Bible verse by verse

[_huckelberry]

In what explicit and specific ways is your relationship with God different to that of someone who has an imaginary friend?
..............
Sorry Nipper, but my imaginary friend can deliver everything that you've listed your God can deliver.
My imaginary friend forgives me all the time and encourages me to try harder to be a better person.
He answers my prayers and gives me direction. He is a good listener.
What can your God do that you can demonstrate, that my imaginary friend can't do?

I have been a little puzzled by the obsessive demand Nipper prove God. After all everybody knows there is no proof of God. To those of us who believe there are reasons to believe which can appear of significant value. I am perfectly willing to observe that there is a possibility of being wrong about them. However recognizing the possibility is not the same as seeing that as the actual case. I believe God is real.

I was finding myself amused by thinking that the reality is that all relationships to God have some aspects in common with relating to an imaginary friend. I suppose that would be the reason for skepticism latching onto a demand for clear separation from imaginary friends. It is a diversionary demand which obscures our relationship to God.


I think the first step in any thought about relating to God is recognizing that we do not automatically have a good understanding of God to form a relationship with. People must start a journey to become like him to create the possibility of knowing him. I wonder if people demanding proof want God to roar from a mountain top. Is god no more than a biggest lion to do this? We cannot know God at all unless we are able to be a friend and share his life with him. That is what Jesus invites us to do. That means that the primary steps are learning to understand and care about other people. Now I admit that is not something possessed by an exclusive club. But that is ok I do not think the basics of a relationship to God are possessed by an exclusive club either.

[_Gunnar]

I think the first step in any thought about relating to God is recognizing that we do not automatically have a good understanding of God to form a relationship with. People must start a journey to become like him to create the possibility of knowing him. I wonder if people demanding proof want God to roar from a mountain top. Is god no more than a biggest lion to do this? We cannot know God at all unless we are able to be a friend and share his life with him. That is what Jesus invites us to do. That means that the primary steps are learning to understand and care about other people. Now I admit that is not something possessed by an exclusive club. But that is ok I do not think the basics of a relationship to God are possessed by an exclusive club either.

Congratulations, huckleberry! I find that a much kinder, humbler and more conciliatory approach to the subject than dogmatic, hellfire and brimstone dogmatism about the real nature and/or existence of God. If you are saying that Christians do not automatically have any better understanding of God than others, I wholeheartedly agree with you!

I would also agree that if there is some entity that is entitled to the appellation "God", "the basics of a relationship" to such a being (as you put it) are not necessarily possessed by any exclusive club. I am convinced, as I hope you are, that a truly just and benevolent God's primary concern would be how we treat each other--not what we believe about him or even whether we believe in his existence.

In that spirit I hope that you and the other participants in this discussion have a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year!

[_The Erotic Apologist]

I have been a little puzzled by the obsessive demand Nipper prove God. After all everybody knows there is no proof of God. To those of us who believe...

Nipper is not a believer. Nipper "knows" Yahweh exists, and on the basis of his "knowledge" feels obliged to approve, and even celebrate as the Israelites slaughter their enemies. This is not to say I believe Nipper is dangerously unhinged; on the contrary I have every reason to believe he is a good, decent, law-abiding citizen. To my mind, a Fundamentalist like Nipper is not nearly as dangerous as, say, a radical Islamist. But on the other hand, Nipper's "knowledge" of Yahweh forces Nipper to assimilate, or at least aspire to, all of Yahweh's worst traits, because Yahweh can do no wrong. This I find more than a little unsettling. This is the reason for my obsessive demand that Nipper prove Yahweh's existence.

I have to agree with Gunnar--people who "believe" are in my experience far more conciliatory and far less judgmental than those who "know".

Oh yeah, happy Festivus!

[_Gunnar]

First, the Promised Land belonged to God before the Canaanites established temporary residency there. It had always been his plan to give this land to the descendants of Abraham: "In the fourth generation your descendants will come back here" (Gen 15:16a). The Lord did not take from the Canaanites that which was "theirs"—he reclaimed that which was his according to his foreordained purposes.

The mere fact that the Bible claims this does not impress me in the slightest. There is much more than ample proof the Bible is far from inerrant--much of which I and others have abundantly pointed out to you.

Second, the Canaanites lived in wicked rebellion against the will and purposes of God. The Lord had predicted that Abraham's descendants would claim the land when "the sin of the Amorites" reached its "full measure" (Gen 15:16b). This "full measure" of sin was attained by the Canaanites in the generation leading to the Jewish conquest.

From my reading of the Bible (including what you have quoted from it on this very thread) it is abundantly apparent to me that the Israelites themselves were not any less immoral and wicked than the Canaanites.

Moses warned his people about these sins they would encounter upon entering the Promised Land: "Let no one be found among you who sacrifices his son or daughter in the fire, who practices divination or sorcery, interprets omens, engages in witchcraft, or casts spells, or who is a medium or spiritist or who consults the dead" (Deut 18:10-11). He stated that anyone who practices such sins is "detestable to the Lord," and explained that "because of these detestable practices the Lord your God will drive out those nations before you" (v. 12). Those who were conquered by Joshua and his armies were not innocent victims, but wicked sinners who received the judgment their transgressions had warranted.

Much of what you quoted in this very thread that the Israelites did, allegedly with God's approval, was no less detestable than what Moses reputedly warned his people about. And you can't justifiably or reasonably claim that none of the countless children murdered by Israelite armies were innocent victims without revealing yourself to be a heartless, brainless fool and/or liar!

Third, the blood retribution practiced by ancient tribal culture required the Jewish armies to destroy not only the soldiers of their enemies, but their families as well. So long as one member of a family remained, that person was bound by cultural law to attempt retribution against the enemies of his people. Such unrest and hostility would have persisted throughout the nation's history, with no possibility of peace in the land. What appears to be genocide was actually the way wars were typically prosecuted.

The mere fact that wars were typically prosecuted in that way does not in any way make it any less detestable for the Israelites to emulate those practices. Is it really so unreasonable or unlikely that God would hold his chosen people to a higher standard than that, or that God could no longer protect them if he did? I think it is more likely that the Israelites' failure to set a good example by emulating and achieving a higher standard contributed to their own demise.

Fourth, in these formative early years of Israel's history it was imperative that the people be kept from the influence of sinners without or within their nation. The holy God who gave them their land would uproot them from it if they rebelled against him (Deut 28:63-68). This warning came to pass centuries later at the hands of Assyria and then Babylon, and ultimately in the national destruction wrought by Rome in the first century of the Christian era.

I think the Israelites and Jews were ultimately done in by their over reliance and faith in their own false prophets and seers and by their own xenophobia and dogmatic and even militant intolerance of any religious views that differed in the slightest from their own.

[_Gunnar]

I have been a little puzzled by the obsessive demand Nipper prove God. After all everybody knows there is no proof of God. To those of us who believe...

Nipper is not a believer. Nipper "knows" Yahweh exists, and on the basis of his "knowledge" feels obliged to approve, and even celebrate as the Israelites slaughter their enemies. This is not to say I believe Nipper is dangerously unhinged; on the contrary I have every reason to believe he is a good, decent, law-abiding citizen. To my mind, a Fundamentalist like Nipper is not nearly as dangerous as, say, a radical Islamist. But on the other hand, Nipper's "knowledge" of Yahweh forces Nipper to assimilate, or at least aspire to, all of Yahweh's worst traits, because Yahweh can do no wrong. This I find more than a little unsettling. This is the reason for my obsessive demand that Nipper prove Yahweh's existence.

My sentiments exactly!

I have to agree with Gunnar--people who "believe" are in my experience far more conciliatory and far less judgmental than those who "know".

thanks for that!

Oh yeah, happy Festivus!

Same to you too!

[_Bazooka]

I have been a little puzzled by the obsessive demand Nipper prove God.

Then you really haven't been paying attention.

After all everybody knows there is no proof of God.

Do you think, based on this thread, that Little Nipper accepts there is no proof of God?

[_LittleNipper]

The Bible is God's Word. The Bible is perfect. Jesus Christ is the God's Son. The Messiah is perfect. Man is not perfect. The Bible is perfect and therefore there is a God or the Bible could not exist because it is perfect. Religions that consider the Bible as imperfect are only attempting to uplift their own imperfection to a higher level.

[_Bazooka]

The Bible is God's Word. The Bible is perfect. Jesus Christ is the God's Son. The Messiah is perfect. Man is not perfect. The Bible is perfect and therefore there is a God or the Bible could not exist because it is perfect. Religions that consider the Bible as imperfect are only attempting to uplift their own imperfection to a higher level.

Hi Nipper, which version of the Bible is God's word and perfect?

Doctrinal differences and translation policy[edit]
Further information: Tetragrammaton in the New Testament
In addition to linguistic concerns, theological issues also drive Bible translations. Some translations of the Bible, produced by single churches or groups of churches, may be seen as subject to a point of view by the translation committee.
Among these the New World Translation, produced by Jehovah's Witnesses, is seen as controversial by some because of the renderings of key verses. Especially verses, that in other Bible translations support the deity of Christ, are rendered differently in the NWT.
Also, the NWT often translates the New Testament Kyrios, "Lord," as "Jehovah" when referring to God. The publishers argue that this can be supported by the fact that the oldest copies of the Greek Septuagint found among the Dead Sea Scrolls (such as 8HevXIIgr) generally have the Hebrew tetragrammaton in the Greek text rather than Greek Kyrios as found in later Septuagint manuscripts. An exception to this is the Cave4 Leviticus fragment, which has Greek Iao.[22] The NWT translators believe that when Jesus read from such earlier scrolls he would have used God's name and not the title. (Luke 4:18, Jo 17:6, 26) The NWT translators did this despite the fact that the tetragrammaton does not appear in the Greek manuscript of the New Testament books. The Greek manuscripts use Kyrios to refer both to Jesus Christ and God the Father.[23]
A number of Sacred Name Bibles have been published that are even more rigorous in transliterating the tetragrammaton, using Semitic forms to translate it in the Old Testament and also using the same Semitic forms to translate the Greek word Theos in the New Testament.
Other translations are distinguished by smaller, but distinctive, doctrinal differences. For example, the Purified Translation of the Bible, by translation and explanatory footnotes, promoting the position that Christians should not drink alcohol, that New Testament references to "wine" are correctly translated as "grape juice".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bible_translations

[_Bazooka]

The Bible is perfect and therefore there is a God or the Bible could not exist because it is perfect.

What say you huckleberry?

[_The Erotic Apologist]

Can you create life out of inert materials?

By myself, no. With my wife, yes.