Religion Thread 2.0

[crozier]

But I am confused at what you guys are trying to accomplish with this thread. Are you attempting to convert people to/away from religion?

If it causes people to convert away from religion, that is always a good thing.

I in every way disagree with this statement.
Religion gives hope, improoves one's ethical desisions, teaches you positive ideals, and the like.

[Yankyal]

But I am confused at what you guys are trying to accomplish with this thread. Are you attempting to convert people to/away from religion?

If it causes people to convert away from religion, that is always a good thing.

I in every way disagree with this statement.
Religion gives hope, improoves one's ethical desisions, teaches you positive ideals, and the like.

Here is some religion improving ethical decisions:

Deuteronomy 22:28-29  -  If a man is caught in the act of raping a young woman who is not engaged, he must pay fifty pieces of silver to her father.  Then he must marry the young woman because he violated her, and he will never be allowed to divorce her.

Judges 5:30 -    They must be dividing the spoils they took: there must be a damsel or two for each man, Spoils of dyed cloth as Sisera's spoil, an ornate shawl or two for me in the spoil.

Zechariah 14:1-2 -    Lo, a day shall come for the Lord when the spoils shall be divided in your midst.  And I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem for battle: the city shall be taken, houses plundered, women ravished; half of the city shall go into exile, but the rest of the people shall not be removed from the city.

Leviticus 20:10 -   If a man commits adultery with another man's wife, both the man and the woman must be put to death.

Deuteronomy  22:20-21 -  But if this charge is true (that she wasn't a virgin on her wedding night), and evidence of the girls virginity is not found, they shall bring the girl to the entrance of her fathers house and there her townsman shall stone her to death, because she committed a crime against Israel by her unchasteness in her father's house.  Thus shall you purge the evil from your midst.

1Samuel 6:19-20 -  From there Elisha went up to Bethel.  While he was on his way, some small boys came out of the city and jeered at him.  "Go up baldhead," they shouted, "go up baldhead!"  The prophet turned and saw them, and he cursed them in the name of the Lord.  Then two shebears came out of the woods and tore forty two of the children to pieces.

Exodus 21:20-21 -  When a man strikes his male or female slave with a rod so hard that the slave dies under his hand, he shall be punished.  If, however, the slave survives for a day or two, he is not to be punished, since the slave is his own property.


9/11 - Religion
Christian Dark Ages - Religion
Crusades - Religion
Witch Burning - Religion
Prosecution against homosexuals - Religion
Inquisition - Religion
Jihad - Religion


Also the point of this thread is to discuss the moral implications of religion and whether or not it is beneficial to humans. These are just from the bible, by the way. I have more from the Book of Mormon, Quran, etc. and so far I have decided that it is very detrimental to society.

I want to hear arguments from the opposition.

EDIT:  I don't know what kind of hope you get from knowing there is a god sending people to hell to be tortured forever if you do not believe in him. Or that there is a god standing by while children starve to death and millions are dying in wars waged. The ethical side of religion is...shown above. Positive ideals can be created without religion(such as freedom of belief, equality, not murdering someone if they disagree).

[Jake]

But I am confused at what you guys are trying to accomplish with this thread. Are you attempting to convert people to/away from religion?

If it causes people to convert away from religion, that is always a good thing.

I in every way disagree with this statement.
Religion gives hope, improoves one's ethical desisions, teaches you positive ideals, and the like.

To be fair, I'm not as anti-religion as Yankyal. For many, it's a glimmer of hope in a sad world. Not everyone can cope with death, and some people need religion to get through the day. On the other hand, if you use religion to justify killing people, oppressing people, or to support your bigotry, then screw you. The fundamental problem with religion is that it uses something called faith. Faith literally means "lack of evidence". Any teaching that prides itself on having people believe in it without questioning it has serious issues. Children are literally brainwashed by their parents into believing things that make absolutely no logical sense and then are taught that science is dangerous, that evolution doesn't occur, and gay people are just sinful creatures controlled by the devil.

Here's the best quote that sums up my feelings on it.
"If religion were true, it's followers would not try to bludgeon their young into an artificial conformity; but would merely insist on their unbending quest for truth, irrespective of artificial backgrounds or practical consequences. With such an honest and inflexible openness to evidence, they could not fail to receive any real truth which might be manifesting itself around them. The fact that religionists do not follow this honorable course, but cheat at the game by invoking juvenile quasi-hypnosis, is enough to destroy their pretensions in my eyes even if their absurdity were not manifest in every other direction."

[crozier]

Ok Yank, you got me. Thats all some pretty horrible stuff.
But the cause of a majority of them is due to corrupt leaders and fear of change. Corrupt leaders can be found anywhere. And  lets say atheism came before religion, they would like call the ones who beleived in a diety "heretics." I bet you they would be the ones who fear change.

The ethical side of religion is...shown above. Positive ideals can be created without religion(such as freedom of belief, equality, not murdering someone if they disagree).

What you said here is very hypocritical. Why don't you just let it go, and let me beleive what I want to beleive? And I dont think atheists made that princible.
I agree with your thoughts on equality and not killing people. I don't think anyone should die for beleiving something different then me. I dont judge.

And Jake, I have not found religion because my parents shoved it down my throat. My family nor I attend church or read any sort of bible or holy texts. They in no way pushed me into what I beleive. We are also quite tolerant to homosextuals (my great uncle was gay), I beleive in the theory of natural selection (hey it makes sense..), and I have an A- in my biology class. Science makes sense, and from the people I know, they have no rebuttal to the thingd they are learning.

[Cactuscat222]

I just find it silly that as soon as people find out God doesn't fit the definition that they made for Him, they just call it quits. (Same for the people who go "I kept asking for an answer, never got one! Must not exist!")

"Oh, God isn't as great as I thought he was? Then he mustn't exist and I don't believe in him!"

Not arguing which way I believe, but I always found that kind of reasoning to just be ludicrous. If anything, I think there is a God who is a dick.

[Titan]

But I am confused at what you guys are trying to accomplish with this thread. Are you attempting to convert people to/away from religion?

If it causes people to convert away from religion, that is always a good thing.

I in every way disagree with this statement.
Religion gives hope, improoves one's ethical desisions, teaches you positive ideals, and the like.

Here is some religion improving ethical decisions:

Deuteronomy 22:28-29  -  If a man is caught in the act of raping a young woman who is not engaged, he must pay fifty pieces of silver to her father.  Then he must marry the young woman because he violated her, and he will never be allowed to divorce her.

Judges 5:30 -    They must be dividing the spoils they took: there must be a damsel or two for each man, Spoils of dyed cloth as Sisera's spoil, an ornate shawl or two for me in the spoil.

Zechariah 14:1-2 -    Lo, a day shall come for the Lord when the spoils shall be divided in your midst.  And I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem for battle: the city shall be taken, houses plundered, women ravished; half of the city shall go into exile, but the rest of the people shall not be removed from the city.

Leviticus 20:10 -   If a man commits adultery with another man's wife, both the man and the woman must be put to death.

Deuteronomy  22:20-21 -  But if this charge is true (that she wasn't a virgin on her wedding night), and evidence of the girls virginity is not found, they shall bring the girl to the entrance of her fathers house and there her townsman shall stone her to death, because she committed a crime against Israel by her unchasteness in her father's house.  Thus shall you purge the evil from your midst.

1Samuel 6:19-20 -  From there Elisha went up to Bethel.  While he was on his way, some small boys came out of the city and jeered at him.  "Go up baldhead," they shouted, "go up baldhead!"  The prophet turned and saw them, and he cursed them in the name of the Lord.  Then two shebears came out of the woods and tore forty two of the children to pieces.

Exodus 21:20-21 -  When a man strikes his male or female slave with a rod so hard that the slave dies under his hand, he shall be punished.  If, however, the slave survives for a day or two, he is not to be punished, since the slave is his own property.

Not one for debating on religon, but these are terrible points.
Crozier is talking about the current time I would assume, and no one follows the bible that riduclously now. Or if they do they a very small group of people that everyone hates with a burning passion.

[Mystery]

(Same for the people who go "I kept asking for an answer, never got one! Must not exist!")

I don't see why asking for any form of evidence whatsoever from a god (not necessarily omnipotent, but he usually should still be powerful enough to at least do divine intervention/miracles) and upon receiving none, assuming it doesn't exist is silly.

If anything, I think there is a God who is a dick.

If this universe does have a god, !@#$ him to hell and back ten times over.

Especially if it's anything like the Christian/Islamic/Jewish god.

Dick isn't even the tip of the iceberg in that situation.

Not one for debating on religon, but these are terrible points.
Crozier is talking about the current time I would assume, and no one follows the bible that riduclously now. Or if they do they a very small group of people that everyone hates with a burning passion.

His point is that quite literally everyone cherry-picks from the Bible, because it would be impossible to follow all of it in today's society, and many are just plain ignored. (I am aware of the argument that Jesus' death got rid of the ritual rules and that's why no one follows them, though that doesn't explain why God set them up in the first place.) Yet many still tote it as the end-all be-all, and still others view it as the best book in the history of world.

Honestly, when I read that book for my first time as a kid, I cried nonstop upon seeing all the horrors in it, to speak nothing of the numerous contradictions and things that just don't make sense. It scarred me.

To this day I still don't understand how anyone who has read it thoroughly can think it's a good book. I accept that people do somehow, but I'd REALLY like to know how they deal with it.

[Cactuscat222]

(Same for the people who go "I kept asking for an answer, never got one! Must not exist!")

I don't see why asking for any form of evidence whatsoever from a god (not necessarily omnipotent, but he usually should still be powerful enough to at least do divine intervention/miracles) and upon receiving none, assuming it doesn't exist is silly.

I'm speaking more about a person who believes in God, then when they don't get a personal answer, they stop believing. I mean, its fair - but from a logical standpoint, you're not really disproving his existence. There could be any number of reasons for a Godlike figure to refuse/fail to respond. Once again, because he doesn't fit your personal thoughts, he suddenly doesn't exist. I just find that silly.

[Mystery]

I'm speaking more about a person who believes in God, then when they don't get a personal answer, they stop believing. I mean, its fair - but from a logical standpoint, you're not really disproving his existence. There could be any number of reasons for a Godlike figure to refuse/fail to respond. Once again, because he doesn't fit your personal thoughts, he suddenly doesn't exist. I just find that silly.

You aren't disproving his existence because it's impossible to disprove. Anyone can always go 'you can never find him, you have to believe' or 'nothing can ever sense him' when defending the existence of a god. By the same token, it is also impossible to prove since the concept of him requires so much blind faith and many other situations (again, some hallucinations and delusions on steroids) can explain every possible situation that would arise involving a god(if the laws of physics were to be broken and 'turned on' again, for example.

Anyway, you could apply that situation to literally anything. (The Pink Invisible Unicorn doesn't respond? But you can't assume it doesn't exist! etc.) Thinking about it that way isn't helpful.

[Hikarikuen]

But I am confused at what you guys are trying to accomplish with this thread. Are you attempting to convert people to/away from religion?

If it causes people to convert away from religion, that is always a good thing.

I in every way disagree with this statement.
Religion gives hope, improoves one's ethical desisions, teaches you positive ideals, and the like.

Here is some religion improving ethical decisions:

Deuteronomy 22:28-29  -  If a man is caught in the act of raping a young woman who is not engaged, he must pay fifty pieces of silver to her father.  Then he must marry the young woman because he violated her, and he will never be allowed to divorce her.

Judges 5:30 -    They must be dividing the spoils they took: there must be a damsel or two for each man, Spoils of dyed cloth as Sisera's spoil, an ornate shawl or two for me in the spoil.

Zechariah 14:1-2 -    Lo, a day shall come for the Lord when the spoils shall be divided in your midst.  And I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem for battle: the city shall be taken, houses plundered, women ravished; half of the city shall go into exile, but the rest of the people shall not be removed from the city.

Leviticus 20:10 -   If a man commits adultery with another man's wife, both the man and the woman must be put to death.

Deuteronomy  22:20-21 -  But if this charge is true (that she wasn't a virgin on her wedding night), and evidence of the girls virginity is not found, they shall bring the girl to the entrance of her fathers house and there her townsman shall stone her to death, because she committed a crime against Israel by her unchasteness in her father's house.  Thus shall you purge the evil from your midst.

1Samuel 6:19-20 -  From there Elisha went up to Bethel.  While he was on his way, some small boys came out of the city and jeered at him.  "Go up baldhead," they shouted, "go up baldhead!"  The prophet turned and saw them, and he cursed them in the name of the Lord.  Then two shebears came out of the woods and tore forty two of the children to pieces.

Exodus 21:20-21 -  When a man strikes his male or female slave with a rod so hard that the slave dies under his hand, he shall be punished.  If, however, the slave survives for a day or two, he is not to be punished, since the slave is his own property.

Not one for debating on religon, but these are terrible points.
Crozier is talking about the current time I would assume, and no one follows the bible that riduclously now. Or if they do they a very small group of people that everyone hates with a burning passion.

And more specifically, all those verses come from the Old Testament, and when Jesus came around he pretty much taught "Yeah, Moses was pretty awesome with his transformer walking stick and all, but those laws are kind of primitive. Just don't be a total ass and you'll probably be fine."

Yet people still can't follow the rules to save their lives.

[Yankyal]

Not one for debating on religon, but these are terrible points.
Crozier is talking about the current time I would assume, and no one follows the bible that riduclously now. Or if they do they a very small group of people that everyone hates with a burning passion.

-Gay marriage is still illegal in some states
-Atheists, homosexuals, and other people who deviate from the religious path are still persecuted in other countries
-So many parents are disowning their children if they are atheist or gay that there are actually shelters specifically for these children
-Stem cell research being halted and losing funding because of religion
-laws oppressing women in islamic states on religion
-9/11 was only 10 years ago and that's probably the biggest example

And the point was that religion does not always promote positive ideals. There are many better ways to develop your morality than with religion.

Just don't be a total ass and you'll probably be fine."

Plenty of people who aren't asses are going to hell. It's not don't be a total ass, it's follow and worship me and nothing else or I will torture you forever.

[Cactuscat222]

I'm speaking more about a person who believes in God, then when they don't get a personal answer, they stop believing. I mean, its fair - but from a logical standpoint, you're not really disproving his existence. There could be any number of reasons for a Godlike figure to refuse/fail to respond. Once again, because he doesn't fit your personal thoughts, he suddenly doesn't exist. I just find that silly.

You aren't disproving his existence because it's impossible to disprove. Anyone can always go 'you can never find him, you have to believe' or 'nothing can ever sense him' when defending the existence of a god. By the same token, it is also impossible to prove since the concept of him requires so much blind faith and many other situations (again, some hallucinations and delusions on steroids) can explain every possible situation that would arise involving a god(if the laws of physics were to be broken and 'turned on' again, for example.

Anyway, you could apply that situation to literally anything. (The Pink Invisible Unicorn doesn't respond? But you can't assume it doesn't exist! etc.) Thinking about it that way isn't helpful.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell%27s_teapot

I understand that. It is impossible to disprove God's existence entirely - none the less though, the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, either.

My point, however, is that there are stronger reasons to have a lack of faith in God. I'm mocking the selfish nature of people who suddenly stop believing because God is no longer the perfect being for them. To me, that isn't logical reasoning.  Though, like I already said, its fine - if you stop believing for reasons as topical as those, then more power to you. I personally just find the reasoning to be more selfish than not.

[RayRay]

I've been reading this thread so far, and a question was itching in my head at school today: if God exists, and he created man, why did he give man the ability to not believe in Him? Was it because of Jesus's death? I have not read anything of the Bible so I am sorry if the answer was obvious.

[Torch]

-9/11 was only 10 years ago and that's probably the biggest example

9/11 wasn't religious, it was just a big !@#$ you to America. America has made a pretty big mess of Arab countries over the years, this was a terrorist response to that.

Not arguing any of the other points though, especially stem cell research. I'm amazed that doesn't have more support.

[Yankyal]

-9/11 was only 10 years ago and that's probably the biggest example

9/11 wasn't religious, it was just a big !@#$ you to America. America has made a pretty big mess of Arab countries over the years, this was a terrorist response to that.

Not arguing any of the other points though, especially stem cell research. I'm amazed that doesn't have more support.

Perhaps Osama's intentions were not based on religion, but I think he used religion(holy war against US) to convince the hijackers to throw away their lives.