The devil was sent to hell because he wanted to rule over heaven and earth but god wouldn’t let him, right? Well, the way the Christians believe it to be, we must devote our entire lives to god or else! We must bow down and worship their god because he is “the one true god”. He sent the devil to hell because why? He couldn’t share leadership? Was he to selfish or jealous, or what? It is funny that a religion such as Christianity would in fact be based upon a selfish god.

And why is the devil considered evil? Because their “one true god” says so! So, who is evil? The one who was sent to hell for wanting to be equal to god or the one who suffers from the same sins as the devil whom was condemned to hell? Isn’t Christianity based upon the same principal as satanic worship (minus all the nasty stuff they doto other people)? There is one true god and it is the one we worship so you must obey or else?

Another thing I find funny is the way that they say to you that if you don’t worship their god you have been won over by the devil! If we do not believe in their god then why would we believe in his adversary?



[This message has been edited by beccababe (edited 05-31-2003).]

The biblcal jehovah and satan are both mythical. But try telling that to an xian.

Does that clear it up?

Exodus 20:5 - Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;

I think he knows he's jealous.

quote:Originally posted by Iscariot2:

Exodus 20:5 - Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;

I think he knows he's jealous.



At least he admits that he has his faults.

As for the question in the subject line - why not?

I bet you're an athiest, and love telling everybody, too.

quote:Originally posted by beccababe:

The devil was sent to hell because he wanted to rule over heaven and earth but god wouldn’t let him, right?

I haven't read the entire Bible(to be honst, I mostly focus on the first 7 books), but I doubt this is anywhere in it.

Sounds like Catholic mythology added after the fact to me.

quote:Well, the way the Christians believe it to be, we must devote our entire lives to god or else!

Yep. That's pretty much it. Kinda foolish, but what do you care if you don't believe in G-d anyway?

quote: We must bow down and worship their god because he is “the one true god”.

He IS the 'one true god'. To them. Who are you to question their beliefs? You don't know that they're wrong.

quote: He sent the devil to hell because why? He couldn’t share leadership? Was he to selfish or jealous, or what?

The entire Satan story is a sham. If one were to take it seriously, as it seems that you do, it's not entirely illogical to come the conclusion that G-d decided that, if Satan were to gain power, he would not use it in a very responsible way.

Besides, G-d had already set up that snazzy 'One and Only True G-d' title.

It's too cool for him to change it.

quote:It is funny that a religion such as Christianity would in fact be based upon a selfish god.

No, it's not funny. It's false.



quote:And why is the devil considered evil? Because their “one true god” says so!

The devil is considered evil because he drives people to hurt their fellow man.

We said the devil was evil. The devil doesn't even exist.

G-d knows he doesn't exist, and has let us go on fearing him just because he's got that kind of sense of humor.

quote: So, who is evil? The one who was sent to hell for wanting to be equal to god or the one who suffers from the same sins as he whom was condemned to hell?

...that didn't make any sense whatsoever. Can you do me a favor and rephrase into something coherent?

quote:Isn’t Christianity based upon the same principal as satanic worship (minus all the nasty stuff they do)?

Well, Christianity worship G-d(or, more accuraterly, Jesus). Satanists worship Satan.

So, no.

quote: There is one true god and it is the one we worship so you must obey or else?

Well, like you said, there's only one true G-d. Why not worship?

Better than burning in eternal hellfire, you know.

You do know that they don't want you to burn in Hell. They actually think they're saving you. They're so compassionate that they want you to be with them in heaven. Sure, they COULD let you burn and get their own mansion in heaven, but they want you to be eternally happy.

They gave up their mansion for you. Show some respect.

quote:Another thing I find funny is the way that they say to you that if you don’t worship their god you have been won over by the devil! If we do not believe in their god then why would we believe in his adversary?

Being taken control of by the devil does not require you to believe in him. Well, to them at least.

Are you sure you're not stuck in 1600s Colonial America? I've never heard of anybody in this century saying that somone's been possessed by the devil.

Christianity, like all other religions, is something you choose to believe. The people who believe it try to help the people who don't. All the religious conflict in society today is caused by people not accepting that other sets of beliefs have rights too.

As for the devil, no where in the bible does it say the devil exists. There is one quote, "If you are not of the Christ, you are anti-christ," (I don't know where this is exactly) but that is like saying if the light is on, it's not off.

If people would just let others believe what they want, except them, & be open to listening to new ideas (not nessasarily believe them), then the world would be a lot more peaceful.

The part of Christianity I don't understand is God has given ten commandments and everyone must follow them or go to hell, but Christians still believe they have free will. How is that free? If your good you receive a huge reward, but if your not perfect you will be punished beyond belief.

[This message has been edited by Schizophrenic Styrofoam (edited 05-29-2003).]

Schizophrenic Styrofoam, the choices that we have are severely underated, but they are still there. Worship God and be saved. Worship yourself and you won't be saved.

quote:Originally posted by Schizophrenic Styrofoam:



As for the devil, no where in the bible does it say the devil exists. There is one quote, "If you are not of the Christ, you are anti-christ," (I don't know where this is exactly) but that is like saying if the light is on, it's not off.



Wow.

Satan is mentioned numerous times in both the old and new testaments. Satan = Devil, btw.

So i'm not sure where you get the above information from.

quote:Originally posted by Schizophrenic Styrofoam:

The part of Christianity I don't understand is God has given ten commandments and everyone must follow them or go to hell, but Christians still believe they have free will. How is that free? If your good you receive a huge reward, but if your not perfect you will be punished beyond belief.





You are not forced to follow the 10 Commandments. It is your choice whether or not to do so. This is Free Will.

Of course, you'll burn in hell if you don't, but you still have to make the choice yourself.

quote:Originally posted by just.landed:

Schizophrenic Styrofoam, the choices that we have are severely underated, but they are still there. Worship God and be saved. Worship yourself and you won't be saved.

How about saving yourself?

quote:Originally posted by TigerJK:

How about saving yourself?



You're free to try.

Save yourself from what? The boogeyman? Your own human nature?

quote:Originally posted by Kikey_Kikeowitz:



You are not forced to follow the 10 Commandments. It is your choice whether or not to do so. This is Free Will.

Of course, you'll burn in hell if you don't, but you still have to make the choice yourself.

That's not free will. Free Will is when you have a reasonable choice. I suppose I say this more easily because I don't believe in hell or the ten commandments.

quote:Originally posted by just.landed:

Schizophrenic Styrofoam, the choices that we have are severely underated, but they are still there. Worship God and be saved. Worship yourself and you won't be saved.

Who's worshipping himself? I'm not. I'm just not a fundamentalist.

quote:Originally posted by Dark_Magneto:

Save yourself from what? The boogeyman? Your own human nature?

from a tyrannical god.

quote:Originally posted by Kikey_Kikeowitz:



You are not forced to follow the 10 Commandments. It is your choice whether or not to do so. This is Free Will.

Of course, you'll burn in hell if you don't, but you still have to make the choice yourself.

Actually you can ask for forgiveness for any offence you may have committed no matter how terrible...

We are all doomed to sin, we all WILL sin...the question is, will we repent from our sins and turn from that path of wrongs to ask for the forgiveness and guidance needed to enter Heaven?

I don't believe in sin. It just doesn't make sense. Why would a "good and just" God punish his creations for something they thought was right at the time, and if he were going to, why so stern a punishment?

quote:Originally posted by Schizophrenic Styrofoam:

I don't believe in sin. It just doesn't make sense. Why would a "good and just" God punish his creations for something they thought was right at the time, and if he were going to, why so stern a punishment?

Because he gets a kick out of it.

Besides, who said he was good and just? Have you ever read the Old Testament? He did some pretty fucked up stuff.

G-d's hardcore.

You can very rarely decide to become a Christian by free choice. How can you when we are talking about a religion based upon fear? The fear that if you do not worship this god you will burn for all eternity?

Christianity was not made up to help us but rather keep us in line.

And for the record, I am not an atheist but I have not found my choice of religion. An atheist does not believe in religion.

quote:Originally posted by beccababe:

You can very rarely decide to become a Christian by free choice. How can you when we are talking about a religion based upon fear? The fear that if you do not worship this god you will burn for all eternity?

If you don't believe in it anyway, what the fuck do you care if they say you're going to burn in hell?

You're not going to if you don't believe in it, as far as your own mind is concerned.

quote:Christianity was not made up to help us but rather keep us in line.

I swear to G-d, I hear this brought up so many times. I'm surprised people haven't realized by now, after 2000 fucking years, that this statement is bullshit.

Christianity was made up to study and follow the teachings of Yeshua of Nazareth, for fuck's sake.

I'm sorry but most people in this forum dont know jack about Christianity. Someone said you don't choos because it's based on fear. If you asked most christians when and why they became christians they would say they had a hole in their life that couldn't be filled by anything they had tried. But it was filled by god, not fear. Maybe you people should work overtime so you can buy a clue.

the christian scriptures have been edited many times over the past 2000 years. I'm not saying christianity has everything wrong here, but along the line the powerful used its innocence to their advantage.

You make a good point to say, if you don't believe it, then it shouldn't bother you that people say you are going to hell. I believe what happens to you is to a large extent decided by what you believe.

forgot something,

christianity was never based on fear, however people in the church have used it to keep people from leaving. God is a thing that, sad to say, is not as closely linked to the church as we would like to believe. He/She/It (to throw off the image of an elderly male) doesn't require us all to believe exactly the same thing. We can each find our own path, the one that works best for us.

quote:Originally posted by Kikey_Kikeowitz:

Christianity was made up to study and follow the teachings of Yeshua of Nazareth, for fuck's sake.



Well, *some* of the teachings. The "gospels" we have and their arrangement have been the subject of some serious political goings on over the last 2000 years, as you are no doubt aware.

Given the rather well-publicized nastiness around what constitutes scripture and how to use it, it's not totally illogical to conclude that at least some of contemporary Christian doctrine has its basis in social control.

quote:Originally posted by Schizophrenic Styrofoam:

forgot something,

christianity was never based on fear, however people in the church have used it to keep people from leaving.

aren't all religions based on fear? ...fear of the unknown and/or fear of death?

isn't the belief in god just a comfort towards fear, in that, god will always accept, or "guide" (for lack of proper terminology) the believer?

[This message has been edited by humble (edited 06-04-2003).]

quote:Originally posted by Schizophrenic Styrofoam:

You make a good point to say, if you don't believe it, then it shouldn't bother you that people say you are going to hell. I believe what happens to you is to a large extent decided by what you believe.

Well, it shouldn't bother you until fanatical "christian" assholes go around telling you that you are going to hell, then beating you with rusty nail-boards and outlawing abortion.

The beliefs of others do affect you, no matter what bullshit you spout about it.

quote:Originally posted by beccababe:

The devil was sent to hell because he wanted to rule over heaven and earth but god wouldn’t let him, right? Well, the way the Christians believe it to be, we must devote our entire lives to god or else! We must bow down and worship their god because he is “the one true god”. He sent the devil to hell because why? He couldn’t share leadership? Was he to selfish or jealous, or what? It is funny that a religion such as Christianity would in fact be based upon a selfish god.

And why is the devil considered evil? Because their “one true god” says so! So, who is evil? The one who was sent to hell for wanting to be equal to god or the one who suffers from the same sins as the devil whom was condemned to hell? Isn’t Christianity based upon the same principal as satanic worship (minus all the nasty stuff they doto other people)? There is one true god and it is the one we worship so you must obey or else?

Another thing I find funny is the way that they say to you that if you don’t worship their god you have been won over by the devil! If we do not believe in their god then why would we believe in his adversary?



[This message has been edited by beccababe (edited 05-31-2003).]

you are a little on the stupid side (no offense)

just go to a church a pray that God will give you some understanding for being such a fatty

anyone who thinks that all religion is based on fear is obviously not a spiritual person

it'd be nice to ''hear'' more about the flipside of the ''religions are based on fear'' coin, but i suppose that's too much to ask. :<

quote:Originally posted by Schizophrenic Styrofoam:

anyone who thinks that all religion is based on fear is obviously not a spiritual person

You can be anti-religion and still be spiritual. Religion doesn't have a monopoly on spirituality, you know.

I think that although some things about religion are bad, the concept of religion is a good one. It introduces people to god.

And that is where it should end.

We need ideas not religion. I think that god doesn’t really care about religion. (Much less Christianity or Catholicism.) I think this because if god loves us and wants us to believe in him and love him he would never approve of a religion that tells us that if we do not do as he says then we will burn in hell for all eternity. If you were god and you wanted to be loved you would want them to come by their own free will not because of fear.

I don’t hate religion and I’m not an atheist because I do believe in god but I really don’t like many of the rules and regulations Christianity and any other religions put forward as a form of worship.

quote:Originally posted by Dark_Magneto:

You can be anti-religion and still be spiritual. Religion doesn't have a monopoly on spirituality, you know.



I meant that you would at least see that religion wasn't all bad; you wouldn't have to like it. I don't like religion, but I know that it isn't based on fear. Fear has become part of it, but it didn't start that way. Religion is based on finding something more, something you just have a feeling is there and your religion is the way you've found to express it. It can be expressed without religion, but traditionally that hasn't been accepted (but it should be accepted). Religion is the express of your soul's search for a meaning to life. Personally, no religion can do this for me.

"You can be anti-religion and still be spiritual. Religion doesn't have a monopoly on spirituality, you know."

but religion just bought PARKPLACE and BOARDWALK.

to beccababe,

your not seeing the flipside of things. basically if yes god did want you to know that if you didnt do what the church said you would burn in hell. Did you think of that.

Oh and one more thing to everyone in this entire forum, to all the ones who want proof, or believe in god but not religion, why do many people think that, because THEY do. If you really believe that god made us or that their is a god maybe, dont you think he/she/it would be smarter than us, and therefore we wouldnt understand much of what he does.

quote:Originally posted by bigtmoney:

If you really believe that god made us or that their is a god maybe, dont you think he/she/it would be smarter than us, and therefore we wouldnt understand much of what he does.

I see that argument employed by Christians alot to excuse atrocities in the Bible.

"Works in mysterious ways" is the motto.

If God exists as a being who is all-powerful and perfectly good, such as many theists profess, then this being must somehow ensure our world is perfectly good. The only way He can do this is to make all of the apparent evils we see in the world into means to a greater good. For example, the pain of a vaccination is in itself bad, but is a means to a greater good. Thus, if God exists, we must have evidence that all of the evils we see are means to a greater good. But even theists admit there is no evidence. That is why they must resort to talking about the mysterious ways in which God works. There's no evidence at all, for example, that twenty million people dying from Spanish influenza is for a greater good.

Another one I get alot is "Who are we to question?", which follows along the same token of ignorance encouragement and blind unquestioning steadfast obedience.

As you can see from Tale of 12 Officers" (http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/mark_vuletic/five.html), woefully inadequate and thought terminating cliches such as those leave much to be desired.

quote:

"Look, there's really no point in my trying to explain the details to you," said the fifth officer, who we had nicknamed 'Brainiac' because he had an encyclopedic knowledge of literally everything and an IQ way off the charts. "There's an excellent reason for why I did not intervene, but it's just way too complicated for you to understand, so I'm not even going to bother trying. I mean, you admit you are nowhere near as knowledgeable as I am, so what right do you have to judge? Just so there's no misunderstanding, though, let me point out that no one could care about Ms. K. more than I did, and that I am, in fact, a very good person. That settles that."

quote:Originally posted by Dark_Magneto:

You can be anti-religion and still be spiritual. Religion doesn't have a monopoly on spirituality, you know.



i think you might be confusing spirituality and morality. of course, i could be wrong, too; but i think all spiritual people ARE necessarily religious.

i really tried to think of an example to counter my own belief, but i cannot. if you can, please do. (am i being too literal on the definition of spirituality?)

What religion would one have to follow to be spiritual? Do only some religions offer spirituality, or does it work for all of them? What if your partalking in a false, manmade religion? Is your spirituality less valid than the man with the unfalsifiable religion?

Can you be spiritual and still not belong to any specific religion? Can one make up their own religion and achieve spirituality from it? What if a man claims he is spiritual, and has a set of beliefs, but they are not held by any current religion? Can he make up his own and thusly validate himself into "spirituality"?

There's something to chew on for awhile.

Originally posted by Dark_Magneto:

What religion would one have to follow to be spiritual?

any religion that deals with the supernatural, or with spirits and/or a diety (-ies). i'm not saying that you must be spiritual, if you are religious, but (only) that you must be religious, if you are spiritual.

Do only some religions offer spirituality, or does it work for all of them?

only some religions offer spirituality.

What if you're partaking in a false, manmade religion? Is your spirituality less valid than the man with the unfalsifiable religion?

(mis-quoted, because i have issues.)

not for me to answer, because (at least to my knowledge,) i'm unreligious.

Can you be spiritual and still not belong to any specific religion?

that's what i'm asking!

Can one make up their own religion and achieve spirituality from it?

seems to be quite a trend, from my viewpoint (whereby ''made up'' is equal to ''unproven'').

What if a man claims he is spiritual, and has a set of beliefs, but they are not held by any current religion?

you're losing me....

Can he make up his own and thusly validate himself into "spirituality"?

isn't that just another way of phrasing "Can one make up their own religion and achieve spirituality from it?"

There's something to chew on for a while.



still haven't found the answer to my question. http://www.totse.com/bbs/frown.gif (http://www.totse.com/bbs/frown.gif) thanks for trying, though.

I find it quite funny how there are thousands of modern near-death experiences, but Christians still prefer to be ignorant of these, and read a book of stories about God 2000 years old, rather than modern ones happening every single day.

I guess because it contradicts their beliefs. They become as skeptical as atheists in a sense.

Christians, got anything to say on that?

*edit*

I should rephrase that. Christians that actually researched near-death experiences (Something besides Christianity?! NO, IT MUST BE WRONG!) do you have anything to say on them? Or are all these people just all involved in some big lie/conspiracy thing?

[This message has been edited by Fuck (edited 06-07-2003).]

what are these near death experiences you speak of?

www.near-death.com (http://www.near-death.com)

the wonders of google can help you out too. I'm surprised nobody cares about these... at first it might seem like someone made the story up, but when you read at least 10 or 20 of them, the stories become freakishly similar... one of the best modern sources of evidence we have of any answers, in my opinion