• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

Using the bible to support any viewpoint.

b33fj3rky

Thinker
B
Joined
Feb 2, 2005
Messages
129
Location
In an ivory tower.
One of the reasons christianity is, and has been, so popular--the bible is so chock full of conflicting ideas and advice, the bible can support all kinds of opposing viewpoints. It's more of a Rorschach blot than a book, really.

For example, money. If you want to get rich, you'll find plenty of verses telling you money is God's blessing. Conversely, if you believe money is evil, poverty is a virtue--you'll find plenty to support the idea that rich folks are almost all going to hell.

Same thing with war and the death penalty--plenty of verses to make you adopt a pro or con stance, depending on which parts you cherry-pick, and what you choose to take literally, instead of symbolically.

What are some other issues bible verses can be shown to oppose, or support, depending on which parts the reader takes literally?
 
Technically all you need is one contradiction.

Let's start with your pre-selected proposition "A" that you wish to demonstrate as true. Begin also with one contradiction: both p and not-p are asserted.

If p is true, then the expression (A or P) is true.

Well, since P is also not true, for the expression to hold, A MUST be true.

You've just proven A, and what it is doesn't even matter.

I think the trick is to put a lot of meaningless steps between asserting p and asserting not-p, so that the person listening forgets.
 
Last edited:
Turn the other cheek but kill the witch.


God loves you unconditionally until you piss him off.


The Earth is 10,000 years old except when it isn't.
 
God is amazing flexible, what with His ability to agree 100% with almost all of his two billion followers. Very rarely have I heard Christians says they disagree with God or the Bible - "I know God hates it when I eat pork, but I respectfully think He's wrong".

The only exception I know of is people who don't dislike gays themselves, but who oppose, say, gay marriage because they're afraid God will punish the homosexuals if they practice their "sinful" sexual orientation.
 
It's been disproven. For starters, the Earth is not, in fact, a hole hogged out in the Waters of Chaos by God, with the land below and the (solid) "vault" above to keep the waters out, which God opens up from time to time and that's how rain gets in.

By the way, atheists who say it couldn't possibly rain enough in 40 days to cover Everest are missing the point. God clearly also "breaks up the fonts" keeping back the water below land, which floods up from below as well.

However, that isn't exactly helping the believers' point, either.
 
Beerina said:
By the way, atheists who say it couldn't possibly rain enough in 40 days to cover Everest are missing the point. God clearly also "breaks up the fonts" keeping back the water below land, which floods up from below as well.
Click to expand...
I've also herd tell that there were no high mountains or deep seas before the Flood, and that they were raised/lowered during the cataclysm. This handily addresses the question of where all the water went afterward.
 
Last edited:
One of my favorites is the whole "be fruitful and multiply" bit from Genesis which contradicts Paul's pleas for everyone to keep it in their pants, permanently. Granted, Paul was an apocalyptic so it would make sense for him to tell people to avoid anything that will distract them from the coming Kingdom of GodTM, but it does rather fly in the face of, well, most of the Old Testament. I'll bet Onan would have preferred Paul's teachings to what he faced.
 
arthwollipot said:
I've also herd tell that there were no high mountains or deep seas before the Flood, and that they were raised/lowered during the cataclysm. This handily addresses the question of where all the water went afterward.
Click to expand...

Let's not forget the continents wandering around ala Walt Brown.
 
Hokulele said:
One of my favorites is the whole "be fruitful and multiply" bit from Genesis which contradicts Paul's pleas for everyone to keep it in their pants, permanently. Granted, Paul was an apocalyptic so it would make sense for him to tell people to avoid anything that will distract them from the coming Kingdom of GodTM, but it does rather fly in the face of, well, most of the Old Testament. I'll bet Onan would have preferred Paul's teachings to what he faced.
Click to expand...

Well in the OT the Jews are the favored of god. In the NT, not so much.

Then there's the apocryphal "Testimonium Felix" that teaches that Cats are Gods.

It was because of this heresy that Cats were persecuted in the Middle Ages.
 
I wouldn't use the Bible to support a wobbly table.
 
Most of the internal contradictions of the Bible vanish if we realize it's a library expressing the views of many different writers. Randall Helms makes this clear in his book The Bible Against Itself as does Richard Elliott Freidman in Who Wrote the Bible?, where he talks about the J,E,P,D and R (Redactor) sources. Of course, understanding these often warring viewpoints tends to preclude accepting divine authorship.
 
I think the analogy to a Rorschach test is a good one personally.

Furthermore, by relying on the bible as absolute and god-inspired, they are essentially saying, "god couldn't be here for the moment, so he left these instructions for us. this means that god is real and he is my god, because it says so in the instructions."

It would be like me claiming that Natalie Portman (:D) loved me because I went to her website and she had a letter to her fans saying, "I love you all! Thank you for your support" or something, and then trying to convince everyone she loved me and needed my support because of that letter. If anything, if I was naive enough to actually believe that internet posting was directed at me, I would set out across the country like Borat in an attempt to be united with the one who "claimed to love me," ... I wouldn't be content to merely have some printout as proof. If she loved me, there should be no problem showing up at her door.

But the average believer is running around with their printout in their hand, claiming that it's a love/instruction letter from god, proof that he knows who they are and now they know who he is. But when you ask them, "okay ... let's go knock on god's door since you know him so well and have a sit down chat," they often have nothing more to offer except personal anecdotes and their printouts from a couple thousand years ago. If they are content with that, then to me, that's more a lack of faith in many ways. Because they prefer having the old printout to actually looking at their lives and saying, "okay wait a minute. let's go find this god and knock on his door and get some answers. this letter doesn't make sense." I mean, if god really wrote the thing, then lets go find him! I need some clarification please!

I suppose that is one kind of "faith", being content with the bible/letter/printout/god-flyer only. Perhaps deciding "the bible says it, I believe it, and that's it" actually is more of a "faith". IDK. But if a person tries one of the claims, finds it lacking, and then has to make circular argument excuses to keep the belief "going" .... then to me, that is a lack of faith. Especially if the truth of the matter is that they become disenfranchised and have to convince themself something is true that they are starting to not want to believe any longer. Because I would demand an answer from god himself ... no more holly bibbles and old letters and preachers jumping around and knocking me over. I'd want the answers from god himself. And if I got no answer when I asked ... that would tell me something right there.
 
The idea of depending on the Bible or using its words as a guide in day-to-day living reminded me of a joke I heard several years ago:

A man used to begin each day by opening his Bible, flipping the pages and plunking his finger down at random, trusting that God would guide him to the right Bible verse that would tell him how to act that day. One morning he did his usual ritual and he read the verse his finger was on:

"And Judas went and hanged himself."

Somewhat shaken, he rationalized that God wouldn't really tell him to commit suicide. There must be a deeper, hidden meaning in the verse relating to his life. To find it, he decided to flip the pages once more. This finger landed on the following verse:

"Go thou and do likewise."

Quite shaken, the man reasoned that perhaps Satan had interfered with his godly oracle. He resolved to try one last time. This time his finger landed on John 13:27 where Jesus says to Judas:

"What you are going to do, do quickly."
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom