Relationship with God

[VanillaCreme]

The devil is an angel.

Common modern mythos holds so, sure. But the early church seems to have regarded Lucifer and Satan as two different entities -- the word used for "Satan," is actually something closer to "the opponent/the adversary," and a lot of early scriptures imply that the god of the bible at times used Satan as a heavenly judge before people are to appear before the throne of god, etc. He's essentially depicted as a heavenly prosecutor that is sort of opposed to (but used by) God.

In fact in some of the earlier Hebrew scriptures, there doesn't seem to be a specific person who is "Satan," it's mostly described as a position which is occupied by different people, nations, entities, etc... at different times who are in opposition to the Jews. If you go back to the early scriptures, Satan is a vague sort of general position of being anti-god.

A lot of the characterization of Satan as being a specific person came later (several hundred years after the days of the apostles) as a response in opposition to other contemporary belief systems -- the imagery of Satan as a goat, corresponding to Pan, etc. Largely the connection between "Lucifer" and "Satan" came about from the fourth-to-sixth centuries AD.

And there are still Coptic christian sects today that revere Lucifer as a saint, believing that he was a fallen angel who later redeemed himself.

I know I said this isn't a discussion thread, but... I just wanted to point that out.

No no, I love learning all the tid-bits about things like this. It's what makes it so fascinating. Thank you for explaining that, because I didn't know all of that.

 

[Minty]

I don't believe in God or any religion. It's a shame that debates on the subject are not allowed on this site because I am fascinated by religion and would like to debate about it.

It's hard for me, as an atheist (humanist, whatever you want to call it) to say 'each to their own' as many people do if they generally have no opinion because I am quite convicted in my atheism, having been brought up a catholic.

I was brought up a catholic (as I mentioned), then I went through my questioning agnostic stage and now, I am an atheist.

One thing for sure, I have never been so happy in my whole life. When that catholic guilt complex evaporates into nothing, oh man, it is the best feeling in the world.

I respect what makes other people happy but I cannot understand why many people's happiness seems to depend on religion.

 

[Limlim]

There appear to be two minty's on this forum now. Do you also have a beard?

 

[SofiasMami]

I don't believe in God or any religion. It's a shame that debates on the subject are not allowed on this site because I am fascinated by religion and would like to debate about it.

It's hard for me, as an atheist (humanist, whatever you want to call it) to say 'each to their own' as many people do if they generally have no opinion because I am quite convicted in my atheism, having been brought up a catholic.

I was brought up a catholic (as I mentioned), then I went through my questioning agnostic stage and now, I am an atheist.

One thing for sure, I have never been so happy in my whole life. When that catholic guilt complex evaporates into nothing, oh man, it is the best feeling in the world.

I respect what makes other people happy but I cannot understand why many people's happiness seems to depend on religion.

Well your experience mirrors mine in every way except I went straight from believer to non-believer. I suppose it's because I personally met too many hypocrites, never found any comfort in faith and personally viewed praying to an unseen entity weird.

However, I like that this forum generally doesn't have religious discussions. There are plenty of other forums on the hashwebs for that. Plus, I've never liked political or religious internet debates. They wind up getting shouty and overly personal.

-Teresa

 

[Badjedidude]

There appear to be two minty's on this forum now. Do you also have a beard?

Or a mustache. Let's not forgets 'staches.

 

[Batman55]

There appear to be two minty's on this forum now. Do you also have a beard?

They are one and the same.

 

[SteveJackson]

just be good to yourself and to others...

 

[Minus]

And there are still Coptic christian sects today that revere Lucifer as a saint, believing that he was a fallen angel who later redeemed himself.

That sounds something like the Yezidi belief in Melek Taus.

 

[edgecrusher]

My main thing is, I just think we should observe the universe and see what it has to show us and go from there. It makes sense. Religions like to start with the answer(god), and then try to find ways for it to make sense. That's backwards. So many people accept god as the answer to the origin of the universe and life, but then seem unable or unwilling to ask where their god then came from. So god is just another step in the original question. It just pushed the line of thinking back one step, which doesn't actually accomplish anything.

If god doesn't believe he has a creator, does that make him an atheist?

To lighten the mood... If Jesus has low self esteem, does that make him an atheist?(you know, because he doesn't BELIEVE in himself, get it?)

 

[Badjedidude]

That sounds something like the Yezidi belief in Melek Taus.

Yeah, I've read that as well. It doesn't seem to be too uncommon among certain christian sects.

 

[VanillaCreme]

My main thing is, I just think we should observe the universe and see what it has to show us and go from there. It makes sense. Religions like to start with the answer(god), and then try to find ways for it to make sense. That's backwards. So many people accept god as the answer to the origin of the universe and life, but then seem unable or unwilling to ask where their god then came from. So god is just another step in the original question. It just pushed the line of thinking back one step, which doesn't actually accomplish anything.

If god doesn't believe he has a creator, does that make him an atheist?

To lighten the mood... If Jesus has low self esteem, does that make him an atheist?(you know, because he doesn't BELIEVE in himself, get it?)

HAR so funny I nearly forgot to laugh. But that does make me wonder where anything came from at all. Sure, I believe one entity made everything we see and know of, and what we don't know of, too. But was there something that made that entity? I've always thought that was something humans will never know.

 

[edgecrusher]

HAR so funny I nearly forgot to laugh. But that does make me wonder where anything came from at all. Sure, I believe one entity made everything we see and know of, and what we don't know of, too. But was there something that made that entity? I've always thought that was something humans will never know.

I agree that that is a possibility. However, it kills me when people seem to be ok with the idea that there is something that is so above us that we will never understand it. As if there are problems we will never be able to solve. That things that we don't currently understand will always be above our intellectual capacity. I think that isn't a good mentality to have. Imagine if all of us always had that mentality over the last couple hundred years. We'd probably still be living in cabins and huts huddled around fires.

This is why I think the entire concept of a creator is just too complacent. Throughout the course of human history it has existed as an answer for whatever we didn't understand at any given time and it has changed to accommodate what we have discovered on our own. We used to think natural disasters and weather were divine intervention. Now through our own volition, we can explain those processes. We used to think disease and illness was divine intervention. Then we discovered that we share this planet with an immense amount of microorganisms that are the explanation for illnesses. With each new thing we learn, god becomes less "powerful." The amount of things thought to be god that we can now explain does nothing but continue to increase. By our own definition of the word, we will continue to learn about the universe and do things that make us the"gods." If we do not destroy ourselves first of course.

We have discovered that our universe is bigger than our gods, and we are having a hard time letting them go.

 

[Sci-Fi]

I agree that that is a possibility. However, it kills me when people seem to be ok with the idea that there is something that is so above us that we will never understand it. As if there are problems we will never be able to solve. That things that we don't currently understand will always be above our intellectual capacity. I think that isn't a good mentality to have. Imagine if all of us always had that mentality over the last couple hundred years. We'd probably still be living in cabins and huts huddled around fires.

That is each individual person prerogative to believe or not believe though and shouldn't be looked down upon.

This is starting to lean towards a debate on what and what does not exist. Let's keep it away from that and more on the original subject.

 

[edgecrusher]

That is each individual person prerogative to believe or not believe though and shouldn't be looked down upon.

This is starting to lean towards a debate on what and what does not exist. Let's keep it away from that and more on the original subject.

And I don't look down upon it. It just blows my mind that anyone would be ok with accepting that. I have a hard time seeing it as anything more than something that holds us back. Which is why I referred to it as complacent. I see many atheists refer to it as ignorance and I don't really think that is a good way look at it and I'm not going to be one of those people.

 

[DVEUS]

yes...i do believe in god...in a nonconformist way...

i believe that there is a god because it makes me feel better about my departed love ones especially my brother who passed away at the young age of 31...

i want to see him again...i want to see my granny again...how can i live my life if my mother isn't here...how can i live my life if i don't know if she and they will be waiting for me...

whether it's real or just a placebo it simply makes me feel better and helps me cope with death...i don't want this life to be the end of the end...

 

[zibafu]

Its early and I'm speed typing cause I need to go to work so if I dont make sense youll have to deal with it :club:

Never said I didn't believe dinosaurs existed, did I? I just said I have a hard time believing the time line and explanations that the scientists give. Read what I say and stop trying to make it something it's not.
As for what I believe, I don't push what I believe on other people and I certainly don't make fun of what others believe or try to tell them they are stupid for believing it. People are free to believe what they want, that's why there is freedom of religion. One of my best friends is an atheist and we have NO trouble getting along at all. Hell, we even have religious discussions sometimes with neither of us getting upset at the other. It's called having respect for others and their beliefs.
Chances are good that if I believe in God, I also believe in the devil, huh?

Having a hard time believing the timeline and explanations is an issue for most, my father for example doesn't believe in evolution (hes not a creationist tho) , so I lent him a book on it and he didn't understand it and his opinion is that if he cannot understand it, then its not proof... which is actually quite ridiculous, I dont understand many things, doesn't mean they aren't true

The great thing about science though is it doesn't require your belief

Hell as far as anyone is concerned we were "created" 5 minutes ago with all of our memories...

However scientists dont just pull explanations out of their asses randomly, they figure stuff out with equipment that is unbiased, impartial and not subject to emotion and form their conclusions based on evidence, in fact a good scientist would try to disprove his own hypothesis

The devil is an angel.

Common modern mythos holds so, sure. But the early church seems to have regarded Lucifer and Satan as two different entities -- the word used for "Satan," is actually something closer to "the opponent/the adversary," and a lot of early scriptures imply that the god of the bible at times used Satan as a heavenly judge before people are to appear before the throne of god, etc. He's essentially depicted as a heavenly prosecutor that is sort of opposed to (but used by) God.

Always used to bother me the devil with "this is devils work" kinda statements, yet if the devil was real and god is real then the devil is his/her creation, which would mean all the devils work is actually gods work too, and the adversary bit - how could "god" have an adversary who isnt anything but another god




My relationship with god is I don't have a relationship with god, I can't prove one way or the other whether there is a god or gods, but I'm not gonna simply believe in something because it might be true

 

[Minty]

There appear to be two minty's on this forum now. Do you also have a beard?

Yeah, I didn't realise that when I joined up. I have no beard, thankfully. Would look weird on a girl

---

Well your experience mirrors mine in every way except I went straight from believer to non-believer. I suppose it's because I personally met too many hypocrites, never found any comfort in faith and personally viewed praying to an unseen entity weird.

However, I like that this forum generally doesn't have religious discussions. There are plenty of other forums on the hashwebs for that. Plus, I've never liked political or religious internet debates. They wind up getting shouty and overly personal.

-Teresa

I think the reason I was agnostic for so long is because I just wasn't getting the answers I wanted and instead of turning my back, I still gave it the benefit of the doubt and kept asking questions. Finally, the only solid answers I got were scientific.

Science gives me answers and religion gives me confusion. I'm still quite fascinated by beliefs though.

 

[Punisher]

Science and religion are not mutually exclusive. Don't have to make a choice between one or the other.

Most of the scientific discoveries we take for granted today were discovered by scientists who believed in God. And many of the scientists today are religious too.

All this generic science talk is irrelevant, getting boring and totally off topic.

 

[edgecrusher]

I think the main difference is that science doesn't take things on faith and is willing to change it's view when something new is discovered. It's just the word used to describe the act of making conclusions based on actual tested observations. Where as religion takes everything on faith and is almost exclusively unwilling to change.

 

[VanillaCreme]

It's hard to say that faith is unwilling to change. Because faith should be from person to person, not religion to religion. While some religions have stayed concrete for centuries, people can change how they view things.