There’s a recent post at The Atheist Ethicist, The Source of Hatred, where Alonzo explores the question of why theists hate homosexuals.
According to him, religion is not the cause. It’s the excuse. It’s what bigots use to rationalize their bigotry: “the Bible says it’s an abomination.”
But… Leviticus also says that eating shellfish is an abomination! Yet most Christians probably eat shrimp, and, anyway, there was never any persecution of shellfish-eaters. Why is that? Why is one sentence taken as “God’s law”, and another just as “ancient dietary laws”, when they’re both forbidden in the same book, and the condemnation for both (“abomination”) is the same?
The answer, of course, is that people are already bigots (though an important source of that bigotry may well be church sermons). Saying “It’s God’s command” instead of admitting to their prejudice makes them feel better.
I loved this part in the article:
If biblical prohibition were the real source of condemnation, we would find ourselves in a society where shellfish eaters and bankers would be prohibited from participating in youth organizations like the Boy Scouts. Those who insist on such a ban would argue that those who so flagrantly violate God’s law cannot possibly be moral, and clearly cannot be considered good role models for our children.
What type of message does it give our children to be a member of a troop whose troop leader is known to be a practicing shellfish eater or banker – when the Bible so clearly identifies these acts as a violation of His law? These children will no doubt come to think that all of God’s law are open to question. This type of moral relativism is the last thing that we need to be teaching impressionable young minds.
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The writings which were not included were not because some group wanted to “design” what Christianity would be, but because such writings did not pass the criteria to be accepted as factual backed by evidence. What WAS included was included because in the time, it was proven and accepted as truth because it passed the test.
Of course there were numerous other writings just as there are contemporary writings as well. To follow anything that is contrary to what Jesus said only states that “I/we choose to believe that this person is above Jesus and when Jesus said “I am the way, the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father except by me” he was just being arrogant and is nothing more than a fraud and a liar.
To minimalize committing scriptures to memory only demonstrates that we are thinking in today’s standards. Yes, Jews memorized scriptures and they still do. So important were the scriptures that committing them to memory was of utmost importance from early childhood. That does not also mean that the Holy scriptures were not recorded They were dilligently and accurately recorded and sustained. No other book has been so faithfully copied with attention to the slightest detail. Were mistakes made? Well, thinking in today’s standards I would say absolutely! But even in today’s standards, given the impotance, I would have to concede that those mistakes would be minor and relatively insignificant. Certainly not broad enough to change the message or to make up the coming of the Mesiah.
Do we want to be God so much that we will ignore that Jesus was so real and had such an impact on the world that time itself was split with his coming – A.D. is Anno Domini which translates to “in the year of our Lord”. Jesus had nothing. Lived as a poor man. Yet he set the mark of time. I think it would take far more than some people picking and choosing “stories” for this to come about. Remember, the eye-witnesses were still alive. They would have never let the New Testament be accepted if it were not true and accurate.
John
JOHN: YOU SAID:
“Yes, Jews memorized scriptures and they still do. So important were the scriptures that committing them to memory was of utmost importance from early childhood. That does not also mean that the Holy scriptures were not recorded They were dilligently and accurately recorded and sustained.”
John: If that were true, those working for King James would not have found two different people killing Goliath the Hittite, whose shew was like a weaver’s beam,” The King wanted to keep both stories, so he told them to put in the one with Elhanan, “the son of” and be sure to put it in italics to show that it was not part of the original duplicate story.
His sense of accurracy was to make sure that he did not leave both stories out. Now, we have two guys killing the same man and you wish to rationalize it because you do not want to accept the fact that David was the story handed down through the J History, from Judah and had a name for God, which was Jehovah, from Yahweh,
and Elhanan came from the E History, from which their name for God was Elohim and then they put their own hero’s name to the story, which was Elhanan.
Another example is the Elisha and Elijah accounts, double narratives. To makea them both valid, one guy places his mantle on the other one, after that other one matches all the miracles of the first one. Actually, they were the same story, each handed down from two different tribes. One tribe could not pronounce Elijah in Hebrew correctly and that is how we got Elisha. When recorded, the determination to be accurate would not allow those putting in the story, to leave the other one out, so they were combined with the rationalization of the mantle scene.
There are many of these double narratives, sometimes triple, as with Genesis 2:4b on is a separate creation story than Genb 1 to 2:4a. Both from the story of the Flood of Gilgamesh
http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs2004/0329gilgamesh.asp, the older account and not in the Bible, and with a different name for God, by the way.
The story in Gen 12, 20, and 26, all the same story. first one: Abran and Sarai. Second one: Abraham and Sarah. keep them both with the verse: “And so God changed Abram’s name to Abraham.” Third one: Isaac and Rebeccah.
All three stories tell of the two going down into the city of Gerar and telling the same King Abimelech that the girl is the sister of the boy, “so that things will go well with us” while we are in town. Abimelech then pays all three couples off because of his sin when he finds out.
No, he paid off only one couple and the story was handed down and developed into three separate accounts and was preserved because they were already classified as holy scriptures.
Now, which one was accurate? Triple narrative. The king was not so dumb as to fall for the same ruse three times!
Marvin,
Why do you purposly leave Jesus out? What exactly is you belief concerning Jesus. I don’t think we ever discussed it.
I preach and teach from Jesus’ teachings how to live, only those things which relate to any person in any century.
i believe that he caused his own death, predicted it, then turn the tables over and made it come true. He desecrated a temple full of crooked priests, exposed their ruse to rip off the poor by making them pay temple tax every time they sinned, The pharisees had to get rid of him if they wanted to control the people.
Jesus accomplished this by being educated, first as a Rabbi, adopting the role of the Old Testament Messiah who was to come, thus made it happen.
His objective was to free God’s people from the Temple’s govenment. When he was ready to do that, he had established himself in only one year and a half by teaching service to one another rather than paying to higher authorities.
The 12 he picked were of the House and Lineage of David to carry on his work once he was crucified.
He believed that His sacrifice would allow him to be resurrected in the hearts of mankind and all the rotten past would be over and mankind would then build the Kingdom of God together, free indeed.
He was saving his people from them, not from some l8th century Inferno because of their sins.
History screwed the story up, got people scared to death they were going to hell in a handbasket, then came up with saving to mean to be saved from hellfire and brimstone by accepting Jesus as the Saviour of the world.
Truth is that nobody needed to be saved from sin by an unconditionally loving God, as he taught the poor with the parable of the prodigal son. God always loves us and always will and will never send us to everlasting punishment because we did not arrive at the threshold of our understandaing of his great love before we took our last breath on earth. Life is eternal and God is always loving us and will be there forever as we progressively learn just how loving and generous He always is.
So, I teach that the fear of God is over, that to follow him is to be in sync with the way He created us. If you strive to do that, you will be much happier than if you “fight against the grain.”
He made us perfect, and with the free will to learn that, so that we don’t keep trying to be “beside ourselves” but instead, acting like true children of God, in touch with His Holy Spirit which is always within us.
I preach that we miss the best of one another when we fail to see the Christ within each other, always there. When you seek out the best in one another, you find the Christ that you may have never realized was there.
That is a better way to teach, then to teach that we are all “Sinners in the hands of an Angry God (Old famous sermon title, remember?).
Marvin,
Thank you for your in-depth reply sir.
I can say that I have felt that was somewhat over a time in my life. I was not raised religious at all. At times I did not believe anything. Other times I believed somewhat like you. Yet others I believed in a works-based acceptance by God. Meaning that if I tried to do good to others, went to church x amount of times per week, and prayed that I was ok. Destiny would have it that I walked into a coffee house one nihgt for a mocha after a day of telling crude jokes with my co-workers. I was not living according to any faith at the time and had really just been living much like you say, being good.
That night as I entered the coffee house things were not quite right. I had never been in a coffee house like this. I was from out of state and there were 5 other men standing there talking. Turns out this was a Christian coffee house and as soon as I cought on, I WANTED OUT. I felt very much out of place. This was a Tuesday and I will never forget was Men’s prayer night. With every attempt to make an excuse and leave, these men would not shut up! I was trapped or so I felt. I was practically unable to speak and they insisted I stay and pray with them. I did.
During the time of prayer something supernatural happened. I felt the weight of my sinful life on top of me. I saw myself for who I was and I saw God for who he is. At that time, I might have been the prodigal son. I had found my bottom and I was coming back home except I had never really been home to be honest. I thought I was a good person but that nihgt I encountered God and saw just how unholy I was and how holy God was. That night I really got it and I stopped living according to my own power and gave God power in my life. When I stood up, I was a new person. I was remade and I thought differently. The next day when I went home I did not speak a word but my wife asked what was up with me, something was different. That is how changed I was Marvin. She could see a physical change in me without me speaking or saying a word of the event. I know this is the transformation that Jesus spoke of to Nicademus. How do I know, because I have experienced it. From that day I have never been the same. To belive and Jesus and to truly be reborn as a new creature are two very different places spiritually.
Before that time, I was never satisfied but since that time I have been completely at peace. No matter what comes my way, I am ok with it because I know God is in control.
The power of my experience has changed my life forever and is why I cannot turn to other ideas that do not set well in my spirit. I do not try and convince people to accept Jesus but to strive to reach the supernatural transformation that is being born again. Once that has happened, we need no explaination from anyone else because the truth will have been revealed to us already of who we are. We will have a great peace in our lives because we will no longer be searching or have a knowledge that something is missing.
John
John: Good answer! What is remarkable to non-Christians, is how common this experience is among those who are born again Christians.
What i have found, however, are those who say they are and they are Jesus-dependent. Rather than “doing what Jesus would do” they preach the rest of the lives telling people what Jesus can do for them, a self-centered Jesusolatry.
Jesus taught responsibililty and when he said: Follow me, he did not mean to hold on to his coattails and let Jesus be Jesus for them. The pulpit has screwed this up horribly!
I find in your statement here and in your attitude with me to be much more mature than most.
In that regard, you get it. If you are an evangelist, you should also demand it. doing what Jesus would do is a personal responsibility to be the best that you can be by seeing what Jesus saw in each of us, the best of God that could be seen. He saw the Father in others the way he wanted us to see the Father in Him. When we believe that “I and the Father are One, then we start acting like the Father and people will recognize the Father when they see us.
That is what is missing from the pulpit! That is the most important teaching of Jesus and it has been lost because the born again Christians just didn’t get it!
Marvin, Shall we celebrate? We have agreed on something? I am tipping my glass of iced tea to you sir with cheers and wishes for peace and blessings to you!
You are right that the message has been lost. Around here we call it diluted gospel that we see every day. The message always seems to be that Jesus is peddled to anyone who will listen as the fix-all to life’s problems. I seldom hear anything other than that. To me, it is only setting the seeker up to be disappointed when he is instructed to say a little prayer then he expects his life to change for the good. If that’s what you speak of too, I am in complete agreement with you.
I am seeing where our paths are not so far apart as I previously thought. Although I look from a litteral biblical perspective, I think we have shared more than shows on the surface as far as enlightenment.
This conversation has reminded me of a great lesson I received in my spirit one day. For some reason, I looked at someone differently than I normally do. I don’t know why but maybe I was being tutored on that day. Anyway, for some reason, I looked at someone and their condition really was offensive. I believe it was because they had obviously made careless choices that placed them in that condition. As quickly as the thought entered my mind, I heard, “Does God love you any more than he loves this man here”? Such a sweet feeling of compassion came over me, Marvin. I think this is what you speak of when you say to see the God in everyone. That was such a long time ago. Since then I have never felt difference for mankind no matter how dirty, rude, unstable or anything. I thank you for your piece of that puzzle and I thank God for the lesson that day.
It’s been real nice exchanging with you today. Thanks and I hope you are blessed this week.
John
John:
I mean that every man woman and child is a door. When you open it and expect to see Jesus, you will. The door is never opened to convert, but to identify the presence of Christ in that person, so that you, not him will be saved…..saved from yourself and meeting the Lord in that person.
Evangelism, from “angel” means messenger of God. The message from God in you to every man woman and child is that the Holy Spirit of God is within the one you are talking to and it is your responsibility as the messenger to knock on that door and find Him, to find the best of that person, because the best of that person is the Presence of God. When you find Him, you are saved.