely someone would say ‘How can they be Nephilim, our Lord killed them all in his wonderful Flood!’Also, if the spies were lying, why did Caleb have to drive out the three giants mentioned by the spies (Num 13:22) in Joshua 15:14? More accurate? How do you know it is more accurate, how do you know that Moses wasn’t lying so that he would install confidence in the Israelites? God has told the Israelites that He would be with them in every battle and that all the need to do was to ‘be still’ (not nervous), so Moses may have lied (a white lie granted) in order to promote confidence in the camp. The anakim sound very similar to the Nephilim!Moses doesn’t need to call the Nephilim, there identity was qualified in numbers 13:33, that they were Nephilim is so well established that Moses doesn’t need to repeat it. Yes there is, in numbers 13:33:American Standard Version:And there we saw the Nephilim, the sons of Anak, who come of the Nephilim: and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight. New International Version: We saw the Nephilim there (the descendants of Anak come from the Nephilim). We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same to them. English Standard Version: And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.There is really some explaining to do wmscott, if you think that there were no Nephilim around after the Flood. It clearly says that they sons of Anak come from the Nephilim. Now if the Nephilim were all wiped out then there can be no one post flood who are even related to the Nephilim, unless of course Noah was, but then we know he wasn’t.Noah and his family are the only people to survive the Flood, so how can any remnant of the Nephilim be around, even if we want to take it as being very very very distant relations of the Nephilim? We are back to the storyteller’s art yet again. Oh I see, then God failed yet again, he is pretty hopeless really isn’t He?This YHWH character really doesn’t’ appear to get anything right, I bet the other Gods in the Canaanite pantheon are very embarrassed by YWHW constant failure, they must look on in disbelief every time YWHW tries to do something, how can a God be so simple? Which really wasn’t eliminated though.This is the danger in taking three thousand year old folk tales literally wmscott, you miss the entire point of why they were written.Brian.

Hi, thank you for your reply. This is from the New Testament, which has nothing to do with the Tanakh. You are taking the opinions of a 2000 year old propagandist as being something that has any relevance to today’s society. The author of Timothy was writing in a world where people believed that you were as likely to meet a God/angel/demon walking down the street as you were likely to meet a flesh and blood human, this is ancient folklore wmscott, read it in context, it is as real as Peter Pan. Apparently YWHW had many different activities, and He was absolutely hopeless at them all. That was one of his activities, he was also a warrior, which he was also hopeless at. This is untrue, if He thought it was perfect he would have said ‘perfect’ and not ‘very good’. How do you know that His intention wasn’t to actually produce an imperfect world, it makes much more sense?If He had made a perfect world then He would not have created sin, He would not have created the option to sin, He created an imperfect universe and all its contents are imperfect too. It may well have been part of His plan, who knows, who cares? Yes, and the Bible certainly has played a large part in the condition of the world today, how many Holy Wars have Christians waged based on the wars of Joshua, wars that have been proven to be untrue? How then can the world be perfect if it is possible to choose to do something evil, God must have created evil in order for people to choose to do it? If God had never created evil, then man could not have chosen it as an option. This verse however, does not apply to everyone, maybe you need to read this in context as well. Try and find out what ‘their spot’ was referring to. I am really bored with the free will defence but will respond nonetheless. With free will we have a choice, we have a choice to choose to sin if we want, however, if there was no such thing as sin then we couldn’t choose it, God created sin as an option for us, God created a flawed creation. Genesis 6:4 is interpreted as saying that giants originated in the marriage between the sons of God and human females. The Nephilim were thought of to be the ancestors of the giants that the Hebrews met in their ‘conquest’ of Canaan. Which we now know is untrue of course, the Israelites never conquered Canaan, there was no conquest and the Israelites merely emerged from within Canaan. So who has actually lied? Moses speaks for God and tells the Israelites that they will conquer the land, they didn’t conquer the land at all, the Bible’s version of the ‘history’ of Israel’s origin is pure fiction. If the story is true the report was actually correct, there was no conquest of canaan. If I were you then I would take everything you read in the Bible with a pinch of salt. The Bible isn’t exactly that clever either wmscott, it is riddled with inconsistencies and absurdities. This is pure circular reasoning, they are wrong because the Bible says they are wrong, deary me what a narrow world you live in. wmscott, I don’t wish to be mean but reading your posts proves that you are in no position to try and correct anyone about the Bible. That only applies in your fantasy world, in the real world where normal people live, these rules do not apply. Thanks for the warning anyway.Brian.

Hi wmscott, I do not reject the Bible completely, some of the Kings mentioned in it can be verified by external sources, a lot of towns and cities have been verified too. However, there is hardly a single event that has been verified, certainly pre 9th century BCE there is virtually nothing in the Bible that has been supported by external sources. This evidence is all in your imagination though.I agree there is not point in discussing the sin creation, you aren’t open mided at all in this area, how someone can choose to do something that doesn’t exist is beyond me, and if they choose to do something that does exist then it has to have been created by God. But, this is contrary to your mindset so there is no point. Of these events that took place, name three from the Pentateuch that took place and cite the evidence please. Some evidence please? The Bible only remains an ‘accurate’ book in the minds of the people who are unfamiliar with the archaeological and historical data. Everyone, and I mean everyone who is involved in the old testament/archaeology debate rejects the Bible’s version of the events from the patriarchs through to the settlement in Canaan. Some even go further and reject the bible up until the time of the Mesha Stele. Check out these books:Albright, William The Archaeology of Palestineand the Bible. F H Revel New York 1935Beek Gus Van The scholarship of William Foxwell Albright : an appraisal. Atlanta Scholars Press 1989.Binford, Lewis Debating Archaeology Academic Press San Diego 1989.Brettler, Marc The Creation of History in Ancient Israel. Routledge
New York:1996Bright, John A History of Israel: Revised edition. SCM Press Ltd. London 1972Buttrick George A.(Ed.) The Interpreters Dictionary of the Bible. Abingdon Press, New York 1962Clements, R. E. ed., The World of Ancient Israel: Sociological, Anthropological and Political Perspectives. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1989Coote, Robert B Early Israel: A New Horizon. Fortress Press Minneapolis 1990.Davies, Philip R. In Search of Ancient Israel. JSOT Sheffield Academic Press, Sheffield 1995.Davies, Philip R. Scribes and Schools: The Canonization of the Hebrew Scriptures, Westminster John Knox Press Louisville 1998Davies, Philip. The Origins of the Ancient Israelite States. JSOT
& Fritz Volkmar Sheffield 1996.
(Eds)Dever, William G What did the Biblical Writers Know And When Did They Know It? What Archaeology Can Tell Us About The Reality of Ancient Israel. Wm B Eerdmans Publishing Co. Grand Rapids Michigan 2001.Dever, William ‘Qom, Khirbet El’ in The Oxford Encyclopaedia of the Near East Eric M. Meyers (Editor)ASOR vol IV Boston Mass. 1997.Dever, William Syro-Palestinian and Biblical Archaeology Fortress Press In Knight and Tucker (Eds.) The Hebrew Bible and its Modern Interpreters. Philadelphia 1985.Finkelstein, Israel The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology’s New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of its Sacred Texts. Touchstone New York 2001Flanagan James W David's Social Drama: A Hologram of Israel's Early Iron Age, Almond Press Sheffield: 1988Fritz, Volkmar An Introduction to Biblical Archaeology JSOT Sheffield 1994.Glueck, Nelson Rivers in the Desert. Farrar, Strauss & Cudahy. New York 1959.Hasel, Michael G. Israel in the Merneptah Stela BASOR no.296
pp.45-63.Gottwald, Norman K. The Hebrew Bible: A SocioLiterary Introduction Fortress Press Philadelphia 1985Gottwald, Norman K The Hebrew Bible in Its Social World and Ours Scholars Press Atlanta 1993Halpern, Baruch The First Historians:The Hebrew Bible and History Harper & Row San Francisco 1988Hughes, Jeremy Secrets of the Times: Myth and History
in Bible Chronology Sheffield Academic Press Sheffield
1990.Isserlin B.S.J. The Israelites. Thames and Hudson Ltd London 1998.King, P J The contribution of Archaeology to Biblical studies Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 45 Catholic Biblical Association Of America Washington 1997.Lance, H D. The Old Testament and the archaeologist. Fortress Press Philadelphia 1981.Lang, Bernhard, ed., Anthropological Approaches to the Old Testament Fortress Press Philadelphia 1985Laughlin, John C H. Archaeology and the Bible. Routeledge London 2000.Lemche, Niels Peter The Israelite in History and Tradition. SPCK London 1998.Lemche, Niels Peter Is It Still Possible to Write a History of Ancient Israel? in V Phillips Long, Israel’s Past in Present Research. Eisenbrauns Indiana 1999Liverani, Mario "Propaganda," in David Noel Freedman, (ed). The Anchor Bible Dictionary Doubleday New York
1992Mays, James Luther Old Testament Interpretation Past, Present, and Future. Essays in Honor of Gene M. Tucker Abingdon Press
Nashville 1995Miller, J Maxwell The Old Testament and the Historian. Fortress Press Philadelphia 1976.Miller, J Maxwell The Israelite Occupation of Canaan:Israelite and Judaean History Fortress Press Philadelphia 1977.Miller, J Maxwell & Hayes John H, A History of Ancient Israel and Judah SCM Press London 1986.Niditch, Susan Oral World and Written Word:Ancient Israelite Literature John Knox Press Westminster 1996Noth, Martin The History of Israel. SCM Press Ltd. London 1983.Overholt Thomas W. Cultural Anthropology and the Old Testament Fortress Press Minneapolis 1996Rogerson, J. W. Anthropology and the Old Testament John Knox Press Atlanta 1978Seters, Van John In Search of History: Historiography in the Ancient World and the Origins of Biblical History, Yale University Press New Haven Conn 1983Shanks, Hershel (ed.) The Rise of Ancient Israel. Biblical Archaeology Society Washington 1992.Thompson, Thomas The Origin Tradition of Ancient Israel 1. The Literary Formation of Genesis and Exodus 1-23.JSOT Press Sheffield 1987.Vaux, Roland de Ancient Israel, vol. 1: Social Institutions. McGraw-Hill, New York 1961Whitelam, Keith W. The Invention of Ancient Israel:The Silencing of Palestinian History. Routledge London 1996.Wilson, Robert R. Sociological Approaches to the Old Testament Fortress Press Philadelphia: 1984The thing is though, this is a debating forum, and asking each other to read some books is not conducive to good debate. Maybe you could pick from your book what you think are the best arguments that support the Bible and I will respond to them. It would be a good idea to open another thread on which to discuss this, as this thread is about Jesus and God .. I believe certain things about the Bible, I believe that it s a collection of propaganda, songs, poetry, social history, laws, mythology, folk tales, and ideological history, I do not believe that there is anything supernatural about it. Why don’t we consider verifiable data that we have, why don’t we pick a few alleged biblical events and examine the evidence for those? You can argue all day about the supernatural aspect of it but you are never going to prove this, the archaeological data can be examined and conclusions drawn from it. Come into the real world for a few days, leave the metaphysical realm to itself and see the reality of the Bible.Brian.

Hi Bill,Doesn't wmscott know about the origin of the name Jehovah?
Does he know nothing about the amalgamation of YWHW and Adonai? Surely he doesn't think that Jehovah is a straightforward translation of YWHW ?Brian.

Hi,I think if I was to follow anything with all my heart I would make sure I knew a little about it !Here is a good link that explains the use of 'jehovhah'Brian.

Hi, Yes, God likes to deceive His creation, notice how he loaded the dice in the eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil myth.
Of course nothing is actually hidden, all that happens is that someone comes up with an alternative interpretation and makes some ambiguous claims, it is patently obvious what most of the Bible is saying. I live perfectly well without ‘God’s Word’, in fact my life is a hundred times better now that it ever was when I was foolish enough to think that the Bible had any ‘Truth’ in it. This is simply self-delusion, God is only real if your really really want him to be, the funny thing is, Jesus pops out of existence by applying a little common sense. You cannot search out the truth of a matter if you have set yourself into a stance before looking into it, your pro-God stance has blinded you to reality. I wasn’t warned about this, and I don’t think anyone else here was. But you do know that the Adam and Eve narrative is a folk tale don’t you, I mean the only people who think this actually happened are people who have serious psychological problems. I disagree, this tale is to explain to an ancient people how evil entered the world, it is crystal clear, all you are doing is giving your own spin where none is needed. I think that Jeremiah and Micaiah would disagree with you. ‘God told me that’ is only the first prerequisite for a prophet, the prophet’s words also have to be proven to have come to pass, which is a bit of a bummer when we know that God is happy to tell his prophets lies in order to test his people’s loyalty. Well we know that the vast majority of the Bible has been proven untrue, no big deal really when the authors were ancient spin doctors. Why should I listen to the religious nuts that approach me in the city centre and tell me that YHWH loves us all when I know there is no such thing as a God. Why do these people leave us decent, honest, and caring people alone? The world would be a much safer place without religion. Prophecy is a totally pointless activity, there isn’t a single prophecy in the entire Bible that has been verified to have come true. If you are talking to God Stephen then you really need to go to your doctor and ask them to recommend a good psychiatrist because you are entangled in a web of self-delusion. All that God has ‘said’ to you is exactly what you thought He would say. Why would God prefer to be called by a composite name, why would God have a preference anyway? If God preferred ‘jehovah’ then why did he tell Moses that His name is YWHW? So He didn’t answer your question then, evidently God has as much an understanding of the Trinity myth that you do, doesn’t this tell you that you are having conversations with yourself? And my contribution to this is to ask you again to seek medical help, I say this in all sincerity because your post shows too many ‘text-book’ replies, ‘God’ has revealed nothing to you and you cannot see this.Your post is sodden with too much bog-standard Christianity, and the errors in your posts are so explicit that a child can spot them. Does it not seem a bit strange to you that a Canaanite deity would prefer a man made name as opposed to the name that He gave to Moses?Your hinting at the Trinity is also a teaching that has no place in YWHW worship, the Trinity is totally alien to Judaism and all you are doing is putting words in ‘Gods’ mouth, it is so obvious that you are hearing what you wish to hear during your ‘divine communion’ that I really need to ask you again to seek therapy.Best of Luck.Brian.

Hi, hope you are well. I respect and value your responses, I am not trying to insult you or ridicule you. I am concerned about anyone who thinks they hear voices. I never claimed that you are mad, I did imply that you may be suffering from a psychosis, but if you haven’t been checked out by a psychiatrist then it is a possibility. Perhaps your aren’t mad after all As are invisible voices. But He has allegedly talked to dozens of prophets, and the language used to describe Him is used so we can have some idea of his greatness. So why then is it that only certain people hear Him, and normally it is only people who try very hard to convince themselves that He exists. Why bother convincing yourself that He is real, these are ancient myths that you are wasting your life away on. Ok, as a scientist then surely you must explore every possible avenue in an attempt to come to an acceptable conclusion? This said, have you asked a professional to examine your state of mind? John Nash claims the same about a number of entities. This is circular reasoning though. You could be interpreting the Bible to fulfil your preconceptions. So why not get a professional opinion?What would your doctor say to you if you went to him and told him that you believe that you are speaking to God? I bet he wouldn’t send you away with his congratulations ringing in your ears. This reason would be what? Says who? You make up the rules to suit yourself. Just because you were like this doesn’t mean that everyone else is. As a scientist then surely you must know that you could be deluding yourself, it is a possibility. But you are judging yourself if these ideas have been confirmed. Why not put God to the test at the forum here where we can judge independently?Here is a test, the next time you chat to the big fella in the sky, ask him to pop over to Scotland and have a chat with me, I am sure if I come to the forum declaring that God is real that a few people would take a lot of notice. We all die, there is no choice and I believe that the idea of God is evil. It is a bout a threat, follow God or burn in Hell, this is a threat. I am in these debates to try and show people how ludicrous it is to believe in God and the Bible.Best Wishes.Brian.

Hi,Well tonight is the big guy's best chance of communicating with me.I got a case of Stella Artois in the fridge, I got enough whisky to float the Titannic in, and once I finish those off if the big guy is not chattering away in my ear then He never will!Happy New Year Stephen Ben Yeshua.Brian.

Hi,An additional point about Alexander was that he was said to born of a virgin! Plutarch wrote that Alexander's mother Olympias was struck in the womb by a lightning bolt the night before her marriage, the bolt caused a fire and when the fire was put out she bore Alexander.Another useless piece of information LOLBrian.

Hi, speaking of false teachings: Genesis is in the Hebrew Bible, Judaism does not have a trinity, you are falsely representing the Book of Genesis. The Tinity is found nowhere in the Old Testament.The verse you quote is a very well-known one, it uses the word 'Elohim' which means Gods, and is a generic term for God. For example, the God (El) of the Old Testament is called YWHW. Genesis 1:26 has also been interpreted as referring to a royal 'we'.The early Hebrews believed that there were many Gods, Baal and Ashterah for exaple, the monotheism was a later development.There are a few other interpretations, but the Trinity is found nowhere in the Old Testament. Christians invented the Trinity as a way out of their polytheistic beliefs.Brian.

Hi,This is the Nicene Creed that was finally adopted by the Church about 400 years after Jesus died?This is still the Christian take on parts of the Bible(although there are Christians who do not believe in the Trinity) it still has no foundation in the Hebrew Bible. However, I will concede that Christians think that there are references to the Trinity in the Old Testament, I am not in the slightest convinced of this, and a lot others aren't either.Anyway, why did it take nearly 400 years for this to be accepted if it was explicitly taught in the Bible?I must mention that I am in no way defending the JW's, in my opinion JW is an extremely ignorant faith (I have a very good personal reason for believing this). The fact that it is possible for JW parents to sit back and watch one of their children slowly dying, when a simple blood transfusion could save that child's life, is tantamount to manslaughter in my opinion.I recognise that people are entitled to believe in whatever they want to believe in, however, I do not need to agree with them or even repsect them, and as far as JW's go, I find their faith extremely backward.The JW base this blood transfusion teaching on verse such asGenesis 9:1-4 Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.
4 "But you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it. This ancient belief also 'supports' their stance:Leviticus 17:13-14 'Any Israelite or any alien living among you who hunts any animal or bird that may be eaten must drain out the blood and cover it with earth, 14 because the life of every creature is its blood. That is why I have said to the Israelites, "You must not eat the blood of any creature, because the life of every creature is its blood; anyone who eats it must be cut off." The life of every creature is in its blood, they believe that a creatures soul is in its blood, so very very sad.Also Acts 15:28-29 It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us not to burden you with anything beyond the following requirements: 29 You are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid these things. Farewell. The JW interpret these verses against eating meat that has not been well drained of blood, with accepting blood through transfusion. This is a horrendous belief that has caused untold suffering, imagine watching your child die, when one word from you can save its life, yet you prefer to hold on to your ancient mythological fairytales rather than save your child, it is heartbreaking.Some people may actually admire a JW for holding to their beiefs, however I personally do not hold the same admiration for these people.Brian[This message has been edited by Brian, 01-11-2004 to remove a final comment that was from the heart rather than the head][This message has been edited by Brian, 01-11-2004]

Hi,Sorry about the late reply, I managed to overlook your reply in my mailbox, sorry about that. I don't disagree with you, however I was simply expressing the JW belief that the soul is in the blood, I didn't make it up!From Here God himself explained the principle underlying those sacrifices: "The soul [or, life] of the flesh is in the blood . The JW often translate the word 'life' as 'soul', so I didn't manipulate anything, I just reported what they believe. I do? That's amazing since I don't believe in the concept of a soul. If I knew I would tell you, but since there is no such thing I am afraid I cannot help you. Ask some of the Christians here, they might be able to help.Brian.