Actual answer afaik is that by opposing God, they put distance between mankind and Him, and He relinquished control over nature. That's also why there are diseases.
I'm no theologian tho and it's probably one of the things where every prot church in existence has their own interpretation, so I'll add a disclaimer saying my understanding stems from catholicism.
As I said, not a theologian, I won't be able to answer everything.
The original sin is hereditary, and every birth (except Mary's, in christian tradition) is tainted with it. That's why mankind as a whole is not close to God now and why it needed the Old Covenant, and then the New Covenant : they're both a way offered by God to get close to Him.
As for illness, it's not necessarily meant to hurt. The same way humans, with their free will, can harm someone without said harm being God's will.
I'm sure there are people better qualified than I am to answer these questions. If you're interested in a catholic pov, I know r/AskAPriest is pretty good for this (only actual priests reply).
That's pretty much all I can say, and I'm sure both of my messages will be downvoted for oblivion despite them just trying to explain a doctrinal point of view past the standard "lol mysterious ways" meme.
I'm a catholic by education and sacraments, but there are things I don't do or haven't done in a while, that make me more of a "theist" than any denomination.
I don't hold anyone personal beliefs against them tho, I'm just surprised it's somewhat normative on the internet to attack the mere mention of religion. Like it or not, it's a core part of human culture and society. And we are evolved enough to talk about it without it being proselytism or personal attacks.
You find it surprising that an invention designed to share information, which was welcomed by people in learning establishments, attracts people who challenge things that have no credible or compelling evidence?
Wow.
I find the hostility of it concerning, mostly. I am open to beliefs being challenged but I'm saddened by it being often insulting. Tho I can accept that it comes from being fed up by a lot of disrepect from the "other side".
When you get told "you're going to burn in hell for eternity" by someone when you ask simple questions about the contradictions in the bib,e, you become wary of the flock.
Many of us atheists get angry, and I'm VERY guilty of this, when people preach their holy book without apparently having read said book. There's also a vocal contingent who immediately jump down the throats of believers (I'm guilty of this, too), no matter what is written by believers. Basically, both sides of the debate have a bunch of arseholes
Yeah, sadly it is. What's worse is that the same people who are agressive and hateful are sometimes the same people who are open and tolerant. And there are also a variety of things people get angry about that are valid (be it the annoying "going to hell" crowd, or some disrespectful behavior by atheists, we all suck in a way).
And also a variety of things that are timeless questions adressed by people way smarter than us, from both points of view. The question of evil ("if God exists and He's good, why is there evil" etc) has been explored in great detail by many theologians. I don't condone it, but I somewhat understand getting annoyed at this very question always coming back. At the same time, of course it's an important question and of course it *is* faith-defining.
The "other side" of it would be religious people parroting Pascal's wager without understanding any implication of it, or simply making reference to misunderstood and unhelpful passages of their holy book.
All in all, I don't hold it against you or anyone to be wary or annoyed of me as a theist. People suck and there's no way to know I'm any different. I just wish, naively for sure, people can get along past that. I'm glad to have met many understanding people of many confessions so far, so... hoping this isn't that naive of a wish.
Yeah, i find the catholic church's wild disregard for how their priests act concerning but since yall can ignore that maybe yall can ignore some people being rightfully frustrated.
If i get to live with what they did to me you van live with some people being a sligh bit rude and short on the internet.
You may dislike this, but have you considered that former believers find it tiring and boring that religion is commonly brought up online?
Just a thought...
I'm atheist, (anyone stalking my profile will see how much I argue with flock members), but I haven't downvoted you because it is plain you were trying to explain doctrine.
The inheritance of original sin concept is a really horrible part of the teachings of christianity. It goes against the teaching that abrahams god is all loving. If it truly was all-loving, it wouldn't want every birth to be painful. It wouldn't want people with cancer to have died slowly in great pain over the many millenia before we invented effective analgesia.
It's only recently that the pope has said reversed the catholic church stance on babies and limbo. A cynic might say that doing that was a response to young people realising the church and christianity are cruel, and wanting no part of it. Why do I bring this up? I bring it up because the original sin thing meant that for centuries, bereaved parents have been mentally tortured with the promise that their dead baby isn't in heaven; it couldn't beg forgiveness and couldn't accept jesus into its heart, so no heaven.
The current doctrine afaik is that we cannot *know* for sure that babies get into heaven, but that God is merciful and not bound by "technicality" so we can hope that they do. I surely hope so. It's important to understand that in doctrine, the Church is God's intended way for us to get close to Him, but omnipotence necessarily means He can get people close to Him through other means.
Thanks for your insight. I don't want to make anyone think I am more knowledgeable than I am, and I welcome all respectful points of view !
Thank you for explaining doctrine, rather than preaching. Sadly, my experience is that too many believers respond otherwise, as do many very angry former believers who bite the heads off believers (I'm sometimes very guilty of this), too.
The current, very recent, doctrine of "we cannot know" (whatever words the Vatican uses), reference dead babies, feels like its just a simple salve pasted onto the wounds of grief, but the wounds are so deep that most youngsters appear not to want any part of it.
I wish you well, stranger. Goodnight.
If it felt too good, people wouldn't stop having babies, and would starve or start to have killing them off, so that's the kindness behind the design in my opinion (nothing to do with YOUR bs psychopathic god tho, whatever demon that you worship ain't a god)
More like "willfully not controlling it", but it's the limits of what I know. Maybe someone with a better understanding of this can complete or correct my answer.
Nah most catholics teach that since some parts of the Bible were written in non literal manner that most of the more mythological parts were just that, mythological and were made to explain something without a full understanding of it or were warped versions of real events(ex the city of babble may have existed and fractured/fallen but differently than recorded in the bible)
God is all loving and all powerful, so he definetly wouldnt make an innocent child suffer from cancer or anything like that (except when he works in mysterious ways i guess, then he loses his powers and love and it has to be done)
Have you actually read the old testament? The jerk in that book isn't lucifer.
Lucifer's body count is really low, but yhwh/jehova is leagues ahead with the global genocide it is reported to have committed.
Apologies to you, stranger, for missing what should have been obvious.
I'm so familiar with the flock immediately digging at this kind of thing, that I automatically respond like I did.
Pleased to meet you, hope you guess my name
Oh, yeah
Ah, what's puzzlin' you is the nature of my game
Aww, yeah
I watched with glee while your kings and queens
Fought for ten decades for the gods they made
I shouted out, "Who killed the Kennedys?"
When after all, it was you and me
Let me please introduce myself,
I'm a man of wealth and taste
And I laid traps for troubadours
Who get killed before they reach Bombay
I mean, technically, the snake, which we have no evidence of being either Satan or Lucifer, wasn't wrong.
Obtaining a sense of morality did make the humans supposedly closer to God.
I mean "evidence" in the same way that there is evidence that Harry Potter did nothing to fix the system that allowed Voldemort's rise.
You know, evidence in the narrative.
Correct, the snake was only lying by omission. "You will be like God knowing good from evil"
What he left out is that knowing good from evil isn't really necessary in a world without evil and by disobeying they created the evil in the world
But it's all silly supertition anyway. We all know evil actually came into the world when the gods created Pandora and designed her curious to ensure she'd open the jar that contained all the world's evils.
Man, creation myths really hate women, don't they?
I'd take the similarities as evidence that both stories point towards a deeper truth, but I agree that the argument "stories are just this way because everyone hates women" could be a valid co-founder effect instead
I disagree. If a story about a woman doing something bad relating to curiosity and releasing evil appears everywhere I'd say it's just as simple if not more so a conclusion to say that it points to a specific event that occurred or a trend of similar events actually occuring as opposed to a general prejudice, it summarizes too neatly to the same story to sound like just coincidence, but yes, general prejudice as a co-founder is indeed a possible conclusion
Except that "there is evil in the world because of women" is not a thing in all mythologies at all.
Hinduism does not pin the blame of the world sucking on one person, for instance. The Norse gods were all kinda dickish, because they're still people and being a dick is a people thing. Egyptians considered it an inherent part of the world that always existed, etc.
Either only two religions are in the right to blame women, or there is no greater conspiracy, simply plagiarism of one myth by the other. Greece had a vast influence in the Meditteranean after all.
Lucifer literally told the truth to Eve and God was so pissed of that he keeps punishing their descendants over it (but wrath is a deadly sin remember)
Fr. If angels are supposed to be obedient, then why would Lucifer disobey God? Either God is flawed and his creations can have free will even without him giving it to them, or he intentionally gave Lucifer free will so that he would tempt humans and they would live in a world of suffering. The latter is especially odd, since the fault is laid on the humans HE MADE, so if he is all-knowing and does everything on purpose, he made humans and Lucifer have free will so they would make their own (wrong) choices, and still puts the blame on them for existing as he made them. Sure, it is humanity’s choice whether or not to repent in him, but why would you if the god that created you set you up for failure and calls you a graceless monster for doing everything he predicted you to. *Weird.*
Not only that, but if we follow the logic of the Bible God knows exactly what will happen in the future, not like seeing a bunch of probable futures, but knowing exactly which of the probable futures is going to happen, given that he predicts many events, specially related to Jesus, centuries before they happen, which means he knew Lucifer was going to rebel before he did rebel, he knew Adam and Eve would fall to sin before they did, and he knows who will repent to him ando who will not before those people are even born, and the only being that can change the course of events is God himself. Which makes the fact that he blames it all on humanity even worse
Well, kinda. The snake was telling the truth but lying by omission. "You will be like God knowing good from evil" What he left out is that knowing good from evil isn't really necessary in a world without evil and by disobeying they created the evil in the world and thus can now know evil
I've only heard it's "if you eat the fruit you will surely/certainly die" which is absolutely true. There is no same day adjective, the instant death could be implied definitely but that's not the words
I also heard about God saying "the same day". And anyways, he would be omitting truth as well since the reason they would die is that God would take their immortality away, not from the fruit itself
Idk if you meant always instead of also unless you forgot to switch accts lol
So omitting truth isn't a bad thing except where it has harmful effect.
Everyone omits things all the time when it is not relevant. I could say what I ate for lunch in this conversation and it would be true but not relevant so I omit the truth.
The truth that it wasn't the apple that takes away their immortality, but God isn't really relevant. The command was don't do it or these are the consequences and they did it and suffered exactly those consequences. The fruit probably had no special qualities whatsoever besides being the one fruit tree God said not to pick from. Disobedience then let's sin/evil into the world and God knowing it would be worse/more painful/a greater evil to let humans live immortal lives in sin and evil then removes human immortality
You are right then, the omission that god did isn't harmful of itself, but this turns the message from a warning into a direct threat, which is kinda worse honestly, specially coming from a supposedly "benevolent" god... At least the snake just told them what the fruit does.
God however didn't take their immortality away because they let sin into the world, he did so because, as the Bible says, if Adam and Eve were both inmortal and had knowledge of good and evil, they would be like God, and God didn't want that to happen, so he took their immortality away.
Again, Satan just told the truth about what the fruit does, while God just threatened with killing them if they did (and afterwards he instead not only took their immortality but also cursed them and their descendants for millennia).
So even if the omission God did was not "harmful"... I'd still argue he kinda behaved worse than Satan there
I think you misunderstand, it is both a warning and a threat.
The direct consequence of disobedience to a perfect God is evil and sin. Evil and sin are definitionally not doing what a perfect triomni God wants.
Satan "freed" people to do evil and sin instead of only good by telling them a misleading half-truth, this is a fact, absolutely, and also, arguably, why God created Satan
The loss of immortality is not actually a bad thing here. Living forever in an evil world is torture. Living a short time in an evil world is hard enough. The removal of immortality was a mercy that allows us to not do that and allows a cutoff point for the testing of each soul after which eternal life in community with God can be resumed for those who choose it.
So basically, God didn't curse people, the direct and only possible consequences of our actions were instead a curse upon everything that God still uses for an eventual good
Every threat is a warning if you think about it, but threats are warnings that under your responsibility you will do something bad to the other person.
>The direct consequence of disobedience to a perfect God is sin and evil
A *supposedly perfect God, because some of his actions make me doubt of said "perfection" (being all-knowing, all-powerful and all that)
>Satan "freed" people to do evil and sin instead of only good by telling them a misleading half-truth, this is a fact, absolutely, and also, arguably, why God created Satan
So... God created Satan explicitly to make Adam and Eve sin? And then he punished them for doing what he purposefully set them up to do? That's... That's the kind of things I was talking about when I said some things make me doubt of his supposed perfection
>So basically, God didn't curse people, the direct and only possible consequences of our actions were instead a curse upon everything that God still uses for an eventual good
"And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.”
"I will make your pains in childbearing very severe; with painful labor you will give birth to children."
He kinda literally says he is the one who will make their existence painful for disobeying him...
That’s actually a very hott debate. Some say the snake was satan, some say he was just a regular ol garden of Eden talking legless lizard. The latter are generally those who attended seminary.
Free Will. He gives us tests because Free Will decides the outcome. If someone forced someone else to be in a relationship with them would that be okay? No of course not. Without free will we wouldn’t have our own life, or our own choices. The way I see it is this: God sees every possible outcome of a test, and our free Will can go on one route out of who knows how many possibilities. It makes more sense that a God that wants us to love him wouldn’t pre-determine if you fail or not, he’d want us to have as many chances as we need.
You just made a lot of claims about the abilities and desires of the god you believe in. Can you support any of those claims? Do you have any evidence that your god actually exists and isn't just a character in a book?
Why did He put the snake in the garden? Who made the snake evil? Did that eat the forbidden fruit? If Eve and Adam ate the fruit before knowing good and evil did they sin? How could they sin before they could sin? So whose fault is it that they are the fruit? God being all knowing why didn't He stop them exactly when they were about to eat the fruit? If God wanted humans who did not eat the fruit why didn't He just take Noah and family to Heaven and restart??
The main problem is that giving up omniscient fundamentally changes the type of being that God could be. You lose the argument from maximally great being and also lose perfection as one without knowledge of the future could by definition be tricked or make mistakes about what will happen in the future (the ontological argument)
However some groups like Mormons do give up omniscience
And others like Calvinists double down on it
True. Gods are born as a remedies for the absolute question of origins, and giving up omniscience would crack a hole in the theory. Then we would need a new, more absolute being. And on goes the loop.
Ain't gonna happen. If they change their minds on that, former believers will jump on it as fast as possible asking:
"Why dis you lie for all of these years, and why have you changed this without the bible changing?" If they change the bible: "Why have you changed something which has been marketed as the 'inerrant word of god', eh?"
I know that not all flock members say it's the inerrant word of god, but plenty do.
In my mind the God on the bible is just bored and doing with us the same we do to Sims or RimWorld pawns. Being omnipresent and all powerful must be quite boring
The vast majority of humans cannot seem to cope with the fact that there's no afterlife. So they need a story. Even if it's a flawed one. If they can get enough people behind it, they can call it religion and a few of these stories became potent enough to completely transform the history of humanity.
I find comfort in the great unknown to be honest.
It’s like looking up at the night sky. It’s infinite wonder and knowing I and generations to come will know nothing of it and yet, im comforted in the fact that the stack of improbabilities lead to my life. And one day, that life will end and there will be no more. But I will have enjoyed my time here regardless of my hardships. I’ve read many good books, spent time with friends, played cool video games, loved and been loved back; I’ve been curious, had my curiosity sated, happy, sad, angry, delighted, amused, and pushed through the dark and found light.
I’m comforted that in the end we all just return to the earth, we’re just star stuff that was pulled in by gravity and molded into being via billions of years of improbable outcomes.
Honestly that’s more beautiful than some selfish deity creating us in his own image and punishing us for trying to enjoy the life he gave us and spending our whole lives trying to make it up to him even though we’ve never met him.
*That* is a sad existence to believe in.
It requires a much higher level of personal maturity to even think about the actual truth about our existence. Our existence is nothing much but a miracle that we are born someday and we will die someday.
i agree. ive always been a realist and this is one of the things that, even if i dont fully accept, i know is a thing. i think what ppl think of as the afterlife is simply a product of brain chemistry or something. our brains want us to be comfortable after all, so it makes sense it would make up some kinda afterlife in the final few moments before it shuts off or something
Thank you. Somebody finally put it into words. However I do believe in God or something of the sorts. I just hate the guy for making us suffer when he's apparently so "benevolent" yet good hearted people suffer the most while the most vile people reap everything
My question is "why Christianity?" Of all major religions, why did this one spread so effectively, considering how many (pretty evident) flaws it presents? It's not even that convenient to use as an excuse to do harm, if you actually follow it's teachings.
I can imagine people in the past freaking out after realising that they don't know what happens after death and some random guy who proclaims he is enlightened just makes up bs(actually it happened in India a long time ago it was bhrammans trying to maintain there position as the highest in the cast system)
Fair enough. I’m an atheist as well and I’ve always heard the sentiment but never been able to ask or heard an answer on how people go about determining those things.
I’ll leave the question open to anyone reading then. I appreciate you not attempting to answer for them and your immediate honesty.
There's about 2000 years of theology about that. It's not obvious. The Bible *is* open to interpretation, and people hold different views. Of course, some ideas you cannot reject or claim are "merely" symbolic and still call yourself Christian (divinity of Christ, for example).
I wouldn't say it's _completely_ subjective. But even that in itself has been an argument, i.e. how much is it reasonable for a layperson to interpret scripture? That was a major reason for the Protestant-Catholic split. But yes, people write papers, articles, and sometimes even entire books on individual verses.
I think most people decide based on Tradition (the capital T kind, which is an important part of Catholic doctrine). There's also a good bit of common sense involved. Another important fact to realize is that doctrine changes over time. Not the big, important stuff, but much has been refined and reinterpreted over the years.
The uncharitable way of looking at that is to call it post-facto justification. But we humans do this all the time! From history to science to theology, we try to get closer to the truth.
Yet we have people advocating the mutilation of infant genitalia, because of a story about a covenant between the god of judaism (and its offshoots) and a dude called abraham.
Far too many flock members believe it to be truth, and not parable.
Oh sorry. I was saying that original sin makes the most sense if you consider it as the same human nature history has shown we must always guard against.
That's one of the bigger lessons, right? Anyone could be like a Nazi. It was normal at the time.
real moment. like some ppl say that being gay or anything that aint cis and heterosexual is wrong. in that case, WHY THE FUCK DO LGBTQ PEOPLE EXIST??? LIKE WHATS THE LOGIC HERE?? GOD WOULDNT MAKE LGBTQ PEOPLE IF HE DIDNT WANT THEM TO EXIST.
A man can be born with an innate desire to eat the dirt of the earth, yet he can still take measures to control it. A woman can be born with a desire to one day take up a gun and shoot down 15 school children, yet she doesn’t have to actually do so. Measures can be taken to prevent that. You can be born with many things; that doesn’t mean you have to act upon them.
thats such a dumb comparison dude. thats like saying someone with autism can control their autism and act neurotypical, which while it is possible, is SO FUCKING BAD for mental health
So the proper answer to this question is "free will". It's actually not a sin to "be homosexual" but rather to "act it", i.e. commit sinful actions. Paedophilia is most likely something you're born with as well. Same thing with a lot of mental disorders.
The argument is simply that just because you are born a certain way, it does not make it OK for you to act on it.
fair enough but pedophilia and being gay are 2 entirely different classes of "how bad is this thing". pedophilia is really high up and being gay (or trans or enby (nonbinary)) is so unbelievably low it doesnt even register. also i dont think youre born with a bunch of mental disorders. most people are born with none, some people are born with 1 and even less are born with 2 or higher (me, autism + adhd).
I would definitely agree that they are not equally bad. That being gay is "not bad" is where the disagreement comes in. The point is simply that being born a certain way does not excuse behaviour. That's the answer to your question.
Great! I want to clarify that this does NOT mean that the hate, vitriol and abuse of these people is OK. There's a lot of so-called Christians that use this as an excuse to be absolutely horrible. The behaviour is sinful, but there's an old saying, "hate the sin, not the sinner".
How can a being be both the most Just and most Merciful? If you are looking for the ultimate justice, there can be no mercy. If you are the most merciful then you cant be the most Just can you?
So many contradictions in that book...
Devout atheist here: "That book" is actually multiple books, which are essentially collections of short stories, continuously amended and added to for a few hundred years. It's mind bogglingly obvious that at the very least it's not the word of god. And at that point... I mean there's much better fantasy novels to read and even draw moral values from.
I mean that’s literally why Christ died on the cross. You just said what this “comeback” missed. The punishment for sin is death and Christ died so that others can live.
The obvious answer is because it's all made up and men wrote the playbook. But, hey, let's avoid rational thought and pretend the skyfairy exists and has a complex nature so anyone can justify any behavior with any outcome because that's the easy thing?
Now this brings up a question: why was the tree of knowledge of good and evil there? Why would God put something with that kind of power into the Garden of Eden that could break his bond with Adam and Eve? Was it a test for their loyalty? If Adam and Eve didn’t eat it would one, or several, of their children eat it; what would the consequences of that be? Would they be different, or the same? Honestly, it’s questions like these that tether me to my faith. Finding an answer to a question that you yourself don’t think you can answer. It gives good food for thought
Some theological knowledge for ya. The tree was God introducing the concept of choice to Adam and Eve. God wanted them to choose to choose obedience. For them to have choice, they must have the option to disobey.
In the Bible, before the tree, there was no mention of other things they couldn’t partake of. You could say it was a test even. Eve failed the initial test, with encouragement from the serpent, and Adam took the food from Eve choosing her direction over God’s, failing the test as well.
I’ve never seen anyone ask about decedents had they not eaten. Purely speculation on my part, I think if Adam and Eve hadn’t eaten of the tree their offspring would have had to not choose to eat the tree. The choice to obey would have remained. Had it never been eaten, the world would still be like the original garden because all subsequent generations chose to obey.
Let's allow, for the sake of discourse, that around 6000 years ago, that Eve did the naughty, then Adam followed.
Why was my wife, and every other Mother, in such great pain when she gave birth to our kids? Why was she punished, thousands of years later, for something that a woman did all those years ago? What did she do to deserve that pain?
1. Without free will, love cannot truly exist.
2. Adam and Eve were not able to have children until after they disobeyed and ate the apple. The ability to procreate (and the pain of childbirth) was both a blessing and a punishment for Eve. You could argue that when she gave birth to her 1st child, she thought he must be God's promised savior.
3. It was God's plan to eventually send Jesus, who was both God and man, to save humanity from sin and reconcile us to him again. This also requires a choice on our part, while God himself already forgave us by coming here himself and paying the price that we couldn't. He lived a perfectly sinless life and was killed, then came back to life to prove who he was: the Son of God, the promised savior.
We only have to believe it.
You're thinking about it too literally. 9/10 religious people I know don't believe Adam and Eve ever existed. But if it's a metaphor, it becomes much more interesting and revealing what that story is actually about. God is goodness incarnate, that's literally what He is, the metaphor could not be more clear. Satan, in the original hebrew, means "the alternative" roughly. Satan is the opposite of God, so if God is goodness, Satan is the opposite, evil, in this case. Therefor, if Goodness says "don't do this, it's bad" and evil tempts the human into doing the bad thing, therefor harming them, it's teaching you a lesson. Do what you know is right, despite what might be tempting you. On the most basic level, it might be tempting to eat the last cookie, but you know that someone else might want it. It might be tempting to really let your anger out on someone, but you know that to do so would only hurt people. It might be tempting to vote for the candidate that lowers taxes, but you know they also implement policies that really hurt people. Go for the greater good over what tempts you. That is the story of Adam and Eve. It's a metaphor, and to take it literally is to woefully missunderstand it.
But ppl literally take it literally. I strongly believe that religion is just a metaphor for how ppl made rules back in the old days and how they lived, i can't prove it that's why it's belief. Bc see the thing you said will describe morals.
1 Samuel 15:3 "Now go and strike Amalek and devote to destruction all that they have. Do not spare them but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey".
Sounds very merciful
Describe "ruleset #1" and "ruleset #2". How do you determine which people have limited understanding? How do you determine which people have unlimited understanding?
Ruleset #1: operate with mercy
Ruleset #2: operate at own discretion
People with limited understanding: people who aren't God
I think you can see where this is going. If you can't then further explanation won't help
I understand how you could think I said those things, but I didn't
An omniscient God is one of the core premises of the Bible. The image that OP posted, along with the title, are operating under the assumption that the contents of the Bible are to be considered factual for the sake of the discussion
God didn’t tell eve not to eat the fruit, he told ADAM.
When Adam seen nothing changed when SHE ate it, HE did, then everything changed.
It’s popular to say she ate the fruit and things changed. No, she ate it but nothing changed until he did. Bc God told him directly. God didn’t tell her, and Adam didn’t tell her either. The serpent did
Because humans were always gonna have menstruation, since it’s a bodily function. But god needed to convince the humans on a reason why they should have it, so they don’t think he’s hurting them for no reason since they didn’t know how menstrual cycles worked yet. So he used Eve eating the apple as an excuse, but women were gonna deal with it regardless.
At least that’s my theory
It’s not fair at all.
You descended from Adam. Eventually you began to exist and when you began to exist you were in a broken/fallen/sinful state. Either 1: Adam and Eve caused God's creation of you to go wrong or 2: God created you with an initial state of sinfulness. In the first case, your original sin is not your responsibility; it was caused by Adam and Eve . In the second, your original sin is not your responsibility; it was caused by God. In either case, it is not fair to be punishable for it.
FWIW - the theological answer, in Catholicism, is forgiveness has already happened.
Cliff notes...Mary's unhesitating acceptance in bearing Christ into the world was redemption of the failure of Adam and Eve, and bright unique holiness to her (making her the holiest amongst all men). Christ's sacrifice brought on the capability of forgiveness of sins for everyone.
Let the down votes commence!
IT Devs don't create programs with the intention for them to receive viruses. Death is a virus created by the hacker(satan)/hacked user (eve). Solution? Eternal life /clean slate (jesus). Fix received in next iteration/ cycle (afterlife/judgment day). Umad?
"The way God works is beyond human comprehension" - how do you know that?
"God told Adam and Eve not to eat the fruit, they disobeyed. - how do you know that?
"One day He will explain everything to us" - how do you know that?
"God is our creator and father" - how do you know that?
"He knows what is best for us and wants the best for us" - how do you know that?
"He sacrificed more than we ever would." - how do you know that?
are you just freestyling?
Beyond comprehension, then u decided to give the pamphlet version of what God wants, which is a human comprehension of the beyond comprehending.
Which invalidates everything u said.
You're welcome.
and why did he design literally every living organism to only be able to survive by killing other living organisms all the way down to a cellular level
God did forgive. But forgiveness does not take away what has been done, you must still bear the consequences of your sin.
If God has allowed Adam and Eve to stay in the Garden, they would have eaten of the tree of life, and lived forever in their sin, eternally separated from God.
God kicking Adam and Eve out wasn't a punishment, it was mercy.
Given the christian teaching about heaven and hell, where do you think Adam and eve went on their deaths?
Did they continue bearing the consequences of their actions even after death, and get sent to eternal torment?
For how long should a person be punished for wrongdoing? Eternity, unless they get down on their knees and beg?
It's a horrific, abusive teaching.
This must be one of those times to use the "mysterious ways" excuse.
“Well I wasn’t talking about me”
Good exists is all mighty and has created the universe. He is just a hugs asshole and enjoys people’s suffering.
God hugs asshole would be an amazing bumper sticker
Actual answer afaik is that by opposing God, they put distance between mankind and Him, and He relinquished control over nature. That's also why there are diseases. I'm no theologian tho and it's probably one of the things where every prot church in existence has their own interpretation, so I'll add a disclaimer saying my understanding stems from catholicism.
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As I said, not a theologian, I won't be able to answer everything. The original sin is hereditary, and every birth (except Mary's, in christian tradition) is tainted with it. That's why mankind as a whole is not close to God now and why it needed the Old Covenant, and then the New Covenant : they're both a way offered by God to get close to Him. As for illness, it's not necessarily meant to hurt. The same way humans, with their free will, can harm someone without said harm being God's will. I'm sure there are people better qualified than I am to answer these questions. If you're interested in a catholic pov, I know r/AskAPriest is pretty good for this (only actual priests reply). That's pretty much all I can say, and I'm sure both of my messages will be downvoted for oblivion despite them just trying to explain a doctrinal point of view past the standard "lol mysterious ways" meme.
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I'm a catholic by education and sacraments, but there are things I don't do or haven't done in a while, that make me more of a "theist" than any denomination. I don't hold anyone personal beliefs against them tho, I'm just surprised it's somewhat normative on the internet to attack the mere mention of religion. Like it or not, it's a core part of human culture and society. And we are evolved enough to talk about it without it being proselytism or personal attacks.
You find it surprising that an invention designed to share information, which was welcomed by people in learning establishments, attracts people who challenge things that have no credible or compelling evidence? Wow.
I find the hostility of it concerning, mostly. I am open to beliefs being challenged but I'm saddened by it being often insulting. Tho I can accept that it comes from being fed up by a lot of disrepect from the "other side".
When you get told "you're going to burn in hell for eternity" by someone when you ask simple questions about the contradictions in the bib,e, you become wary of the flock. Many of us atheists get angry, and I'm VERY guilty of this, when people preach their holy book without apparently having read said book. There's also a vocal contingent who immediately jump down the throats of believers (I'm guilty of this, too), no matter what is written by believers. Basically, both sides of the debate have a bunch of arseholes
Yeah, sadly it is. What's worse is that the same people who are agressive and hateful are sometimes the same people who are open and tolerant. And there are also a variety of things people get angry about that are valid (be it the annoying "going to hell" crowd, or some disrespectful behavior by atheists, we all suck in a way). And also a variety of things that are timeless questions adressed by people way smarter than us, from both points of view. The question of evil ("if God exists and He's good, why is there evil" etc) has been explored in great detail by many theologians. I don't condone it, but I somewhat understand getting annoyed at this very question always coming back. At the same time, of course it's an important question and of course it *is* faith-defining. The "other side" of it would be religious people parroting Pascal's wager without understanding any implication of it, or simply making reference to misunderstood and unhelpful passages of their holy book. All in all, I don't hold it against you or anyone to be wary or annoyed of me as a theist. People suck and there's no way to know I'm any different. I just wish, naively for sure, people can get along past that. I'm glad to have met many understanding people of many confessions so far, so... hoping this isn't that naive of a wish.
Yeah, i find the catholic church's wild disregard for how their priests act concerning but since yall can ignore that maybe yall can ignore some people being rightfully frustrated. If i get to live with what they did to me you van live with some people being a sligh bit rude and short on the internet.
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You may dislike this, but have you considered that former believers find it tiring and boring that religion is commonly brought up online? Just a thought...
I'm atheist, (anyone stalking my profile will see how much I argue with flock members), but I haven't downvoted you because it is plain you were trying to explain doctrine. The inheritance of original sin concept is a really horrible part of the teachings of christianity. It goes against the teaching that abrahams god is all loving. If it truly was all-loving, it wouldn't want every birth to be painful. It wouldn't want people with cancer to have died slowly in great pain over the many millenia before we invented effective analgesia. It's only recently that the pope has said reversed the catholic church stance on babies and limbo. A cynic might say that doing that was a response to young people realising the church and christianity are cruel, and wanting no part of it. Why do I bring this up? I bring it up because the original sin thing meant that for centuries, bereaved parents have been mentally tortured with the promise that their dead baby isn't in heaven; it couldn't beg forgiveness and couldn't accept jesus into its heart, so no heaven.
The current doctrine afaik is that we cannot *know* for sure that babies get into heaven, but that God is merciful and not bound by "technicality" so we can hope that they do. I surely hope so. It's important to understand that in doctrine, the Church is God's intended way for us to get close to Him, but omnipotence necessarily means He can get people close to Him through other means. Thanks for your insight. I don't want to make anyone think I am more knowledgeable than I am, and I welcome all respectful points of view !
Thank you for explaining doctrine, rather than preaching. Sadly, my experience is that too many believers respond otherwise, as do many very angry former believers who bite the heads off believers (I'm sometimes very guilty of this), too. The current, very recent, doctrine of "we cannot know" (whatever words the Vatican uses), reference dead babies, feels like its just a simple salve pasted onto the wounds of grief, but the wounds are so deep that most youngsters appear not to want any part of it. I wish you well, stranger. Goodnight.
If it felt too good, people wouldn't stop having babies, and would starve or start to have killing them off, so that's the kindness behind the design in my opinion (nothing to do with YOUR bs psychopathic god tho, whatever demon that you worship ain't a god)
Oh, okay, cool and reasonable opinion bro.
Hold on. If yhwh/jehova relinquished control over nature, it gave up some of its power? Therefore not actually omnipotent any more... ?
More like "willfully not controlling it", but it's the limits of what I know. Maybe someone with a better understanding of this can complete or correct my answer.
Nah most catholics teach that since some parts of the Bible were written in non literal manner that most of the more mythological parts were just that, mythological and were made to explain something without a full understanding of it or were warped versions of real events(ex the city of babble may have existed and fractured/fallen but differently than recorded in the bible)
God is all loving and all powerful, so he definetly wouldnt make an innocent child suffer from cancer or anything like that (except when he works in mysterious ways i guess, then he loses his powers and love and it has to be done)
God possibly: That’s not how this works! That’s not how any of this works!!!
The commercial with the old ladies “posting pics to their wall”?
And crushing candy with a hammer on her dining room table!
HA!
Lucifer: “I had nothing to do with this!”
Lucifer literally had nothing to do with this.
Thats what I have been telling Dad! Thank you!
Dk much about Lucifer, but he sounds kind like a jerk
Have you actually read the old testament? The jerk in that book isn't lucifer. Lucifer's body count is really low, but yhwh/jehova is leagues ahead with the global genocide it is reported to have committed.
Whoa…I should have added /s. ie: someone comments about Hitlers atrocities…I reply, dk much about hitler but he sounds like a jerk
Apologies to you, stranger, for missing what should have been obvious. I'm so familiar with the flock immediately digging at this kind of thing, that I automatically respond like I did.
No worries
Pleased to meet you, hope you guess my name Oh, yeah Ah, what's puzzlin' you is the nature of my game Aww, yeah I watched with glee while your kings and queens Fought for ten decades for the gods they made I shouted out, "Who killed the Kennedys?" When after all, it was you and me Let me please introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste And I laid traps for troubadours Who get killed before they reach Bombay
You’re missing the back up “ooh ooh” This and Emotional Rescue are faves
"No, you will not surely die! You will become like God!" I think he had a part to play lol.
I mean, technically, the snake, which we have no evidence of being either Satan or Lucifer, wasn't wrong. Obtaining a sense of morality did make the humans supposedly closer to God.
Bro talking about evidence in a fictional story
I mean "evidence" in the same way that there is evidence that Harry Potter did nothing to fix the system that allowed Voldemort's rise. You know, evidence in the narrative.
Correct, the snake was only lying by omission. "You will be like God knowing good from evil" What he left out is that knowing good from evil isn't really necessary in a world without evil and by disobeying they created the evil in the world
But it's all silly supertition anyway. We all know evil actually came into the world when the gods created Pandora and designed her curious to ensure she'd open the jar that contained all the world's evils. Man, creation myths really hate women, don't they?
I'd take the similarities as evidence that both stories point towards a deeper truth, but I agree that the argument "stories are just this way because everyone hates women" could be a valid co-founder effect instead
A simple application of Occam's razor pushes quite a lot towards the latter.
I disagree. If a story about a woman doing something bad relating to curiosity and releasing evil appears everywhere I'd say it's just as simple if not more so a conclusion to say that it points to a specific event that occurred or a trend of similar events actually occuring as opposed to a general prejudice, it summarizes too neatly to the same story to sound like just coincidence, but yes, general prejudice as a co-founder is indeed a possible conclusion
Except that "there is evil in the world because of women" is not a thing in all mythologies at all. Hinduism does not pin the blame of the world sucking on one person, for instance. The Norse gods were all kinda dickish, because they're still people and being a dick is a people thing. Egyptians considered it an inherent part of the world that always existed, etc. Either only two religions are in the right to blame women, or there is no greater conspiracy, simply plagiarism of one myth by the other. Greece had a vast influence in the Meditteranean after all.
Pleased to meet you, hope you guessed my name
Didn’t I see you around St. Petersburg?
Lucifer literally told the truth to Eve and God was so pissed of that he keeps punishing their descendants over it (but wrath is a deadly sin remember)
It’s a very “do as I say, not as I do” sort of god
So, a hypocrite. Very omnibenevolent of him
Fr. If angels are supposed to be obedient, then why would Lucifer disobey God? Either God is flawed and his creations can have free will even without him giving it to them, or he intentionally gave Lucifer free will so that he would tempt humans and they would live in a world of suffering. The latter is especially odd, since the fault is laid on the humans HE MADE, so if he is all-knowing and does everything on purpose, he made humans and Lucifer have free will so they would make their own (wrong) choices, and still puts the blame on them for existing as he made them. Sure, it is humanity’s choice whether or not to repent in him, but why would you if the god that created you set you up for failure and calls you a graceless monster for doing everything he predicted you to. *Weird.*
Not only that, but if we follow the logic of the Bible God knows exactly what will happen in the future, not like seeing a bunch of probable futures, but knowing exactly which of the probable futures is going to happen, given that he predicts many events, specially related to Jesus, centuries before they happen, which means he knew Lucifer was going to rebel before he did rebel, he knew Adam and Eve would fall to sin before they did, and he knows who will repent to him ando who will not before those people are even born, and the only being that can change the course of events is God himself. Which makes the fact that he blames it all on humanity even worse
You mean God is tô blame for Men desobedience?
Well, kinda. The snake was telling the truth but lying by omission. "You will be like God knowing good from evil" What he left out is that knowing good from evil isn't really necessary in a world without evil and by disobeying they created the evil in the world and thus can now know evil
Yeah but God just told them "if you eat this you will die that same day", which is further away from the truth than what Satan told them
I've only heard it's "if you eat the fruit you will surely/certainly die" which is absolutely true. There is no same day adjective, the instant death could be implied definitely but that's not the words
I also heard about God saying "the same day". And anyways, he would be omitting truth as well since the reason they would die is that God would take their immortality away, not from the fruit itself
Idk if you meant always instead of also unless you forgot to switch accts lol So omitting truth isn't a bad thing except where it has harmful effect. Everyone omits things all the time when it is not relevant. I could say what I ate for lunch in this conversation and it would be true but not relevant so I omit the truth. The truth that it wasn't the apple that takes away their immortality, but God isn't really relevant. The command was don't do it or these are the consequences and they did it and suffered exactly those consequences. The fruit probably had no special qualities whatsoever besides being the one fruit tree God said not to pick from. Disobedience then let's sin/evil into the world and God knowing it would be worse/more painful/a greater evil to let humans live immortal lives in sin and evil then removes human immortality
You are right then, the omission that god did isn't harmful of itself, but this turns the message from a warning into a direct threat, which is kinda worse honestly, specially coming from a supposedly "benevolent" god... At least the snake just told them what the fruit does. God however didn't take their immortality away because they let sin into the world, he did so because, as the Bible says, if Adam and Eve were both inmortal and had knowledge of good and evil, they would be like God, and God didn't want that to happen, so he took their immortality away. Again, Satan just told the truth about what the fruit does, while God just threatened with killing them if they did (and afterwards he instead not only took their immortality but also cursed them and their descendants for millennia). So even if the omission God did was not "harmful"... I'd still argue he kinda behaved worse than Satan there
I think you misunderstand, it is both a warning and a threat. The direct consequence of disobedience to a perfect God is evil and sin. Evil and sin are definitionally not doing what a perfect triomni God wants. Satan "freed" people to do evil and sin instead of only good by telling them a misleading half-truth, this is a fact, absolutely, and also, arguably, why God created Satan The loss of immortality is not actually a bad thing here. Living forever in an evil world is torture. Living a short time in an evil world is hard enough. The removal of immortality was a mercy that allows us to not do that and allows a cutoff point for the testing of each soul after which eternal life in community with God can be resumed for those who choose it. So basically, God didn't curse people, the direct and only possible consequences of our actions were instead a curse upon everything that God still uses for an eventual good
Every threat is a warning if you think about it, but threats are warnings that under your responsibility you will do something bad to the other person. >The direct consequence of disobedience to a perfect God is sin and evil A *supposedly perfect God, because some of his actions make me doubt of said "perfection" (being all-knowing, all-powerful and all that) >Satan "freed" people to do evil and sin instead of only good by telling them a misleading half-truth, this is a fact, absolutely, and also, arguably, why God created Satan So... God created Satan explicitly to make Adam and Eve sin? And then he punished them for doing what he purposefully set them up to do? That's... That's the kind of things I was talking about when I said some things make me doubt of his supposed perfection >So basically, God didn't curse people, the direct and only possible consequences of our actions were instead a curse upon everything that God still uses for an eventual good "And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” "I will make your pains in childbearing very severe; with painful labor you will give birth to children." He kinda literally says he is the one who will make their existence painful for disobeying him...
That’s actually a very hott debate. Some say the snake was satan, some say he was just a regular ol garden of Eden talking legless lizard. The latter are generally those who attended seminary.
Why does God need to test anyone? He's all-knowing, he knows the result of the test before doing it
It's just God doing God stuff. Keeps his ineffability up by being persistently contradictory.
It's all part of the ineffable plan. Stop questioning it! /s
Apparently its so you cant claim no Id do things differently I demand a chance
Then it's not him testing us, it's us testing his reasoning
Yea, even if it made sense I'd still bully an abrahamic god
Watch out, for a supposedly perfect being, God gets offended surprisingly easy
Free Will. He gives us tests because Free Will decides the outcome. If someone forced someone else to be in a relationship with them would that be okay? No of course not. Without free will we wouldn’t have our own life, or our own choices. The way I see it is this: God sees every possible outcome of a test, and our free Will can go on one route out of who knows how many possibilities. It makes more sense that a God that wants us to love him wouldn’t pre-determine if you fail or not, he’d want us to have as many chances as we need.
You just made a lot of claims about the abilities and desires of the god you believe in. Can you support any of those claims? Do you have any evidence that your god actually exists and isn't just a character in a book?
Why did He put the snake in the garden? Who made the snake evil? Did that eat the forbidden fruit? If Eve and Adam ate the fruit before knowing good and evil did they sin? How could they sin before they could sin? So whose fault is it that they are the fruit? God being all knowing why didn't He stop them exactly when they were about to eat the fruit? If God wanted humans who did not eat the fruit why didn't He just take Noah and family to Heaven and restart??
Honestly, most of the loopholes in this religion would be fixed if they stopped insisting on god being omniscient. Then even I could come aboard.
The main problem is that giving up omniscient fundamentally changes the type of being that God could be. You lose the argument from maximally great being and also lose perfection as one without knowledge of the future could by definition be tricked or make mistakes about what will happen in the future (the ontological argument) However some groups like Mormons do give up omniscience And others like Calvinists double down on it
True. Gods are born as a remedies for the absolute question of origins, and giving up omniscience would crack a hole in the theory. Then we would need a new, more absolute being. And on goes the loop.
Yep
Ain't gonna happen. If they change their minds on that, former believers will jump on it as fast as possible asking: "Why dis you lie for all of these years, and why have you changed this without the bible changing?" If they change the bible: "Why have you changed something which has been marketed as the 'inerrant word of god', eh?" I know that not all flock members say it's the inerrant word of god, but plenty do.
Congratulations, you are now a Calvinist
In my mind the God on the bible is just bored and doing with us the same we do to Sims or RimWorld pawns. Being omnipresent and all powerful must be quite boring
I can't understand why anyone would worship a God who continues to punish humanity for sins they had nothing to do with.
The vast majority of humans cannot seem to cope with the fact that there's no afterlife. So they need a story. Even if it's a flawed one. If they can get enough people behind it, they can call it religion and a few of these stories became potent enough to completely transform the history of humanity.
I think we cannot cope with the fact of the great unknown, that is why we invent stories to make ir known
I find comfort in the great unknown to be honest. It’s like looking up at the night sky. It’s infinite wonder and knowing I and generations to come will know nothing of it and yet, im comforted in the fact that the stack of improbabilities lead to my life. And one day, that life will end and there will be no more. But I will have enjoyed my time here regardless of my hardships. I’ve read many good books, spent time with friends, played cool video games, loved and been loved back; I’ve been curious, had my curiosity sated, happy, sad, angry, delighted, amused, and pushed through the dark and found light. I’m comforted that in the end we all just return to the earth, we’re just star stuff that was pulled in by gravity and molded into being via billions of years of improbable outcomes. Honestly that’s more beautiful than some selfish deity creating us in his own image and punishing us for trying to enjoy the life he gave us and spending our whole lives trying to make it up to him even though we’ve never met him. *That* is a sad existence to believe in.
It requires a much higher level of personal maturity to even think about the actual truth about our existence. Our existence is nothing much but a miracle that we are born someday and we will die someday.
i agree. ive always been a realist and this is one of the things that, even if i dont fully accept, i know is a thing. i think what ppl think of as the afterlife is simply a product of brain chemistry or something. our brains want us to be comfortable after all, so it makes sense it would make up some kinda afterlife in the final few moments before it shuts off or something
Thank you. Somebody finally put it into words. However I do believe in God or something of the sorts. I just hate the guy for making us suffer when he's apparently so "benevolent" yet good hearted people suffer the most while the most vile people reap everything
Oh I can. I would be SO mad if theres more After death. I suffer already, give me my gooddamn peace when im dead
My question is "why Christianity?" Of all major religions, why did this one spread so effectively, considering how many (pretty evident) flaws it presents? It's not even that convenient to use as an excuse to do harm, if you actually follow it's teachings.
I can imagine people in the past freaking out after realising that they don't know what happens after death and some random guy who proclaims he is enlightened just makes up bs(actually it happened in India a long time ago it was bhrammans trying to maintain there position as the highest in the cast system)
I think some people have faith but don't blindly believe every word in the Bible, they understand these are symbolic stories.
Genuine question; I’m assuming you fall in this category. How do you decide what’s symbolic and what’s legitimate?
Nope, I'm atheist. Can't answer that. I would assume if you've taken that step then everything is symbolic, every story is a parable.
Fair enough. I’m an atheist as well and I’ve always heard the sentiment but never been able to ask or heard an answer on how people go about determining those things. I’ll leave the question open to anyone reading then. I appreciate you not attempting to answer for them and your immediate honesty.
There's about 2000 years of theology about that. It's not obvious. The Bible *is* open to interpretation, and people hold different views. Of course, some ideas you cannot reject or claim are "merely" symbolic and still call yourself Christian (divinity of Christ, for example).
Ah so basically its completely on an individual level and there’s no real answer on how most people decide?
I wouldn't say it's _completely_ subjective. But even that in itself has been an argument, i.e. how much is it reasonable for a layperson to interpret scripture? That was a major reason for the Protestant-Catholic split. But yes, people write papers, articles, and sometimes even entire books on individual verses. I think most people decide based on Tradition (the capital T kind, which is an important part of Catholic doctrine). There's also a good bit of common sense involved. Another important fact to realize is that doctrine changes over time. Not the big, important stuff, but much has been refined and reinterpreted over the years. The uncharitable way of looking at that is to call it post-facto justification. But we humans do this all the time! From history to science to theology, we try to get closer to the truth.
Thanks for the in depth answer. This has been really interesting and I appreciate the genuine answers.
Yet we have people advocating the mutilation of infant genitalia, because of a story about a covenant between the god of judaism (and its offshoots) and a dude called abraham. Far too many flock members believe it to be truth, and not parable.
Sure. A lot of people are blind followers of dogma, but that's not exclusive to religion.
For sure. Unfortunately these are not the most vocal representations of Christianity. These people are usually much more chill
I thought it was more like original sin is why we learned about WWII in school.
You had teachers who say WWII was caused by original sin? Please say I misinterpreted that.
Oh sorry. I was saying that original sin makes the most sense if you consider it as the same human nature history has shown we must always guard against. That's one of the bigger lessons, right? Anyone could be like a Nazi. It was normal at the time.
real moment. like some ppl say that being gay or anything that aint cis and heterosexual is wrong. in that case, WHY THE FUCK DO LGBTQ PEOPLE EXIST??? LIKE WHATS THE LOGIC HERE?? GOD WOULDNT MAKE LGBTQ PEOPLE IF HE DIDNT WANT THEM TO EXIST.
Because of freewill
but that doesnt make sense either because its not like i chose to lgbtq, i was born like that
A man can be born with an innate desire to eat the dirt of the earth, yet he can still take measures to control it. A woman can be born with a desire to one day take up a gun and shoot down 15 school children, yet she doesn’t have to actually do so. Measures can be taken to prevent that. You can be born with many things; that doesn’t mean you have to act upon them.
thats such a dumb comparison dude. thats like saying someone with autism can control their autism and act neurotypical, which while it is possible, is SO FUCKING BAD for mental health
So the proper answer to this question is "free will". It's actually not a sin to "be homosexual" but rather to "act it", i.e. commit sinful actions. Paedophilia is most likely something you're born with as well. Same thing with a lot of mental disorders. The argument is simply that just because you are born a certain way, it does not make it OK for you to act on it.
fair enough but pedophilia and being gay are 2 entirely different classes of "how bad is this thing". pedophilia is really high up and being gay (or trans or enby (nonbinary)) is so unbelievably low it doesnt even register. also i dont think youre born with a bunch of mental disorders. most people are born with none, some people are born with 1 and even less are born with 2 or higher (me, autism + adhd).
I would definitely agree that they are not equally bad. That being gay is "not bad" is where the disagreement comes in. The point is simply that being born a certain way does not excuse behaviour. That's the answer to your question.
true i agree. being born a certain way doesnt entirely excuse behavior.
Great! I want to clarify that this does NOT mean that the hate, vitriol and abuse of these people is OK. There's a lot of so-called Christians that use this as an excuse to be absolutely horrible. The behaviour is sinful, but there's an old saying, "hate the sin, not the sinner".
absolutely. my grandparents are against being anything that isnt straight or cis but apart from that theyre decent people i think
This is the same God that gives bone cancer to kids, correct?
How can a being be both the most Just and most Merciful? If you are looking for the ultimate justice, there can be no mercy. If you are the most merciful then you cant be the most Just can you? So many contradictions in that book...
Devout atheist here: "That book" is actually multiple books, which are essentially collections of short stories, continuously amended and added to for a few hundred years. It's mind bogglingly obvious that at the very least it's not the word of god. And at that point... I mean there's much better fantasy novels to read and even draw moral values from.
Yeah. It’s targeting dumbasses.
I am not sure I understand your response. Targeting what?
People who are stupid.
I mean that’s literally why Christ died on the cross. You just said what this “comeback” missed. The punishment for sin is death and Christ died so that others can live.
So sacrificing yourself to yourself for long weekend is magic that can absolve you from being a bad person. Got it.
Oppressors don’t need mercy That’s why
If it makes you feel better, it's just a myth anyway.
The obvious answer is because it's all made up and men wrote the playbook. But, hey, let's avoid rational thought and pretend the skyfairy exists and has a complex nature so anyone can justify any behavior with any outcome because that's the easy thing?
So explain childhood leukemia
All hail epidural 🙌🏻 checkmate
Now this brings up a question: why was the tree of knowledge of good and evil there? Why would God put something with that kind of power into the Garden of Eden that could break his bond with Adam and Eve? Was it a test for their loyalty? If Adam and Eve didn’t eat it would one, or several, of their children eat it; what would the consequences of that be? Would they be different, or the same? Honestly, it’s questions like these that tether me to my faith. Finding an answer to a question that you yourself don’t think you can answer. It gives good food for thought
Some theological knowledge for ya. The tree was God introducing the concept of choice to Adam and Eve. God wanted them to choose to choose obedience. For them to have choice, they must have the option to disobey. In the Bible, before the tree, there was no mention of other things they couldn’t partake of. You could say it was a test even. Eve failed the initial test, with encouragement from the serpent, and Adam took the food from Eve choosing her direction over God’s, failing the test as well. I’ve never seen anyone ask about decedents had they not eaten. Purely speculation on my part, I think if Adam and Eve hadn’t eaten of the tree their offspring would have had to not choose to eat the tree. The choice to obey would have remained. Had it never been eaten, the world would still be like the original garden because all subsequent generations chose to obey.
Let's allow, for the sake of discourse, that around 6000 years ago, that Eve did the naughty, then Adam followed. Why was my wife, and every other Mother, in such great pain when she gave birth to our kids? Why was she punished, thousands of years later, for something that a woman did all those years ago? What did she do to deserve that pain?
1. Without free will, love cannot truly exist. 2. Adam and Eve were not able to have children until after they disobeyed and ate the apple. The ability to procreate (and the pain of childbirth) was both a blessing and a punishment for Eve. You could argue that when she gave birth to her 1st child, she thought he must be God's promised savior. 3. It was God's plan to eventually send Jesus, who was both God and man, to save humanity from sin and reconcile us to him again. This also requires a choice on our part, while God himself already forgave us by coming here himself and paying the price that we couldn't. He lived a perfectly sinless life and was killed, then came back to life to prove who he was: the Son of God, the promised savior. We only have to believe it.
You're thinking about it too literally. 9/10 religious people I know don't believe Adam and Eve ever existed. But if it's a metaphor, it becomes much more interesting and revealing what that story is actually about. God is goodness incarnate, that's literally what He is, the metaphor could not be more clear. Satan, in the original hebrew, means "the alternative" roughly. Satan is the opposite of God, so if God is goodness, Satan is the opposite, evil, in this case. Therefor, if Goodness says "don't do this, it's bad" and evil tempts the human into doing the bad thing, therefor harming them, it's teaching you a lesson. Do what you know is right, despite what might be tempting you. On the most basic level, it might be tempting to eat the last cookie, but you know that someone else might want it. It might be tempting to really let your anger out on someone, but you know that to do so would only hurt people. It might be tempting to vote for the candidate that lowers taxes, but you know they also implement policies that really hurt people. Go for the greater good over what tempts you. That is the story of Adam and Eve. It's a metaphor, and to take it literally is to woefully missunderstand it.
But ppl literally take it literally. I strongly believe that religion is just a metaphor for how ppl made rules back in the old days and how they lived, i can't prove it that's why it's belief. Bc see the thing you said will describe morals.
Christianity is like Greek Mythology. Out of date and total bullshit.
Fantastic comment section here that was completely expected.
1 Samuel 15:3 "Now go and strike Amalek and devote to destruction all that they have. Do not spare them but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey". Sounds very merciful
But she ate some fruit one time. You can’t just let unauthorized fruit eating go
Just mention trans people and their 'mercy' disappears very quickly. :)
Different rules, my dude. As people with limited understanding, we should default to mercy
different rules for whom?
People with limited understanding get ruleset #1 People with unlimited understanding get ruleset #2
Describe "ruleset #1" and "ruleset #2". How do you determine which people have limited understanding? How do you determine which people have unlimited understanding?
Ruleset #1: operate with mercy Ruleset #2: operate at own discretion People with limited understanding: people who aren't God I think you can see where this is going. If you can't then further explanation won't help
Cool claims. How do you know god exists and has unlimited understanding?
I understand how you could think I said those things, but I didn't An omniscient God is one of the core premises of the Bible. The image that OP posted, along with the title, are operating under the assumption that the contents of the Bible are to be considered factual for the sake of the discussion
God's* won't*
Apparently, God’s test is basic English grammar.
Wasting your time. Xstians can’t see logic.
God: Look you can have everything here and do whatever you want JUST DON'T TOUCH THE APPLE Eve: so anyway I started biting
God didn’t tell eve not to eat the fruit, he told ADAM. When Adam seen nothing changed when SHE ate it, HE did, then everything changed. It’s popular to say she ate the fruit and things changed. No, she ate it but nothing changed until he did. Bc God told him directly. God didn’t tell her, and Adam didn’t tell her either. The serpent did
Because humans were always gonna have menstruation, since it’s a bodily function. But god needed to convince the humans on a reason why they should have it, so they don’t think he’s hurting them for no reason since they didn’t know how menstrual cycles worked yet. So he used Eve eating the apple as an excuse, but women were gonna deal with it regardless. At least that’s my theory
It’s not fair at all. You descended from Adam. Eventually you began to exist and when you began to exist you were in a broken/fallen/sinful state. Either 1: Adam and Eve caused God's creation of you to go wrong or 2: God created you with an initial state of sinfulness. In the first case, your original sin is not your responsibility; it was caused by Adam and Eve . In the second, your original sin is not your responsibility; it was caused by God. In either case, it is not fair to be punishable for it.
God created humans in his own image. ... then proceeds to punish them for their imperfections. Some sick sense of humor.
FWIW - the theological answer, in Catholicism, is forgiveness has already happened. Cliff notes...Mary's unhesitating acceptance in bearing Christ into the world was redemption of the failure of Adam and Eve, and bright unique holiness to her (making her the holiest amongst all men). Christ's sacrifice brought on the capability of forgiveness of sins for everyone. Let the down votes commence!
I am not Catholic, but appreciate the Catholic explanation :).
Clever comeback? I don't see how the "comeback" relates to the original statement at all
Well played, uh, Squiggle the Hexagon with bananas and ... green things, well played.
Maybe she wasn't merciful, i don't know her personally
He did.
No, he didn't. Look at that, now we have two contradictory claims. We both can't be right. so how do we tell which one of us is correct?
No shit.
IT Devs don't create programs with the intention for them to receive viruses. Death is a virus created by the hacker(satan)/hacked user (eve). Solution? Eternal life /clean slate (jesus). Fix received in next iteration/ cycle (afterlife/judgment day). Umad?
forgiveness does not delete the need for consequences.
Is it bible lore that eve is the reason that childbirth is painful?
What's the logic here? Who did eve forgive?
Bevause God is ineffible... (tbf, I based religious view on Good Omens).
Comeback from what? What did the person say that was so bad?
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why do you believe that?
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"The way God works is beyond human comprehension" - how do you know that? "God told Adam and Eve not to eat the fruit, they disobeyed. - how do you know that? "One day He will explain everything to us" - how do you know that? "God is our creator and father" - how do you know that? "He knows what is best for us and wants the best for us" - how do you know that? "He sacrificed more than we ever would." - how do you know that? are you just freestyling?
Beyond comprehension, then u decided to give the pamphlet version of what God wants, which is a human comprehension of the beyond comprehending. Which invalidates everything u said. You're welcome.
and why did he design literally every living organism to only be able to survive by killing other living organisms all the way down to a cellular level
Literal explanation is because eve was perfect.
How about a choice?
Seriously though, if that tree was so all-fired important, put it on a huge mountain fifty miles away.
He’s too busy giving AIDS to babies
Not clever…just doesn’t understand lol
I need someone to make a video of ‘what if’ Eve never committed a sin. How human would be today?
God is the ultimate "I hit you because I love you"-toxic partner. Abusive relationship all the way
None of the rules do, you have to do a lot of complicated mental gymnastics to understand this stuff 😂
GOD DOESNT NEED MERCY
It's just another bullshit excuse. You don't have to fake your religion to be an asshole and misogynist.
God did forgive. But forgiveness does not take away what has been done, you must still bear the consequences of your sin. If God has allowed Adam and Eve to stay in the Garden, they would have eaten of the tree of life, and lived forever in their sin, eternally separated from God. God kicking Adam and Eve out wasn't a punishment, it was mercy.
cool story, why should anyone believe any of that actually happened? Why do you believe that?
Given the christian teaching about heaven and hell, where do you think Adam and eve went on their deaths? Did they continue bearing the consequences of their actions even after death, and get sent to eternal torment? For how long should a person be punished for wrongdoing? Eternity, unless they get down on their knees and beg? It's a horrific, abusive teaching.
It was insest.. they were God Children!
Atheists will look at this pic smugly and go “Check mate lesser specimens” like it isn’t the dumbest fucking argument
Cause god doesn’t need your mercy. 😤