Justin Best begins talking about Paul at 60 minutes into the video. He credits his deconstruction of Paul with his eventual deconversion. He also talks about the following people whose works he studied and some of whom he has had conversations. Has anyone come across these names in their research?
Dr. Richard Carrier: wrote Jesus from Outer Space and On the Historicity of Jesus
Tovia Singer: an American Orthodox rabbi who teaches how Jesus could not have been the Messiah
Dr. Dennis MacDonald: proposes a theory wherein the earliest books of the New Testament were responses to the Homeric Epics, including the Gospel of Mark and the Acts of the Apostles
Homer’s Odyssey, inspiration for book of Mark, Paul copied Aristotle, Plato 1:40:00
Thersites the Historian: a youtube channel connecting Jesus with Thersites
I've heard a few different people take issues with Paul's epistles. Have you learned something about him or his writings that makes him out to be a manipulator?
All I know is that he was sent by God.
How do I know this? Paul himself says so of himself. He said it, that settles it, I believe it.
How do I know this? Paul himself says so of himself. He said it, that settles it, I believe it.
You're saying then that because the bible says he was sent by God means he was a manipulator just as God was. Cool - I can definitely see this.
I've been listening to videos about how much Paul included teachings of Plato almost word for word in his writings which contradicts his saying that what he taught was not of men but by revelation from Jesus Christ. It's called "Paul or Plato? The Bible's Shady Origins" by Justin Best. I don't want to spend a lot of time researching whether the many examples shown on the video are accurate, but other videos have also focused on issues with his writings. A deconstruction of Paul's epistles is one way to see how the bible is not valid as a source of truth.
Although I have been feeling relief from not having to please a god anymore so he would answer prayers, I woke up this morning feeling an emptiness knowing that he was no longer my source of love.
Not wanting to get up, I laid there and came to realize that the only option left was to love myself – not love me because God loved me, but to love me as in “it's all up to me now” and surprisingly, this was okay with me. My core belief of being unlovable since childhood was always the reoccurring great need in my life for seeking after God's acceptance and love.Now, accepting that I am the sole person responsible for loving who I am seems to have come with an unforeseen benefit. The emotional connection I had to my childhood pain is no longer there.
Here is why I think this happened .
For a while now (and for periods over the years), I felt guilty for not trusting God enough, not walking by the spirit or power of God enough, not speaking his word boldly enough, etc., and all of this meant, according to Paul's epistles, I was not being "enough" for God . It was the exact same guilt I had as a kid for not being "enough" to make my dad want to stop drinking. I realize now that my two reasons for guilt had melded together in that the spiritual guilt reinforced my childhood guilt. Pretty deep, eh .
Coming to believe recently that the epistles, with all the hype of what we are called to be and to do, were not inspired by God but written by a man. This blew up my spiritual belief of not being enough. Being free of that guilt allowed me to see there was actually nothing left of the self blame I carried as a child.
Thankfully, freedom is no longer needing to . (I'm also thankful for the little emoji guys to help me tell my story.)
If you can find anything else specifically written to "the body of Christ" (which we are part of) that tells us what God has promised or will or will not do for us in this day and time... well, maybe I haven't seen it.
How many of the promises that Paul has written of speak of things that are heavenly in nature (and perhaps is yet to come), rather than things which are earthly?
How about these:
Phil 1:6 Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform (complete) it until the day of Jesus Christ:
Phil 2:13 For it is God which works in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.
Phil 4:13 I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me.
Phil 4: 19 But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.
And because of the above promises, here is my favorite: Eph 1:19 And what is the exceeding greatness of his powerto us-ward who believe, according to the working of his mighty power.
Here is something written recently by someone who believes in this verse and says they have seen this power in their life. It is part of a prophecy they are giving from the Lord. Oh, to have the faith of this person. (Btw, what is spoken about faith is according to scripture.)
"But if you have faith in God, you will command the impossible, and you will need to do just that in the work I am sending you. I am sending you my Children to gather the sheep that remain, for many will come to me in these last minutes and I will not deny them, but I passionately search for them still. Open your mouths in faith and stand for me and minister to my Children. I have told you how to wield my power, but you refuse my instruction, so I will tell the forgetful among you once again. Why do you sheepishly ask a spirit to leave its host with stuttering lips and using my name Jesus Christ in a faithless manner? Do not use my name in vain! Command the spirits in my name with great faith and have faith in the words that I will give you, and the evil spirits will depart by my power through you! Why do you timidly ask sickness to leave when you should speak to the sickness in confidence in my name and command the impossible in my name and heal the sick.
Without getting into Bible verses, the violence in the Old Testament (“crimes” for which God prescribes the death penalty, God’s anger and wrath in punishing his people, and God’s command to the Israelites to commit genocide), as well as God’s need for Christ to suffer and be crucified to save us from the sin He made to pass unto all mankind, and the concept of the lake of fire (whatever that is) in Revelation are so way over the top, I don’t want to believe any of it is true.
When I first came out as atheist, I started a thread you can probably still find here called "Are you more moral than Yahweh?" It took a look at a number of questionable OT positions (and I think one or two NT, but mostly OT) that are inconsistent with a God who is the author of morality. But if you are to take the position that morality is objective (spoiler alert, it's not) and that certain moral standards are absolute (like rape among humans is always wrong and the victim is the person who was raped), then you have to conclude that the God of the Old Testament is frankly not moral.
Is it moral to prescribe the death penalty for picking up sticks between dusk Friday and dusk Saturday? No. Of course not. But Yahweh (allegedly) did that. It's sociopathic! "But it was another time." SO WHAT!?!?!
So what you're describing here is a clash between what the Bible actually says about Yahweh (and by extension Jesus) and your own understanding of what actual morality is. And then you have to defend your own morality against the (absolutely and demonstrably false) premise that there is no such thing as morality without Yahweh because he is where we get morality from. HE MOST CERTAINLY IS NOT.
Morality does not come from religion. Religion comes from morality. And it is not "objective," which is why our culture rejects a slew of Old Testament pronouncements as immoral. We may have once thought, incorrectly, that eating shellfish or mixing fabrics was immoral. We know better today.
Like beating your slave to within an inch of her life is righteous, as long as that inch carries her life through day two post beating. Let her die from her wounds on day five.
The knowledge of good and evil is the knowledge of God
Probably why he told em not to eat it. The devil was not supposed to be referenced.
That's interesting cman because God could have locked Lucifer and the fallen angels in chains forever at the time of their rebellion just like Revelation says he will do for a thousand years.
What was God's reason for letting Lucifer remain free? The bible doesn't give one, but here's the thing.
Adam and Eve didn't turn their backs on God's goodness and disobey him all on their own? They had no "sin nature" and did not know evil so they would have no reason to do so. They, and all of their descendants, could have known and loved God as well as enjoyed God's blessings. God could have delighted in them just as we delight in our children. (And no, they would not have been robots, otherwise those with eternal life in a future place where there is no more sin would also be robots.)
But that apparently wasn't good enough for God. He needed and therefore demanded their obedience and that's where Lucifer comes in. Only when the serpent deceived Eve (which he was very "gifted" at according to Gen 3:1) did his temptation result in their sin.
Even though I used to believe this, I am so tired now of hearing how sin and death came into the world because God so loved mankind that he gave them free will, and since man chose to disobey God, what happened as a result is totally their fault.
When I first came out as atheist, I started a thread you can probably still find here called "Are you more moral than Yahweh?" It took a look at a number of questionable OT positions (and I think one or two NT, but mostly OT) that are inconsistent with a God who is the author of morality. But if you are to take the position that morality is objective (spoiler alert, it's not) and that certain moral standards are absolute (like rape among humans is always wrong and the victim is the person who was raped), then you have to conclude that the God of the Old Testament is frankly not moral.
Is it moral to prescribe the death penalty for picking up sticks between dusk Friday and dusk Saturday? No. Of course not. But Yahweh (allegedly) did that. It's sociopathic! "But it was another time." SO WHAT!?!?!
So what you're describing here is a clash between what the Bible actually says about Yahweh (and by extension Jesus) and your own understanding of what actual morality is. And then you have to defend your own morality against the (absolutely and demonstrably false) premise that there is no such thing as morality without Yahweh because he is where we get morality from. HE MOST CERTAINLY IS NOT.
Morality does not come from religion. Religion comes from morality. And it is not "objective," which is why our culture rejects a slew of Old Testament pronouncements as immoral. We may have once thought, incorrectly, that eating shellfish or mixing fabrics was immoral. We know better today.
Wow - I found your thread from 2014 which garnered over 600 replies. I'll check it out. I also found your thread "Ten Years of Unbelief" which I plan to read after replying.
As horrible as the curses listed in Deuteronomy 28 are, the support of them by apologists is just as disgusting.
I think verse 63 in that chapter says a lot: "And it shall come to pass, that as the Lord rejoiced over you to do you good, and to multiply you; so the Lord will rejoice over you to destroy you, and to bring you to nought; and ye shall be plucked from off the land whither thou goes to possess it.
It's not that I think as a mere mortal that I have the right to criticize a biblical almighty and creator God, it's that I no longer believe that such a horrible god truly exists.
Like beating your slave to within an inch of her life is righteous, as long as that inch carries her life through day two post beating. Let her die from her wounds on day five.
I haven't found scripture that mentions 5 days yet, but here's one that mentions 2.
Exodus 21:20 And if a man smite his servant, or his maid, with a rod, and he die under his hand; he shall be surely punished.
21 Notwithstanding, if he continue a day or two, he shall not be punished: for he is his money.
I have skimmed through 6 commentaries on these verses; 3 of them only talked about verse 20 and the other three had different "justifiable" explanations for verse 21. It's too much to stomach.
I don't think there is a scripture that mentions five days. It's arbitrary, like one or two days. The implication is that one or two days of survival is enough to get the slave owner off the hook, after that (five days, two weeks...), if the slave dies from the wounds, well, too bad -- the only loss is the slave owner's money. Only need to ensure your sex slave survives one or two days.
Even though I used to believe this, I am so tired now of hearing how sin and death came into the world because God so loved mankind that he gave them free will, and since man chose to disobey God, what happened as a result is totally their fault.
To clarify, it is obvious that we have free will. My point for the above statement is that Adam and Eve had a perfect and loving relationship with God until Lucifer entered into the picture. Then, they were tempted by the great and cunning tempter and chose the fruit over God. The issue for me is why in this biblical record was there even a need for Adam and Eve to make a choice.
More precisely, why did God need to put the forbidden-to-eat tree in the garden in the first place? In a perfect world like the garden of Eden, would needing to obey someone be a necessary part of proving your love for that someone? If so, that would make the definition of love obedience.
I ask these questions because of the firm belief Christians have to argue that Adam and Eve chose to disobey God thereby putting the focus for the corruption of the world on them and not on God who designed the whole scenario to be set up this way in the first place. Mankind became nothing but degenerate sinners, impure and evil instead of imperfect (to varying degrees) human beings, and God became their glowing necessary savior.
IMO, Genesis 3 is either a true record of a god which continues to demand obedience to this day, or it is a story that ancient mankind came up with to explain the pain and suffering in the world.
The issue for me is why in this biblical record was there even a need for Adam and Eve to make a choice.
There's actually a rather simple, but very logical, answer for that if really you want to hear it. Of course, whether anyone choses to believe it is another matter altogether, as there's never going to be an sort of empirical proof for it. So, I'll merely preface it with some "if's."
If in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth... and, as noted elsewhere in scripture, he is the Father of all (Eph. 4:6).. and even more specifically, the Father of spirits... then with that is it not clear that He also the Father of Lucifer? Furthermore, without going too deep into the weeds here... perhaps you'll allow me to continue with some "what if's."
What if God needed (or perhaps wanted) a replacement for Lucifer (in reference to the devil, prior to the aspiration to "be like the most High"), who was second (only to God) over all of creation. He could just create another replacement to fill the position Lucifer once held... yes? But, why suppose that there was some imperfection in God's initial creation of Lucifer, that God was going to somehow "do better" the next time around? Do you see the problem with that?
If so, then perhaps it will make more sense why God came up with a two step replacement plan that wouldn't ever have the same issue that Lucifer had. The first step involved the creation of man, and a proving period (an appointed time, so to speak.) But the first Adam failed. The second did not.
We, as the progeny of the first man Adam, were all subjected to the failures of the first. The law, given many hundreds of years after that first failure, was not given to save anyone. It was given that "every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God." Was the law harsh? Very harsh. It is called the law of "sin and death" for a reason.
Yes, the first Adam made a horrendously bad choice.
Yet, the second man made a far greater good choice... that we can likewise freely participate in, should we choose to believe it.
Yes, I also see that Genesis 3 is a story and a lot more than just that one chapter as well. What I still wonder about is how the man-made story called the "red thread" of the messiah was kept going through all the years of the OT writings. Any comments or suggestions?
Yes, I also see that Genesis 3 is a story and a lot more than just that one chapter as well. What I still wonder about is how the man-made story called the "red thread" of the messiah was kept going through all the years of the OT writings. Any comments or suggestions?
Somehow people were convinced (hoodwinked?) into accepting vague claims as god-breathed, IMO. There may have been [edit: likely was SOME] some divine inspiration, but I no longer believe that holy men wrote what God told them to write, verbatim.
Religion, is generally about finding ways to get humans to act in concert as groups to do what some faction wanted them to do or believe.
Yes, I also see that Genesis 3 is a story and a lot more than just that one chapter as well. What I still wonder about is how the man-made story called the "red thread" of the messiah was kept going through all the years of the OT writings. Any comments or suggestions?
Yes, but I heard it taught in twi without, I think, any mention of Oral Robert. The thought just came to me that this topic was discussed on GSC and with a search, it shows 160 places where it has.
So, my question was how did the continuity of this idea make its way all through the OT. This is one of the points that was used to show God had to have been its author.
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Raf
When I first came out as atheist, I started a thread you can probably still find here called "Are you more moral than Yahweh?" It took a look at a number of questionable OT positions (and I think one
Charity
According to Genesis 1-3, God creates a paradise and many different kinds of awesome life and everything is perfect. What a great God He is. Then everything is corrupted because of one single act of
Charity
After leaving twi, it was necessary to unlearn the lies we were taught in order to become healthier. I think it is true for leaving Christianity as well - it happens when one sees the problems with w
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Charity
Justin Best begins talking about Paul at 60 minutes into the video. He credits his deconstruction of Paul with his eventual deconversion. He also talks about the following people whose works he studied and some of whom he has had conversations. Has anyone come across these names in their research?
Dr. Richard Carrier: wrote Jesus from Outer Space and On the Historicity of Jesus
Tovia Singer: an American Orthodox rabbi who teaches how Jesus could not have been the Messiah
Dr. Dennis MacDonald: proposes a theory wherein the earliest books of the New Testament were responses to the Homeric Epics, including the Gospel of Mark and the Acts of the Apostles
Homer’s Odyssey, inspiration for book of Mark, Paul copied Aristotle, Plato 1:40:00
Thersites the Historian: a youtube channel connecting Jesus with Thersites
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Nathan_Jr
All I know is that he was sent by God.
How do I know this? Paul himself says so of himself. He said it, that settles it, I believe it.
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Charity
You're saying then that because the bible says he was sent by God means he was a manipulator just as God was. Cool - I can definitely see this.
I've been listening to videos about how much Paul included teachings of Plato almost word for word in his writings which contradicts his saying that what he taught was not of men but by revelation from Jesus Christ. It's called "Paul or Plato? The Bible's Shady Origins" by Justin Best. I don't want to spend a lot of time researching whether the many examples shown on the video are accurate, but other videos have also focused on issues with his writings. A deconstruction of Paul's epistles is one way to see how the bible is not valid as a source of truth.
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Nathan_Jr
There is wisdom in the Bible, for sure. There are ideas worth contemplating, meditating on. There are beautiful turns of phrase, poetry.
But It's not the only contemplative book of wisdom, ancient or modern, worth reading.
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Nathan_Jr
What I'm saying is what I've said many times: The one claiming to speak for God is surely the one who does not.
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Charity
Warning: Getting personal here
Although I have been feeling relief from not having to please a god anymore so he would answer prayers, I woke up this morning feeling an emptiness knowing that he was no longer my source of love.
Not wanting to get up, I laid there and came to realize that the only option left was to love myself – not love me because God loved me, but to love me as in “it's all up to me now” and surprisingly, this was okay with me. My core belief of being unlovable since childhood was always the reoccurring great need in my life for seeking after God's acceptance and love. Now, accepting that I am the sole person responsible for loving who I am seems to have come with an unforeseen benefit. The emotional connection I had to my childhood pain is no longer there.
Here is why I think this happened
.
For a while now (and for periods over the years), I felt guilty for not trusting God enough, not walking by the spirit or power of God enough, not speaking his word boldly enough, etc., and all of this meant, according to Paul's epistles, I was not being "enough" for God
. It was the exact same guilt I had as a kid for not being "enough" to make my dad want to stop drinking. I realize now that my two reasons for guilt had melded together in that the spiritual guilt reinforced my childhood guilt. Pretty deep, eh 
.
Coming to believe recently that the epistles, with all the hype of what we are called to be and to do, were not inspired by God
but written by a man. This blew up my spiritual belief of not being enough. Being free of that guilt allowed me to see there was actually nothing left of the self blame I carried as a child. 
Thankfully, freedom is no longer needing to
. (I'm also thankful for the little emoji guys to help me tell my story.)
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Charity
How about these:
Phil 1:6 Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform (complete) it until the day of Jesus Christ:
Phil 2:13 For it is God which works in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.
Phil 4:13 I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me.
Phil 4: 19 But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.
And because of the above promises, here is my favorite: Eph 1:19 And what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who believe, according to the working of his mighty power.
Here is something written recently by someone who believes in this verse and says they have seen this power in their life. It is part of a prophecy they are giving from the Lord. Oh, to have the faith of this person. (Btw, what is spoken about faith is according to scripture.)
"But if you have faith in God, you will command the impossible, and you will need to do just that in the work I am sending you. I am sending you my Children to gather the sheep that remain, for many will come to me in these last minutes and I will not deny them, but I passionately search for them still. Open your mouths in faith and stand for me and minister to my Children. I have told you how to wield my power, but you refuse my instruction, so I will tell the forgetful among you once again. Why do you sheepishly ask a spirit to leave its host with stuttering lips and using my name Jesus Christ in a faithless manner? Do not use my name in vain! Command the spirits in my name with great faith and have faith in the words that I will give you, and the evil spirits will depart by my power through you! Why do you timidly ask sickness to leave when you should speak to the sickness in confidence in my name and command the impossible in my name and heal the sick.
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Raf
When I first came out as atheist, I started a thread you can probably still find here called "Are you more moral than Yahweh?" It took a look at a number of questionable OT positions (and I think one or two NT, but mostly OT) that are inconsistent with a God who is the author of morality. But if you are to take the position that morality is objective (spoiler alert, it's not) and that certain moral standards are absolute (like rape among humans is always wrong and the victim is the person who was raped), then you have to conclude that the God of the Old Testament is frankly not moral.
Is it moral to prescribe the death penalty for picking up sticks between dusk Friday and dusk Saturday? No. Of course not. But Yahweh (allegedly) did that. It's sociopathic! "But it was another time." SO WHAT!?!?!
So what you're describing here is a clash between what the Bible actually says about Yahweh (and by extension Jesus) and your own understanding of what actual morality is. And then you have to defend your own morality against the (absolutely and demonstrably false) premise that there is no such thing as morality without Yahweh because he is where we get morality from. HE MOST CERTAINLY IS NOT.
Morality does not come from religion. Religion comes from morality. And it is not "objective," which is why our culture rejects a slew of Old Testament pronouncements as immoral. We may have once thought, incorrectly, that eating shellfish or mixing fabrics was immoral. We know better today.
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Nathan_Jr
Like beating your slave to within an inch of her life is righteous, as long as that inch carries her life through day two post beating. Let her die from her wounds on day five.
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cman
The knowledge of good and evil is the knowledge of God
Probably why he told em not to eat it. The devil was not supposed to be referenced.
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Charity
That's interesting cman because God could have locked Lucifer and the fallen angels in chains forever at the time of their rebellion just like Revelation says he will do for a thousand years.
What was God's reason for letting Lucifer remain free? The bible doesn't give one, but here's the thing.
Adam and Eve didn't turn their backs on God's goodness and disobey him all on their own? They had no "sin nature" and did not know evil so they would have no reason to do so. They, and all of their descendants, could have known and loved God as well as enjoyed God's blessings. God could have delighted in them just as we delight in our children. (And no, they would not have been robots, otherwise those with eternal life in a future place where there is no more sin would also be robots.)
But that apparently wasn't good enough for God. He needed and therefore demanded their obedience and that's where Lucifer comes in. Only when the serpent deceived Eve (which he was very "gifted" at according to Gen 3:1) did his temptation result in their sin.
Even though I used to believe this, I am so tired now of hearing how sin and death came into the world because God so loved mankind that he gave them free will, and since man chose to disobey God, what happened as a result is totally their fault.
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Charity
Wow - I found your thread from 2014 which garnered over 600 replies. I'll check it out. I also found your thread "Ten Years of Unbelief" which I plan to read after replying.
As horrible as the curses listed in Deuteronomy 28 are, the support of them by apologists is just as disgusting.
I think verse 63 in that chapter says a lot: "And it shall come to pass, that as the Lord rejoiced over you to do you good, and to multiply you; so the Lord will rejoice over you to destroy you, and to bring you to nought; and ye shall be plucked from off the land whither thou goes to possess it.
It's not that I think as a mere mortal that I have the right to criticize a biblical almighty and creator God, it's that I no longer believe that such a horrible god truly exists.
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Charity
I haven't found scripture that mentions 5 days yet, but here's one that mentions 2.
Exodus 21:20 And if a man smite his servant, or his maid, with a rod, and he die under his hand; he shall be surely punished.
21 Notwithstanding, if he continue a day or two, he shall not be punished: for he is his money.
I have skimmed through 6 commentaries on these verses; 3 of them only talked about verse 20 and the other three had different "justifiable" explanations for verse 21. It's too much to stomach.
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Nathan_Jr
I don't think there is a scripture that mentions five days. It's arbitrary, like one or two days. The implication is that one or two days of survival is enough to get the slave owner off the hook, after that (five days, two weeks...), if the slave dies from the wounds, well, too bad -- the only loss is the slave owner's money. Only need to ensure your sex slave survives one or two days.
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Charity
To clarify, it is obvious that we have free will. My point for the above statement is that Adam and Eve had a perfect and loving relationship with God until Lucifer entered into the picture. Then, they were tempted by the great and cunning tempter and chose the fruit over God. The issue for me is why in this biblical record was there even a need for Adam and Eve to make a choice.
More precisely, why did God need to put the forbidden-to-eat tree in the garden in the first place? In a perfect world like the garden of Eden, would needing to obey someone be a necessary part of proving your love for that someone? If so, that would make the definition of love obedience.
I ask these questions because of the firm belief Christians have to argue that Adam and Eve chose to disobey God thereby putting the focus for the corruption of the world on them and not on God who designed the whole scenario to be set up this way in the first place. Mankind became nothing but degenerate sinners, impure and evil instead of imperfect (to varying degrees) human beings, and God became their glowing necessary savior.
IMO, Genesis 3 is either a true record of a god which continues to demand obedience to this day, or it is a story that ancient mankind came up with to explain the pain and suffering in the world.
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cman
They ate because, as described, they will be as Gods. The serpent was right.
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Nathan_Jr
Yes
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TLC
There's actually a rather simple, but very logical, answer for that if really you want to hear it. Of course, whether anyone choses to believe it is another matter altogether, as there's never going to be an sort of empirical proof for it. So, I'll merely preface it with some "if's."
If in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth... and, as noted elsewhere in scripture, he is the Father of all (Eph. 4:6).. and even more specifically, the Father of spirits... then with that is it not clear that He also the Father of Lucifer? Furthermore, without going too deep into the weeds here... perhaps you'll allow me to continue with some "what if's."
What if God needed (or perhaps wanted) a replacement for Lucifer (in reference to the devil, prior to the aspiration to "be like the most High"), who was second (only to God) over all of creation. He could just create another replacement to fill the position Lucifer once held... yes? But, why suppose that there was some imperfection in God's initial creation of Lucifer, that God was going to somehow "do better" the next time around? Do you see the problem with that?
If so, then perhaps it will make more sense why God came up with a two step replacement plan that wouldn't ever have the same issue that Lucifer had. The first step involved the creation of man, and a proving period (an appointed time, so to speak.) But the first Adam failed. The second did not.
We, as the progeny of the first man Adam, were all subjected to the failures of the first. The law, given many hundreds of years after that first failure, was not given to save anyone. It was given that "every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God." Was the law harsh? Very harsh. It is called the law of "sin and death" for a reason.
Yes, the first Adam made a horrendously bad choice.
Yet, the second man made a far greater good choice... that we can likewise freely participate in, should we choose to believe it.
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Rocky
It is a STORY.
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cman
The serpent is Christ
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Charity
Yes, I also see that Genesis 3 is a story and a lot more than just that one chapter as well. What I still wonder about is how the man-made story called the "red thread" of the messiah was kept going through all the years of the OT writings. Any comments or suggestions?
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Rocky
Somehow people were convinced (hoodwinked?) into accepting vague claims as god-breathed, IMO. There may have been [edit: likely was SOME] some divine inspiration, but I no longer believe that holy men wrote what God told them to write, verbatim.
Edited by RockyReligion, is generally about finding ways to get humans to act in concert as groups to do what some faction wanted them to do or believe.
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Nathan_Jr
Like the Oral Robert's sermon?
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Charity
Yes, but I heard it taught in twi without, I think, any mention of Oral Robert. The thought just came to me that this topic was discussed on GSC and with a search, it shows 160 places where it has.
So, my question was how did the continuity of this idea make its way all through the OT. This is one of the points that was used to show God had to have been its author.
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