http://www.cracked.com/article_15699_9-most-bad…

See also http://www.westegg.com/morgan/bible.html

He that is wounded in the stones, or hath his privy member cut off, shall not enter into the congregation of the Lord—Deuteronomy 23:1

sparkles … how did you change your avatar?

I could have so much fun making things up-but I have been addressed admirably in the forum despite being of dissenting opinion. The one that scares the the crap out of me is about Enoch, who did his thing, got chosen by God, and either became Metatron the flaming-eyed Regent of Heaven or just ascended.

“Enoch walked with God; then he was no more, because God took him away.” —Genesis 5:24 NIV.

For one thing you’ve got God playing favorites. Then there’s the matter of what’s so great about Enoch, like could it be something I wouldn’t like? Then you’ve got power being seemingly thrown around, a fate more or less better than the proverbial ‘eternal bliss’, the possibility of a killer man-angel. It’s horrific-not just like a gory movie or a car crash, but like the party in Orwell’s ‘1984’ or the whims of an abusive parent-like rather than out-in-the-open violence a close, lingering, pervasive, unavoidable maleficence.

People say it’s all about love and forgiveness and happiness-but when they used buses with diesel-exhaust suffocation-chambers at the onset of the Holocaust there were bright happy faces painted on the outside. I mean, once you start calling this lunacy every positive adjective-noun combination you can make from the dictionary what can it mean except that some of them ain’t correct?

“Enoch walked with God; then he was no more, because God took him away.”
All I see here is a man dying peacefully. Nothing about Metatron is mentioned anywhere in the Bible that I can recall.

Furthermore, God is all-knowing, so He would not have given any kind of power to one who did not merit it, who would not use it for the purpose God intended.

“People say it’s all about love and forgiveness and happiness-but when they used buses with diesel-exhaust suffocation-chambers at the onset of the Holocaust there were bright happy faces painted on the outside.”
This is a great example. What they did is done, no changing that. It may or may not have been wrong. What the New Testament is telling us is for YOU to love and forgive THEM. Because hatred can lead only to misery for all those involved.

God loves everyone equally, this is like the 8th grade argument “The teacher is playing favorates” which sometimes might be the case but for the most part its just the students putting up fake walls, just because someone answer more questions and the teacher answers favorably doesn’t mean the teacher is playing favorites hes only answering the people that call him.

as for the book of enoch, it makes sense why its not included, if thats what your referring to. Just because discovery channel does a special on some silly book doesnt make it viable. I do love me some discovery channel :) doesn’t mean i always agree with it though, they’ve been wrong before and im sure will be in the future.

So back to the book, lets say you write a novel, its your best work! its amazing, everyone loves it, and you wrote it with your good friend Jimmy and you end on chapter 14, ahh what an accomplishment. You and Jimmy find out someone wrote chapter 15, who doesn’t know you and has no idea how the characters are developed or the ideas behind the story, do you think that chapter should be included into the book? i wouldn’t say so, same goes for the book of enoch.

on the topic of bible versus i am scared beyond belief. here is what i mean.

if a teenager does not repect his parents and does not go to them when the call shall be stoned

if anyone assicates with the same sex shall be stoned

Any woman who does a high placed job shall have them replaced with a man and she shall be stoned

i am scared by the bible right now ver very scared

that was the old Mosaic Law

“on the topic of bible versus i am scared beyond belief. here is what i mean.
if a teenager does not repect his parents and does not go to them when the call shall be stoned
if anyone assicates with the same sex shall be stoned
Any woman who does a high placed job shall have them replaced with a man and she shall be stoned
i am scared by the bible right now ver very scared”

The only thing I can suggest to you is research Zombie.. Stoning is human judgment… fear no human.. Your body is only flesh it might hurt but read up on Rasputin and you will see how far spirituality can take you body.

This tells us that without love we are nothing

13:1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, [1] but have not love, I gain nothing.

4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; [2] 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

8 Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. 11 When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. 12 For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.

13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Hathnofury:

Fellow monotheist, from what I am seeing of this site the way to get across to the nonbelivers is not directly quoting scripture. Because that is all interpretation. You must have new angle. Then grab back your sword soldier of God.

yes i know that . . . but this is thread is about some really good scripture as well as trying to lead others on the path to god

“yes i know that . . . but this is thread is about some really good scripture as well as trying to lead others on the path to god”

Only god can lead them. You only must plant a seed and once it is planted it must grow on its own. You cannot crusade around and boast our beliefs or else they do not listen. Pride is the issue here.

yeah your right i should have worded what I said a little different

Well, OK, I will say that there are a lot of verses in the bible that are a little kooky. I think one should realize that the words were written a long time ago; there were different laws, different attitudes and different beliefs. Things change so much over time, the authors of the bible could not know much about the way things are today. One thing I don’t like is the way some people pick and choose verses to prove their point of view. Homosexual behavior is condemned, but if the preacher’s wife is a vice president at IBM, she is condemned, too??!! Sometimes its hard to make much sense out of it. However, I do think that god did play favorites in the bible, just read some of the books by the prophets. God was real nice to them when they did what he wanted them to do, but don’t be a don’t bee where god is concerned (Romper Room reference). They quickly found out where they stood when they messed up. And don’t even get started on Job (lol). Zombie45, take anything you read with a grain of salt, including the bible. Authors, even of fiction and scientific texts have a point of view. You just might not see it at first, but its there AND make sure you understand it.

Hath:

Take it like this. This is your chance to let these people know what Christianity is all about, and you have to think about how many people have come to these people before you (Probably quoting scripture, Proud, and Judgmental). There is a reason they are atheist remember that. Then assess the issue. New angle=Sharper Blade

I think this is the most bad ass Bible verse. Jesus sums up the entire Bible in TWO SENTENCES!!

Mark 12:28-33 (New International Version)
New International Version (NIV)

Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society
NIV at IBS NIV at Zondervan

The Greatest Commandment
28One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?”

29”The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. 30Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ 31The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’There is no commandment greater than these.”

32”Well said, teacher,” the man replied. “You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. 33To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.”

There is a lot of beautiful prose in the bible, thank you for sharing that.

(yah…I wonder a bit on and off topic, but I assure you that if you can stay awake through my overly verbose post, there is a topical question in here :)

Wow…this site is weird enough that I had to sign up. I have very, very often thought, “I may not be a Christian, but I studied the Bible enough to know that if the Big Guy came back, based on the life I have lived and the thoughts I have and the actions I undertake, my ass is gonna be WAY up that line compared to those 700 Club bozos…”

And for the most part, I have been right. Then, I come here and see…gasp of gasps, compasionate people claiming to be Christians. Hell, I had almost given up on the notion that such a thing could exist. Of course, you still have morons like Dragongoof running around letting and giving you guys a bad name. But, I must say that I am very, VERY impressed with some others I have seen here. One of the things that initially drove me from ‘The Church’ was the gleeful dismissal of logic and all things intelligent. Here, I have found people I could not disagree with more and who I find to be remarkably and startelingly ignorant and misguided…just as they most certainly view me…and yet I feel that I could engage them in sincere, honest and legitimate discussion.

I can not express enough how startled I was to find this. You guys really, really need to ‘keep the faith’ (ok, I HATE them, but the pun was a bit intended) and keep it up. Dragonbozo and his ilk have done more damage to your cause than any incarnation of evil or Lucifer could ever dream of. It is only you and those like you who bring any hope at all back to your cause.

Anyway…So, I had to make an account to ask the question…
“I think one should realize that the words were written a long time ago; there were different laws, different attitudes and different beliefs. Things change so much over time, the authors of the bible could not know much about the way things are today.”

I am startled…amazed…stunned to see a self-described Christian speak so candidly, and I am sorry to say, honestly.

So, my question is for those here who have not devised their own twisted, perverted proof of intellectual=evil, and I would ask you, as this has confused me for awhile…

As the above quote expresses, the Bible was authored by men. We can see that the Bible we find in the little rack on the back of the pew today is so much different from what we can find of the ‘originals’ that it is almost humerous. Heck, Luke and John apparently couldn’t decide on what Jesus told them the Lord’s Prayer would be, Jesus told everyone that poor fools aflicted with a devastating desease were possessed by spirits and the ‘originals’ clearly, plainly and flatlly state that the world is flat, with four corner and the sky is help up by poles… It has been edited and messed up, translations botched and politics injected…and yet, you put the faith of your eternal salvation in accuracy and ‘Truth’ of this book. How in the world does this not make the logical part of your brain completely short circut?

This is not rhetorical or anything else. When I was in Boy Scouts, I won several national awards for religious work I did. I elected to be baptized at age 13, which was not exactly the act that got me in the ‘cool crowd’. I grew up in religion and for a good part of my life, it was a crucial and cherished thing for me.

I am a VERY spiritual person and have that longing that all humans have. At some point, however, my brain developed enough that I could no longer ignore all the just plain lunacy I saw all around me in organized religion. There are others here who seem remarkably thoughtful and humble and reflective. It is to you that I address my question. I have no problem at all, and my concious is perfectly fine with laying many, many hostile and mean labels on the likes of Dragonboob and his ilk. But you guys however…you seem to actually think…and you fascinate me. I never thought that Western religion had any place for someone who finds things like ‘logic’ and ‘reason’ important.

You guys feel you are called to plant the seed in me to lead me back to The Light…so, bring it on. I do not have a lot of faith (ok…I am on a pun roll, and rather embarrased) in your success, but I come to the discussion with an open mind, a humble attitude and a lot of enthusiasm for your reaction.

Dragonbreath, I will beat you to it and engage you in the debate that you can handle: You are a poo-poo head. There, now there is something for you so you don’t feel left out (sorry to be so swarmy and take those shots, but there is no personality on the planet more appaling to me…even the Satanists are better people for at least they are honest to the belief system they supposedly adopt).

Well that was quite alot to take in and I think I shall read it a few more times before I respond to your questions. This probably could have been a new topic but whatever… We’ll take it as it comes. I did want to agree with your statement:

“I come to the discussion with an open mind, a humble attitude and a lot of enthusiasm for your reaction.”

I look forward to having some mutually beneficial discussions with you as it looks like we’re coming at this from different angles.
-PLUR

sparkles…You have my attention…I want the t-shirt…

GhOst, I am not a christian, I am an atheist. I’m sorry if my posts in this topic have misled you…

I’ve got nothing really against the perpetrators of the Holocaust per-se, none of my folks got hurt, and I mean in a different time and place they may have lead more normal lives, and the victims may have done more to save themselves, and America more to save them, but as for what should’ve happened, say when the RAF bombers got over top of Dresden? There was only one thing to do.

Forgive them? I call that the despicable philosophy of the spaniel that rolls on it’s back when kicked.

As for Enoch I’m no Bible scholar-but he got some kind of preferential treatment. I can give you ten lines to substantiate that-but I haven’t found a single passage to say why, other than because he was God’s special buddy.

Gh0st:
“It has been edited and messed up, translations botched and politics injected…and yet, you put the faith of your eternal salvation in accuracy and ‘Truth’ of this book. How in the world does this not make the logical part of your brain completely short circut?”

It is simple friend. It is this idea alone. That there was once a man who went beyond the blackness of death. Who cured when there was no medicine. Walked on an idea as unstable as water. Who withstood the ignorance of his own loved ones with no spite. My Messiah. My faith is from no one book or rice paper text. It is within an idea that someone witnessed these things actually and factually happening. That is faith.

Hanno:
“As for Enoch I’m no Bible scholar-but he got some kind of preferential treatment.”

Me and me fellowship look at being a prophet almost like carrying the burdens of the people. Yes, Moses did have kick butt powers but, he walked as a slave for 40 years before that option came to him. Yes, Jesus was the best ever(Hands Down Simply Put LoL) but look at his outcome, he also felt human pain and ignorant oppression from “Babylon”. Abraham and all of his people will forever be the people of God, but before that he was asked by God to kill his son and he was going to do it. No questions asked. Could you have done that. Lott the only survivor from, my forever played trump card, Sodom and Gomorrah traveled through the desert until his death think he was the only human left on the earth. In turn, resorting to incest with his daughters to repopulate.

Becoming a Prophet is not “preferential treatment” it is being gifted with a burden of the people. Simply put.

Yeah, but being God’s special buddy? I think I can handle anything Enoch put up with as per the scriptures…

He was just like you or me.. But no need for tangible “proof” still his faith went unquestioned.. You couldn’t handle anything god could dish if you are an atheist. The day you questioned faith your chances for being his “Special Buddy” went out the window.