Occasionally a theist makes an argument so amusingly stupid that it would be a shame not to share it with a larger audience. This is one of those occasions.
On another thread, we’ve been discussing the unloving way in which God — supposing that he exists at all — is treating the victims of Hurricane Harvey (and the soon-to-be victims of Hurricane Irma, unfortunately). In the course of that discussion, fifthmonarchyman — a Christian — made the following, er, memorable argument:
I form the light and create darkness, I bring prosperity and create disaster; I, the LORD, do all these things.
– Isaiah 45:7
keiths:
Yes, and creating disaster for his children is exactly what every loving father sets out to do. Right, Mung?
Nothing says “I love you” like drowning someone or wiping out their possessions.
At that point fifthmonarchyman got the bright idea that he could defend God by arguing that God is not our father. He wrote:
quote:
the Originator of the heavens and the earth! How could it be that He should have a child without there ever having been a mate for Him – since it is He who has created everything, and He alone knows everything? – Sura 6:101
and
and say: “All praise is due to God, who begets no offspring, and has no partner in His dominion, and has no weakness, and therefore no need of any aid” -and [thus] extol His limitless greatness. – Sura 17:111
end quote:
That’s right, folks. Fifthmonarchyman quoted the Quran to argue against the idea that God is our father — forgetting that the latter idea comes straight from Jesus. What are the first two words of the Lord’s Prayer? Our Father.
Seeing fifth — a Christian — use the Quran to argue (unwittingly) against Jesus is one of the stupidest moves I’ve seen in a long while. I therefore renominate fifth for the title of World’s Worst Apologist.
After posting his comment, fifth belatedly realized that he had just thrown Jesus under the bus. He tried to undo the damage:
Get it keiths ?
A loving father is not the default understanding of God. Not by a long shot.
To know him as Father you need to have met his Son. Once you have met his Son you are simply not dissuaded when bad things happen.
peace
It’s a bit too late to backpedal, fifth.
This is a good time to quote Augustine again, on the topic of Christians who make fools of themselves:
…we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn.
The inanity goes even deeper. I’ll elaborate in the comments.
Don’t try to be cute.
It’s you who believes God exists.
It’s you who is defending God’s infinitely loving genocidal edict.
It’s you (and it’s really one for the books) who is trying to defend God’s genocidal order by noting it was never successfully completed.
Just….wow.
Speaking of superstition, I love this earlier story about Moses and the Amalekites:
How gullible would you have to be to actually believe that story?
Fundagelical Christians, this is why we laugh at you.
Reminds me of Phoebe’s ‘powers’!
I wonder how many Israelites died on that battlefield every time Moses went to the bathroom?
Awful.
A question for non-fundagelical Christians who nevertheless believe that the Bible is God’s word:
You may not believe these goofy stories, unlike the fundagelicals. But why did God put crap like this into his holy book?
This is a reply to keiths post in the species-2 thread. It doesn’t belong there but it fits in well here.
Don’t you think it would be hypocritical of Christ to advise that the only way to salvation is through path of sacrifice where we must be willing to give up the transitory, bear our crosses and trust in him and then for Him to prevent us from enduring the path he recommends by making sure we have an easy life?
If you want an example of how the life of a true believer in Christ should be conducted read “The Imitation of Christ”
Here are some words to ponder from these writings:
Does God have the power to give you the free will to reply to this post while at the same time retain the power to prevent you from replying? Can He determine all actions and also allow free will?
keiths,
Suppose a dictator allows someone to publish a book critical of the government. Does that mean he has relinquished, now and forever, the power to prevent other critical books from being published? Of course not.
What if the dictator allows someone to prevent the dictatorship having rule over their particular domain?
Do you agree that to be omnipotent means to have total power everywhere and through all time?
.
CharlieM,
Are you seriously, and with a straight face, arguing that God doesn’t warn people about hurricanes because if he did, he would be preventing their salvation?
The question was:
Humans put it there. And humans declared the book to be holy.
Neil,
Right. But note who I addressed the question to:
Then Christ is a hypocrite.
Is Christianity not replete with tales of people being relieved of their suffering through the work of the Holy Spirit? Drug addicts, alcoholics, criminals, people enduring the most agonising diseases….you can find their testimonies everywhere.
If there really is nothing ‘better or more useful for man’s salvation than suffering‘ then why does Christ constantly intervene in peoples lives to alleviate it? He should leave well alone and let suffering run its course, surely?
Have you ever taken pain-killers, Charlie?
Was that the Christ-like thing to do?
CharlieM,
Those are separate questions, and they reveal the source of your confusion. You can possess a power without exercising it. I have the power to take a hammer to all the windows in my house. I choose not to. Does that negate the power? No, of course not.
It means having the power to do anything that is logically possible. It does not mean actually doing everything that is logically possible.
What does any of this have to do with the actual issue of God’s unloving behavior?
Why does God drown people and destroy their homes? Why doesn’t he warn them of impending disasters, so that they have time to prepare?
So, why is that relevant?
You are claim that God is mean because he issues edicts that you think are genocidal. That complaint is nonsensical if God does not exist.
You are mistaken, I certainly would not defend a genocidal act.
I would not defend God at all certainly not to you.
God does not need me to defend him.
Try to keep up . It was Keiths asked why God needed to kill all the Amalekites.
I asked him for evidence that God did that.
Since you are fixated on a command you are sure was never actually given I asked you how it was even possible that a nonexistent God could do such a thing.
Once you have explained how a nonexistant God could command anything at all I’d hope you could explain how God could make an command that was immoral.
I’ll be waiting
peace
Some recommendations for the believers who are reading this thread:
1. Admit to yourselves that you want God to be loving. (Nothing wrong with that. If God existed, I’d want him to be loving, too.)
2. Admit to yourselves that wanting something does not make it true. You may want God to be loving, but that’s irrelevant to whether he actually is loving.
3. Acknowledge that the way to evaluate a hypothesis is to compare it to its competitors, seeing which one fits the evidence best.
4. Admit to yourselves that because you want God to be loving, you want to ignore the evidence that he is not loving. Resist that temptation!
5. Ask yourselves “Do I want the truth, or do I want to cling to Christianity even if it’s not true?”
6. Examine the actual evidence. You will see, immediately, that the hypothesis of a loving God is a terrible fit, utterly contradicted by the evidence.
7. You may feel discombobulated and upset. That’s a natural reaction to finding out that one of your core beliefs is wrong (and not just wrong, but obviously wrong). Acknowledge the feeling, but don’t give in to it. Don’t cling to belief just because it’s comforting.
8. Experience the joy and relief of following the evidence where it leads and embracing the truth. To be a Christian is to fight the truth, and that’s a hopeless and exhausting task. Life is much better when you’re not continually running from the evfidence and fighting the truth.
fifth, to Woodbine:
As if Woodbine or I had claimed that the command was actually given by a nonexistent God.
You’re losing this argument badly, fifth, and that’s making you desperate. Desperate enough to make up stuff about your opponents in an attempt to distract people from your own failures.
It won’t work.
Woodbine’s take was correct:
He’s right. You should be embarrassed and ashamed.
Please, please share the URL of this thread with your pastor.
It reminds me of when fifth tried to defend this appalling commandment of God’s:
Fifth’s defense was “Well, we don’t actually know that this was ever carried out”, as if that would get God off the hook for his bloodthirsty and unloving command.
Believers,
If the Christian God exists, he is watching all of you struggle and fail to explain his “loving” behavior. Why doesn’t he help you out? Why doesn’t he grant you the answers you need? Why is he allowing atheists to run circles around you?
Does he want Christianity to look stupid? Or is it just that he doesn’t exist?
Hint: It’s the latter. He doesn’t exist, so he can’t give you the answers, and he can’t stop the hurricane. Christianity is false.
I’m sure there’s a German word for it (they’re usually good with that sort of thing) but I’m genuinely embarrassed for you, FMM.
These attempts at obfuscation are the kind that Sal Cordova leaves on the cutting room floor.
Woodbine: I think Raskolnikov is evil & I think those that defend his actions are immoral.
FMM: That complaint is nonsensical because Raskolnikov does not exist.
Woodbine: Oh, boy.
Woodbine:
There is. It's fremdschämen.
FMM, you seem to have skated un-deftly around the question from earlier.
When an omnipotent being needs to relocate a group of people, why is it necessary to kill children?
Where lies the logical contradiction in the safe extraction of the Israelites and abstaining from killing the Egyptian first-born sons?
It’s not obfuscation.
I am genuinely interested in why you would find this sort of thing to be interesting.
You and keiths seem to think that I’m engaging in some sort of “apologetic” exercise.
Trust me I’m not doing anything of the sort. I find the idea that God would need defending to be laughable.
What I want to know is why these sorts of sentimental/emotional topics are so important to you all.
You bring them up at all most every opportunity often hijacking threads to do so. Then you engage in mutual congratulation as if you have demonstrated something important.
I certainly would not be concerned about God’s moral character if I did not think he existed. And surely you should know that no Cristian will be convinced that God is a meany by discussions such as this.
It really just seems to be a huge waste of time from my perspective. Yet you keep returning to the same goofy topic again and again like Sisyphus.
I’d really like to understand what your motivation is
peace
Who said it was necessary to kill them or that God needed to relocate them?
You really seem to be importing a lot of assumptions into this conversation with out any kind of warrant.
If it’s so important to you I suggest you spend a little bit of time reading up on the subject.
peace
Do you honestly think that the passover was just about the safe extraction of the Israelites? What ever gave you that idea?
peace
Woodbine: I think Raskolnikov is evil & I think those that defend his actions are immoral.
FMM: Why on earth bring that topic up? You do realize that Raskolnikov is a fictional character don’t you.
peace
There are non-fundagelical Christians who accept that the Bible was written by humans. Some of them also call it “the word of God”, an expression that they are using in a metaphorical sense.
Neil,
I know. That’s precisely why I didn’t address my question to “non-fundagelical Christians”, addressing it instead to “non-fundagelical Christians who nevertheless believe that the Bible is God’s word.” The qualifying clause is there for a reason, Neil.
fifth,
Are you playing dumb to deflect attention, or do you actually not get Woodbine’s point in bringing up Raskolnikov?
Neil Rickert,
After over 150 years of so-called “scientific progress” apparently, there are still some Darwinian fundamentalists who, believe or not, think that Darwin’s natural selection acting on variation can build new body plans… This is not a joke!
What should they be called? Omni-morons perhaps? 😉
If you really want to suggest that they’re dumb, call them J-Macs.
Glen Davidson
God sure has keiths fooled.
fifth:
True. It’s the last thing he needs. With believers like you, who needs apostates?
fifth, to Woodbine:
Oh, you definitely are. That’s exactly what you’re doing. That’s what your posts are about, and it’s why you’ve been quoting all those Bible verses at us.
You’re failing badly, so of course you’d like to pretend that you aren’t even trying, but you’re not fooling anyone, fifth. You’re trying very hard but falling flat on your face.
Please, please share this thread with your pastor and fellow church members, so they can see how, with the great power of Jesus on your side, you get defeated again and again by mere atheists.
Back to the Danse Apologia….
If there is no necessary connection between resolving the problems of the Amalekites or the Pharaoh or whatever and slaughtering children…..then why would an ‘infinitely loving’ God elect to do so?
Why, out of the presumably infinite options available to an omnipotent being, would the slaughtering of children even be considered?
I know you see the problem, FMM. That’s why you’re throwing chaff and flares all over the place.
Why would an omnipotent and infinitely loving God slaughter children unnecessarily?
And to answer your question….
I’m sure you can mine the Bible for an answer that confirms your suspicions – but to entertain you I’ll just repeat what I said earlier….
keiths,
Another month, another month of Keiths struggling to decide what good means…
fifth,
Again, are you really this confused, or are you just playing dumb for tactical reasons?
This is extremely easy to understand. Woodbine and I do not believe in God. You and your fellow Christians do. Furthermore, you believe that your God is loving and just. The evidence we’ve been discussing (including the people whom God is drowning and whose homes he is destroying as we speak) shows that God, if he exists at all, is not loving and just. Therefore Christianity is false.
Any Christian reading this thread can see the logic. None of you can refute it. There is no rational reason to be a Christian when you can clearly see that one of its essential tenets — that God is powerful and loving — is false.
One thing I’ve noticed from talking to Christians is that they often are ashamed of their doubts. Part of this is because other Christians treat doubt as shameful, and people who express their doubts often get the cold shoulder from their fellow believers. I learned very quickly to keep my mouth shut about my doubts, and to ponder them privately instead.
The nice thing about a thread like this is that any believer who has doubts about God’s goodness can see that those doubts, far from being shameful, are fully justified, and that it’s the other folks — the ones who insist on God’s goodness — who have some ‘splainin’ to do. And they can look around and see that none of the believers here actually have answers
So, to the doubters: You are the rational ones, for doubting. The evidence is overwhelmingly on your side, and it’s the diehard dogmatists like fifth who are wrong. He has shut his eyes to the evidence, out of fear. That’s a mistake. Don’t follow his terrible example.
phoodoo,
Another month, another month of phoodoo avoiding the questions I’ve posed.
Why not be brave and tell us why your “loving” God is drowning people and destroying their homes? Be brave and tell us that to complain about death and destruction amounts to complaining about dandruff and mosquito bites, and that God can’t be bothered with trivialities such as deep human suffering.
keiths,
How can I discuss a loving God, when you are afraid to say what loving means?
Jesus said:
Christians, why not ask Jesus for an effective defense against the atheists in this thread?
That’s a rhetorical question, of course. You know as well as I do that if you ask, it will not be given to you. Seek, and you will not find. Knock, and the door will not be opened to you.
Another empty promise from Jesus. Yet more evidence that Christianity is false.
Ask God to make you smarter, so you can know when you are being embarrassed?
Why, even God has a sense of humor.
You’re phailing, phoodoo.
phodoo,
You’re unfamiliar with the concept?
In any case, where did you get the idea that I was afraid to say what “loving” means?
To love someone is to care about them, to want them to be happy, to desire that they be relieved of pain and suffering. Is this mystifying to you? To love someone is not to want to kill them or ruin their life.
Now:
Why not be brave and tell us why your “loving” God is drowning people and destroying their homes? Be brave and tell us that to complain about death and destruction amounts to complaining about dandruff and mosquito bites, and that God can’t be bothered with trivialities such as deep human suffering.
keiths,
That is so phucking phunny, how you can change an f to a ph! How did you think of that?
Why aren’t you thankphul that God gave you such an amazing brain? ph to f!! HAHAHAHA! Whoa!
All suffering?
Anything but answer the questions, eh, phoodoo?
Why not be brave and tell us why your “loving” God is drowning people and destroying their homes? Be brave and tell us that to complain about death and destruction amounts to complaining about dandruff and mosquito bites, and that God can’t be bothered with trivialities such as deep human suffering.
keiths,
No, I am not familiar with your concept of loving. But since you refuse to explain it, we can’t really discuss what you mean, now can we?
But I do have empathy for the fact that you don’t know what you mean.
phoodoo,
Then use yours!
Tell us why your “loving” God is drowning people and destroying their homes. Tell us that to complain about death and destruction amounts to complaining about dandruff and mosquito bites, and explain why your loving God can’t be bothered with trivialities such as deep human suffering.
keiths,
I already have, Geez keiths, go back and read! Suffering is unavoidable in a world with choices. So there you go, I know what I mean, but you certainly don’t know what you mean.
phoodoo:
You’re actually claiming that God can’t create “a world with choices” without drowning people and destroying their homes?
Are there choices in Heaven?
keiths,
Or having hills, which you wish didn’t exist!