I have absolute proof that there is no God.

[seeker]

I've just seen in our local paper that a little girl who lives in our town has died. She has been the focus of much prayer since she was taken ill last year. Her parents were thoroughly good Christian people who trusted God absolutely.

The is no way that a loving, omnipotent, beneficent God who notes even a sparrow falling would not have answered these people's prayer.

So, if I had even a scintilla of doubt, it is now gone. There is no God.

[HolofernesesHead]

Seeker, did you see my post (some days ago now) on the sufferings of the early church? If you read about the persecution of Christians under Nero in the 60s, and then start to ask yourself how they might have understood those words as they were being fed to lions or used as human torches for Imperial palace garden parties, it becomes obvious that from the start, Christainity has never been about geting safe passage through life. 'In this world you will have many troubles.' 'Some of you will be killed'. 'An hour is coming when those who will kill you will think that they are offering worship to God.'

You've got to balance this stuff out with the 'ask and you will receive', otherwise, with all respect, you're not being truthful to the bible. It has both messages, of suffering and of hope. Paul is the epitome of this paradox; he talks about carrying around in his body the death of Jesus (in his suffering) so that the life of Jesus may be revealed. It's so easy to take a few words out of context from the Bible, but in all honesty I do think that enaging with the Bible in any meaningful way means hearing all the messages, not just one or two.

[HolofernesesHead]

Sorry TechnoDad, I'm sure you are very honest. Didn't mean to imply otherwise.

[kimjoy]

almost all scientists beleive in evolution so would not the God type come at the end of the process not the start?

[trumphy]

I'm sorry for your loss.

[technodad]

Kimjoy

I wouldn't say scientists "believe" in evolution, they simply see that the evolutionary theory is proven by the immense quantity of data and that all other "theories" are clearly complete an upper bollox pedalled by pseudo science idiots who are either too stupid or too brainwashed to understand the data correctly.

[garlicnuts]

Thanks for your answer to Technodad, Holo. I've just examined your part 1 here, which points out that the same translation was made elsewhere, with different results: the presence of parthenos as the rendering of 'almah, did not give rise in any Jewish community of the pre-Christian era to a belief in the virginal conception of Immanuel.

This can only mean the early christian churches chose the word 'virgin' over 'maid', thus choosing to found the entire religion on a sexist myth. That totally undermines its entire basis as Technodad says.

YY, seeker. [sigh]

[seeker]

Evolution is not something you "believe" in, any more then you "believe" in gravity.

[technodad]

Do you think Holo will re-evaluate her answers if it turns out she has (once again) been selective with her data?

[NovackNGood]

If Mary had existed she would have been about 13 or 14 as she was promised to jospeph, not married and joesph could be anywhere from 20 to 80, although most bible scholars put that age at closer to around 40.

The only ones who don't agree with that are the modern right wing american evangelical types who get very hot under the collar when you point out that joeseph was a kiddie fiddler.

Interestingly the american evangelicals have started to turn that argument against the Islamic faith as Aisha was written as being only 9 when promised to Muhammed but this is probably used as the age to make it certain people see her as a virgin and therefore pure as it was customary by the time of mohammed for 13 year olds to mary to 17 year old men etc so by saying she was 9 nobody would question her virginity and purity.

[trumphy]

I wonder, why do people have such a drive to keep living, if we are meant to grow old and die? If there is no God, and we all evolved, then why don't we just accept death, surely it would be easier than the horrific pain felt when losing a loved one? Just a thought.....

Also sorry to all of you who have experienced such a devastating loss.

[NovackNGood]

That is life, the fact that some can't cope with death so need a crutch of a miaical sky fairy to go and live with because they fail to accept death is like children needing a tooth fairy. Of course some people can't handle broken hearts which is why we end up with stalkers and jealousy exes who acid burn and shoot, or rape, terrorise their ex`s etc. Seems like failure to cope is a mental illness not proof of any god.

[technodad]

trumphy - I am not sure I understand what you are trying to say (I think you are trying to say "Why do people have a desire to carry on living if there is no god? Therefore there must be a god").

We have a drive to survive because it is a characteristic that we have evolved (over billions of years), because it gives us a higher likelihood of successful reproduction. We are pre-programmed to fight to survive!

Very simple really.

[HolofernesesHead]

Garlic, thank you (Imean that sincerely, not sarcastically!) I had forgotten the most important factor in that the 'Bible' which early CHristians knew and read was (what is called now) the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Hebrew scriptures, and in the Septuagint, which I've just checked, Isaiah 7:14 does indeed use parthenos. So the thing to bear in mind is that the Septuagint was a Jewish undertaking, complied probably in the 3rd c. BCE after the conquest of Alexander the Great and the Hellenisation of the ancient world, and, screamingly obviously, before the writing of the New Testament. I wasn't eliberately being selecive so as to deceive you, I had genuinely forgotten to factor that in. I've been working all weekend!

So the prophecy quoted in Matthew is the same as the text of Is. 7:14 in the Septuagint, i.e. it is the quotation as Matthew would have known it, as someone who was probably Jewish but raised and steeped in Greek. Again, there is much that could be said here wrt gender identity across Greek and Hebrew cultures, and Egyptian too, the idealisation of virginity in both etc etc, but no doubt that'd be ignored and written off as 'waffle.'

Of course, much remains unanswered by this account - one big thing being the unescapable conclusion that what Isaiah meant in Is. 7:14 is very different to what Matthew means in his citation of it - but that's part of a much bigger question wrt Jewish-Christian identities in the first century, which is, undoubtedly, 'waffle.' Fascinating, wonderful, truthful waffle.

On that note, I don't mean this in an offensive way, but atheism as depicted on this thread causes me one huge problem, which is that to buy into it, I'd have to shut off a big part of my brain. If 'hard evidence' and one-sentence answers are the only admissible...well, evidence, I'd have to seriously dumb myself down to go along with it. Life is complex, identities of all types are complex (and wrt Mary gender and religious identities are part of the picture). I find all this stuff endlessly fascinating and the possibility that God is part of it all, I find fascinating. To say it's all 'made-up stuff' is just so reductive, so flat-earth. Christianity, and Judaism are historic religions and there is a wonderful wealth of history there to be explored and interpreted, with so much wisdom and humanity and love. I'm not saying this to score points, I honestly think that to give that wealth up, I'd come off poorer; to dismiss it all as 'made-up stuff' I'd have to shut down the best part of my brain.

[NovackNGood]

Why would a belief in god give you any more of a have a drive to keep living if you get to a better place with god?...

Ah yes because your religion put that catch 22 in that suicide was evil even though it is not actually condemned in the bible despite 6 people committing suicide i the bible not once does it say god condemned them after it. After all who would follow a suicide cult....some do of course but the cult then tends to die out.

christians have no other reason to keep on living than any one else. Except the christians in their arrogance think that if they are hard done by it is god testing them...cuckoo.

[NovackNGood]

Holo

It was the christians who believed the earth was flat. The Assyrains had already said it was round and at the sun was at the centre of the solar system. It was the church that said it was flat with 4 corners and then when Galileo pointed out the sun was the centre of the soar system the christians called him a heretic.

Your naivety is that to believe in chistianity is to have shut off your brain to accept the churches silly woo woo, Your use of the phrase jewish-christian and failure to acknowledge the rest of the Abrahamic religions points you out to no doubt be anti-islamic despite your religions all being about the same and indeed lslam and christianity being far closer than judaism and christianity therefore I suspect you are just one of those american creationsist.

[Hullygully]

I wish I hadn't come to this so late. I can't possibly read all of it, but it looks most inneresting.

[trumphy]

Hi Technodad

I was thinking of it from a practical point of view. Having lost people myself and experiencing the pain and shock. Evolution is supposed to be about survival of the fittest etc, so what is the point in having such strong emotions when they can be so crippling, surely that is counter productive? You can look at life and people can tell you we evolved from this or that and I think, ok, but it doesn't answer the, I don't know how to describe it, the yearning I have to understand why? Why are we here? If there is no God what is out there? What is our future going to be? Meaning of life type stuff I guess.

Actually it's starting to make my head spin now!

[NovackNGood]

Atheism is not a religion Holo. It is simply the word used to describe those who do not get blindly led into believing nonsense about a big sky fairy creating the planets because some people cant understand the actual science of astrophysics etc. Just because you didn't understand everything at school you don't need to run to a simpletons explanation that is basically a con, a form of cultural marxism to keep you in your place.

As that great author, and american Mark Twain wrote, the first religion started the moment the first fool met the first conman. The problem is that once folks are conned they hate to admit it as they would lose face. Thats is why conmen do so well.

[HolofernesesHead]

Nocak, I was using the word 'flat-earth' metaphoriacally. I'd have to stop using metaphor too, wouldn't I??!!

And oh, for heaven's sake. You've never met me. You know little., if anything, about me. Your own prejudices fill in the rest. And you get it wildly wrong. You know nothing about me! I'm not even going to try and defend myself against that ridiculous charge of anti-Islam. I'm really cross at you. First time I've been really cross at someone on MN. (Stomps off to stir dinner aggressively)

[HolofernesesHead]

And yes, of course I know that atheism isn't a religion.

[NovackNGood]

[NovackNGood]

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[NovackNGood]

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[NovackNGood]

LAst word