Some Questions For Atheists
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Yeah I did, kinda, read it again. You understand that I'm taking a very difficult stance here, especially me being an atheist and all, so I'm not expecting to convince you, all I want to do is see if people can view things from a different perspective, weather right or wrong, its annoying to challenge your beliefs, but i also believe it makes you stronger as a person... which ironically is another belief i could challenge.
I just want all Christians to understand more atheistic arguments, and more atheists to understand Christian arguments, its one thing to know of, but a totally different thing to understand it, and I still don't think I understand it all yet either.
Niximus
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We understand their arguments. They are just very very weak.
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God most likely didn't make Joshua brutally kill every man woman and child in Jericho. The Biblical story of the fall of Jericho to the Israelites is very likely a complete fiction...or at the very most a folktale with little or no basis in fact.
The violent conquest of Canaan by the Israelites as outlined in the Book of Joshua is certainly not supported by the available archaeological evidence.
For example exacvations at the sites of Jericho, Ai and indeed of other ancient Canaanite cities have shown that these ancient cities were unfortified. Therefore the walls of Jericho that came tumbling down at the blasts of trumpets in the Biblical story did not, and could not, have happened.
Archaeological evidence has also demonstrated that at the time of the Israelites supposed sack of Jericho, wich is about the thirteenth century BC, there was no settlement of any kind. There was certainly no archaeological signs of a city that has been sacked and burnt to the ground at that time. Like Jericho, the nearby archaeological site of Ai has shown no evidence of any settlement at the time of the supposed conquest by the Children of Israel, much less any layer of destruction.
The events described in the Book of Joshua and Judges dealing with the conquest of Israel are part of what is know as the Deuteronomistic History. This comprises the seven books of the Bible from Deuteronomy to the Second Book of Kings.
Many Biblical scholars believe that the Deuteronomistic History was compiled during the reign of king Josiah of Israel (639 BC - 609 BC) and enforces the idea that the entire land of Israel should be ruled by the divinely chosen leader of the entire people of Israel, who strictly follow the laws handed down at Sinai and the stricter warnings against idolatory given by Moses in the Book of Deuteronomy. In other words the Deuteronomistic History was written to further the religious reform and territorial ambitions of the Kingdom of Judah, who were operating in a political vaccum after Assyria withdrew from the lands occupied by the fallen Kingdom of Israel.
Judah, a backwater up to this point of time, had been a state where there had been considerable religious diversity. Archaeology has identified not only shrines to other gods other than Yahweh to Jehovah, but also that Yahewh himself was believed by the Israelites to be only one of several gods. For example in northeastern Sinai inscriptions were found that suggested that Yahweh had a consort, the goddess Asherah.
With the rise of Judah the Kings of Judah and the priests at Jerusalem attempted to further centralise the worship of Yahweh. The priestly establishment determined to establish the proper methods of worship for all the people of Judah and indeed for all the Israelites living in the north under Assyrian rule. The historian Morton Smith dubbed this new religious movement the "YHWH-alone movement". Hence the various Books that were written established the law (Leviticus) and established a history (the Deuteronomistic History) that emphaised that Jerusalem was the centre of the worship of Yahweh and that the members of the Davidic dynasty of Judah were the only legitimate representatives and agents of Yahweh's rule and were to rule over all the lands of Israel, including those of the former northern Kingdom of Israel.
That would mean of course that the worship of idols would have to be stamped out. The Book of Joshua offered a clear lesson - when the people of Israel did follow the Law of the covenant with God to the letter, nothing would be denied them. The other lesson of course was that if the people of Israel remained apart from the indigenous people (the Canaanites who worshipped gods other than Yahweh), they will be rewarded. Should they attempt to assimilate by worshipping other Gods or by marrying their women, they will be punished as the Canaanites were punished. By death and destruction. The Book of Joshua, believed to have been written between 750 BC and 630 BC, illustrated that very well and re-inforced the centralised rule of the cult of Yahweh for the inhabitants of the Kingdom of Judah. Some have suggested that the Deuteronomistic History is little more than a propaganda exercise for the cult of Yahweh and the Davidic line of the Kingdom of Judah.
It has also been noted by Biblical scholars that the list of towns ascribed to Judah in the Book of Joshua corresponds precisely to those known to be within Judah's borders in the reign of King Josiah in the seventh century BC. Archaeology reveals that some of those very same cities listed in the Book of Joshua (the events of which should take place in the Late Bronze Age - 1550 BC - 1150 BC) were only inhabited in the 7th century BC.
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The J Dog
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If we were all serious about this debate, rather than being committed to one side or the other of the argument, then we'd all be agnostic.
Nobody can prove or disprove the existence of a higher power, just as nobody can logically explain the beginnings of existence prior to the big bang.
A wise man once told me that religion was invented by an economist, recognising the demand by people for meaning to their lives, and the opportunity to supply them this meaning, and have power over them.
Why have people abandoned belief in the ancient Greek and Roman gods in favour of the new lot?
Nobody can prove or disprove the existence of a higher power, just as nobody can logically explain the beginnings of existence prior to the big bang.
A wise man once told me that religion was invented by an economist, recognising the demand by people for meaning to their lives, and the opportunity to supply them this meaning, and have power over them.
Why have people abandoned belief in the ancient Greek and Roman gods in favour of the new lot?
JW Frogen
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No, agnosticism it is simply saying I don’t know.
Fundamentalists know, both religious and atheist. They are sure they know.
Still, everyone can, indeed will experience God, though they cannot know God.
"Know" being the critical ape-word here.
Whether they know it or not.
Not all religious people or atheists are fundamentalists.
Agnostics don't believe in god, therefore they are atheists. Just don't have the balls to admit it.
JW Frogen
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No, atheists say there is no God.
Agnostics say 'I don’t know.'
It is the difference between Cardinal Pell, Osama Bin Laden, Richard Dawkins and Montaigne Confucious, or Socrates.
There is a huge difference here.
BS.
I would describe myself as Agnostic. I don’t believe there is a Christian God as described in the bible. But I accept that there may be a god, in whatever form that may be. Conscious, unconscious...
And there may not.
I philosophise a bit and engage in many conversations with people about this. I do not lack the balls to admit to anything.
From what i remember, it was you who did not have the balls to accept that atheism is the active faith that there is no god, and is therefore a religious belief in itself.
I don't "know" that there is no god, nor do I claim to. But because I choose not to believe in the god everyone else is proposing, doesn't make it a religious belief or anything else.
Otherwise you have to be agnostic about the flying spaghetti monster, FFS!
JW Frogen
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What about the evolving cheese omelet?
The one that cooks with time and controls all evolution?
If it does not exist, does that mean evolution does not exist?
The J Dog
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I haven't heard of the flying spaghetti monster movement, or met any of its believers, so there is no way to be agnostic. There need to be two opposing beliefs in order to be in the middle.
That said, a flying spaghetti monster would be pretty handy in these times of high food prices and transportation costs.
I don't agree with this either. I'd say I'm an agnostic, in the sense that I don't believe in the god/s of the major religions, but I'm not prepared to say there isn't a god or gods. There might be, I just don't know. I think that's the key difference between agnosticism and atheism. If you're going to dismiss agnostics, then doesn't your dogmatic adherence to atheism make you just as 'bad' as religious fundamentalists?
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I've heard this one, but I look at god like any other philosophical topic, if it can't be proved, take the position of disbelief, like we do with anything. Something that can't be proved must be dismissed, it's how our legal system works and how I see philosophy as. Plus, what can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence. The problem with agnosticism is that agnostics expect people to hold a position of middle ground with things, why should I hold a middle position on a topic as of yet I have found no reason to hold? I go back to my original position, disbelief.
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I haven't heard of the flying spaghetti monster movement, or met any of its believers, so there is no way to be agnostic. There need to be two opposing beliefs in order to be in the middle.
That said, a flying spaghetti monster would be pretty handy in these times of high food prices and transportation costs.
You haven't met mantis yet?
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...... there was this tunnel leading to a brilliant white light, grand ma was standing there smiling at me
JW Frogen
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No lights or tunnels, just the inherent nature of being rather than not being.
See, if you are sure something does not exist, why waist so much time arguing against it?
You do, because you are arguing against the current of your own existence.
You are trying to convince yourself.
I am not really part of this.
