Interesting read.

I am not an atheist but am a man who, thanks to apotheosis, believes himself to have high morals. Perhaps even superior to women.
I will take the Jewish view of Eden as man’s elevation as opposed to the Christian view that Eden was man’s fall. I do this because the Jewish view was the initial view of their scriptures. I give their view more authority than I do to Christianity. That Jewish view was later reversed by Christianity. Why Christianity did this is not clear.

http://www.mrrena.com/misc/judaism2.php

For this mental exercise, I say women are more moral than men. I take this view because teaching a topic is the best way to learn it, and that most of the child rearing/teaching in that day was done by women. Women then, teaching children their first morals, would also teach themselves morals faster than what men would.

I do not read scriptures literally but will use the literal view and my logic trail and progression through Eden as if I do.
Eve was first to eat of the tree of knowledge, and as scriptures states, became as God. That is, she developed the same moral sense as God. She then recognized that instead of leaving Adam to follow God’s instruction to not eat, she chose, with her new wisdom, to have Adam also eat of the tree of knowledge. Thus both were elevated to having a moral sense.

Is the Jewish view the correct one?

Who should lead mankind in religious and political thinking?

Who are more moral? Men or women?

Regards
DL

Or, ‘The Next American Messiah.’

Would people like a youthful Brother Mario enter?  Young Benny Hinns, Joel Osteens, and Jan Crouches?  Would a new Saint Francis come to light, maybe among the hopefuls in Fargo ND?  Would he or she come on stage with a little bird perched on an index finger, causing a feeling of peace to descend on a worldwide audience of 31 million? 

Among the 2 billion Christians in the world, there must be hundreds, or thousands of fervent young people wondering if they are Jesus.  If the ratings are good, if some of the contestants are able to cast out demons, or cause the judges to tear up and get their wallets out . . . if the real Jesus really does enter . . . I mean, after all, a worldwide audience of 31 million?  Think about it.  Would the popular ‘phone in’ vote go to the contestant with the little bird on their finger, or to the real Jesus who told everyone to stop paying taxes to murder people in other countries?  To be kind to those who persecute them?  To give their shirt to those who took their coat?

Any ideas for the judges panel?  Joel Osteen, Brother Mario, Paula White, Benny Hinn, Bill Maher, Sam?

Scroll down on the following link, and you’ll find a good video of Professor Bart Ehrman explaining that no New Testament scholar doubts the historical existence of Jesus (as Ehrman says, Hector Avalos is an old Testament scholar, and Bob Price does not have a teaching position).  Ehrman will soon be publishing an E-Book against the mythicist position:

http://www.patheos.com/community/exploringourmatrix/2011/07/27/bart-ehrman-on-mythicism/

Dr. McGrath is also contributing a part by part debunking of pseudo-scholar Early Doherty’s book “Jesus: Neither God nor Man.”  Here is a sample:

http://www.patheos.com/community/exploringourmatrix/2011/08/17/review-of-earl-doherty’s-jesus-neither-god-nor-man-chapter-10-part-one/

This is a good site on the historical Jesus because it shows the mythicist position is just held by a bunch of nobodies who don’t understand the bible.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/25/modern-day-exorcisms-perf_n_1228567.html#s635543&title=Exorcism_in_Mexico

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/richard_carrier/whynotchristian.html

There are many instances in scriptures where God does not follow the golden rule.

Ezekiel 18:20
The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son: the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him.

In the sacrifice of Jesus, God demanded that Jesus bear the sins of the wicked who will repent.

This is hardly doing unto others or following the advice of scriptures.
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Matthew 25:41 (Jesus speaking): Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

Romans 12:21 Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

Hell can hardly be called a good thing. This again is hardly Jesus doing unto others or following the advice of scriptures.
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Does the God you know follow the golden rule?

How can he be doing so when a good God would find a good and moral way to convert instead the draconian methods he seems to use that go against the golden rule and his own good advice in his scriptures?

Regards
DL

TheBrotherMario - 15 January 2012 04:51 AM

Which brings me back to an experience in her class, not unlike my experience on Project Reason: One time two girls in the class were speaking about the Immaculate Conception as the initiation of the Virgin Birth. I told them, and this professor, that the Immaculate Conception was the initiation of the birth of Mary, and was instrumental in the dogma of Mary, the Mother of God, being born without Original Sin. These two girls (who were the resident Catholics) laughed and said they had never heard such a thing. And the professor smirked at me, and told the girls that this is a perfect example of how you can refute opinions with a little research (for she was a professor of Rhetorical Theory and knew such things). The girls nodded in approval, and the class looked at me like I was crazy. And when the next class came around, these girls and this professor did not say a peep about the truth of the Immaculate Conception, if they even researched it.

It seems rather elementary that normal people would be confused about the famous “Immaculate Conception” as a term referring to the magical conception of Jesus Christ, that is, the formation of a zygote from the union of a human egg and “god’s sperm” - (in whatever form that latter fantasmigorical sex cell is described in layman’s terms?).

But the “fact” is obvious from any reading of the New Testament that the “Immaculate Conception” refers to the genetic formulation of the Mary cell.  It appears that god had already interjected his presence into the sexual act of Mary’s parents when their conjugal union produced a fertilized Mary (conjuction of egg and sperm).  God had already picked that particular eggcell as his own “mother of god” precursor at her conception.  Now why, was this necessary (that Mary be conceived “immaculately”?).  Well obviously, god was not going to personally impregnate a regular human female who had been born with Original sin (the sin of Adam) on her soul, so he purged the original sin from the cellular conception of Mary, thus making her pure for his own future indiscression.  Naturally, god needs a virgin to bear his child, but not just any old virgin smeared with the decadent pathos of original sin, he needs a virgin who is pure and sinless, so that he can then preserve her for his own enjoyment (or employment).  I mean, if Mary had original sin, then the son of god could be stained with the same corruption, so the imaginative writers of the New Testament invented the “Immaculate Conception” as their remedy for the problem of original sin in all humans.

This entire biblical episode just cries out clearly that the myths of the new testament are entirely created by the writers of that time. The deliberate concoction of this kind of divine intervention, is plain evidence that this was written in hindsight in a flagrant attempt to undercut the stain of original sin on the soul of god’s son.  Now anyone who would take the story of the “Immaculate Conception” as true is severely in need of gullibility correction. It seems to me that belief in this concept is proof of a person’s incapacity to reason poperly.