I just wrote out a whole reply to DD which got eaten by hamsters, but I think yours says all that needs to be said about it.
Seriously, dude, is there anyone posting regularly on this board, let alone in this thread, who believes the Bible is the literal word of God? I mean, keep blowing up those strawmen if that’s how you get your jollies, but seems to me like it would get tedious after a while.
Speaking of strawmen, I don’t see anything in @Riemann’s posts that indicate that they think that there is anyone in this thread who believes the bible is the literal word of god.
So far as I can tell, they are just pointing out the things that are said in the bible, whether or not anyone here believes them is well beyond the scope of what they are discussing.
So what? What on earth are you arguing about? This is a Pit thread, and I’m obviously targeting the objects of the Pitting for mockery. I’m pointing out an egregious example of how ridiculous the text is if interpreted from the perspective that a vast number of people do embrace, the preposterous notion that it is the inspired wisdom of a benevolent God and a source of moral guidance for schoolchildren. (Also relevant to the subsequent discussion of the notion that the Bible is a great work of literature.)
It is if you want to make sure that the school children don’t make fun of people for being bald.
I’m arguing specifically against your assertion that the Bible approves of or encourages cannibalism.
You’ve already pointed out the real intellectual challenge to Biblical religion, the fact that the universe certainly doesn’t seem like an omnipotent and omnibenevolent entity is in charge. It is also certainly true that the Bible unambiguously approves of genocide, patriarchy, and a lot of other stuff which everyone today would agree is evil. All very valid criticisms which don’t rely on tortured interpretations of the text.
If we look at the subset of fools who subscribe to “Biblical literalism”, they believe a lot of stupid stuff like Young Earth Creationism and whatnot; but they DON’T believe in practicing cannibalism. Literally nobody, as far as I know, has ever used those verses as proof texts for the idea that cannibalism is OK. So in this particular case you aren’t quoting “a perspective that a vast number of people embrace”, you’re just making up strawmen, Which I really don’t understand, because it’s not like you need to make shit up to demonstrate that fundie Christians are evil morons.
Right.
That’s Catholics.
Again, you’re the one strawmanning. Of course I never claimed that any Christians believe cannibalism is okay. That’s the whole point. The Bible embraces a whole lot of stuff that all of us (Christian and non-Christian alike) know is morally abhorrent.
When I talked about a “perspective that a vast number of people embrace”, I was perfectly clear - many Christians believe that the Bible in toto is the inspired wisdom of a benevolent God and a source of moral guidance. Actually reading the content of the Bible - including passages like this - show how ridiculous that perspective really is.
We don’t need to look at those who subscribe to biblical literalism, we just have to look at those who say that they have their morals founded on christian beliefs.
Then they pick and choose which parts of the bible to believe to justify what they already want to do.
I’m sure that if someone wanted to eat human flesh, they would point to those bible verses as justification, just as people point to the ones that justify discrimination or oppression of others to justify their actions there.
The Bible is a lengthy, complex, often vague, and frequently contradictory document. It’s not some straightforward list of unambiguous rules to live by. It’s fair to say that anyone looking for wisdom in the Bible is going to pick and choose the parts they like and ignore others; there’s literally no other option.
So there are clearly evil things which the Bible unambiguously endorses.
There are evil actions which people attempt to justify by citing the Bible, sometimes accurately and sometimes not.
There are evil actions which could maybe theoretically be justified by twisted interpretations of Biblical prooftexts, but which nobody has ever actually tried to justify thusly.
Seems like if you’re trying to demonstrate that the Bible is evil, you’d do better to concentrate on examples of the first two things rather than the third, but you do you.
I almost feel the need for some extensive footnotes to this post, so I don’t spend the day scouring the internet for some clue where I can find translations of anything Beowulf and Gilgamesh wrote.
Don’t worry we got you covered
I wonder what would happen if you brought a copy of this to one of those Harry Potter book burnings?
Beowulf and Gilgamesh are characters in their eponymous sagas, not the authors of them. I apologize for any confusion this may have caused.
Silly me, forgetting to put a footnote on my post to indicate my knowledge of that fact, and that I was mocking your sentence structure, which clearly suggested that you were including them in your list of authors.
I wish I had a dime for every time I heard some religious blowhard tell some made-up story where the atheist thought he was right and then admitted he was wrong. It’s like their favorite fucking thing to get excited about, and not once can they ever give a name or date or place.
They were raised on lies, they were taught to lie to themselves. If you put a gun to their head and told them to find an objective truth, they couldn’t do it. Their heads contain nothing but fantasy, gossip, and wishful thinking.
Right which is the point. They aren’t basing their morals on the bible, they are justifying their actions by quoting bible verses.
No, I am pointing out that the bible can be used to justify anything you want to use it to justify, good or evil.
There are people who quote bible passages as they sell the shirt off their back to feed the poor, and there are others who quote bible passages as they commit genocide. (and there are some who will do both, and see no contradiction in their actions.)
You do seem to love setting up these strawmen to fight, seems kinda pointless, but you do you.
i thought about clarifying that in the original post, but it was completely irrelevant to my point and would have made the sentence clumsier. I didn’t think that even on the SDMB anyone would be enough of a pedantic nitpicker to point it out and “mock” it. Congratulations, I guess.
As DesertDog wrote, you’re thinking of God 2.0. The God 1.0 of the Old Testament, which you quoted, was not a benevolent God but, in His own words, a jealous God who visits the iniquities of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate Him, who only shows love and kindness to those who love Him and keep his commandments. (read: holds grudges and is only kind towards the obedient)
The problem of theodicy is usually a major topic in legit comparative religion classes, such as BigT’s college course covering the Book of Job specifically.
~Max
I don’t know that this really holds. One can simultaneously believe that the entire Bible came straight from God’s hand, and that the majority of it doesn’t actually contain moral and ethical instruction.
Of course that’s also the flaw in it. There’s a story about cannibalism. How do we know whether it endorses cannibalism, or condemns it, or is just part of another story? So much of the interpretation depends on extra-textual gatekeepers or pre-existing moral sensibility. But you can’t talk about that, because then the Bible is no longer an authority sufficient unto itself.