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Post by Satori on Dec 14, 2004 9:21:50 GMT -5
The other thing to keep in mind is the nation was commanded directly by God to go to war. God used this as a means to destroying immorality just as he did with the flood and just as he did so many times when the Israelite forsook him. God has the right to take human life. He gives and He takes away. Well that's just not true is it. All this 'commanded directly by God' rubbish is the same trash spouted by people who want to justify a 'Holy War' somewhere these days. The single biggest problem with these God-believing religions is that a clever leader can get an uneducated population to do just about anything 'in the name of God'. I'm sorry Joel - I'm not usually that harsh (despite our differences) - but your support of the Old Testament in this respect is just as bad as any Muslim Jihad.
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Post by Areopagite on Dec 14, 2004 21:04:16 GMT -5
First off, Satori, the whole "War for Oil" complaint is baseless. I'm not seeing my gas prices going down, are you? I haven't heard of any American companies making money off of Iraqi oil. Iraqis are getting the money. So how is the war for oil? No results indicate that.
Second of all, you can't throw Joel's comment aside because you don't care for what it means. God, who has done many things despite your choosing not to believe, did command the Israelites in several wars. Your concern about a clever leader leading an uneducated group in the name of God is understandable. Remember, though, that the Bible is "special revelation", and, so, it would be next to impossible for someone to lead Christians in a war, claiming God's command.
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Post by joelhaldeman on Dec 15, 2004 0:49:26 GMT -5
Oil has everything to do with the war in Iraq. Lower prices were not neccesarily the reason though. With a crazy leader like Sadam, if he wanted to hurt America all he would need to do is torch the oil fields. We wantyed control of the oil, not neccessarily lower prices. It wouldnt make sense for this war to only be based on WMD. We know for a fact that North Korea has WMD and they are a greater danger to the United States then Iraq.
Satori-I got nothing. I disagree about the clever leader and uneducated people but i cannot justify a Christian holy war over another religions. The only thing that I can say is I believe my God is real and theres is not but I know they would say the same thing.
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Post by Satori on Dec 15, 2004 2:39:09 GMT -5
First off, Satori, the whole "War for Oil" complaint is baseless. I'm not seeing my gas prices going down, are you? I haven't heard of any American companies making money off of Iraqi oil. Iraqis are getting the money. So how is the war for oil? No results indicate that. No, not yet they don't. It's too early; the country's still too unstable. However, it isn't just for oil - although that's a major factor - but neither was it just (or even at all) for stopping WMDs or deposing Saddam Hussein (specifically). I can't believe that anyone can miss the 'oil connection', at least to some degree. That's what religious argument is about. Better to 'throw his comment aside' than to lead the equivalent of a Crusade for my religion into his house. Prove it. No it isn't, it's just words on paper written by Man. That's all any of this is, whether written by you, me or the people who wrote the Bible. That's why it's not really important at the deepest level (but we won't go there today). Wrong, it's already happened many times.
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Post by Satori on Dec 15, 2004 2:46:34 GMT -5
Satori-I got nothing. I disagree about the clever leader and uneducated people but i cannot justify a Christian holy war over another religions. Apologies for the harshness of my comment - I was having a very un-Buddhist day Well I think you have the same, one Abrahamic God - you and, say, a Muslim just have different ways in interpreting how to go about serving Him. Unfortunately that's where a lot of conflict arises.
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Post by joelhaldeman on Dec 15, 2004 17:21:16 GMT -5
I completly disagree with you here. Just because the Muslims believe that it is the same God and that it is the 3rd part of the religion following Judiasim and Christianity does not mean it is the same God. There are clear and distinct differences between the character traits of Alah and Yahweh. The God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament sows the same character-not so for the God of the muslims. If an object is described as having 4 corners by one person and 3 corners by another person we know that it is 2 different objects. Just like the God of Islam and the God of Christianity are different as they have different characteristics
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Post by desertfox on Dec 15, 2004 20:48:40 GMT -5
"the object of war is not to die for ur country... it is to make the other bastards die for theirs..." General George S. Patton
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Post by Satori on Dec 16, 2004 3:04:22 GMT -5
I completly disagree with you here. Just because the Muslims believe that it is the same God and that it is the 3rd part of the religion following Judiasim and Christianity does not mean it is the same God. There are clear and distinct differences between the character traits of Alah and Yahweh. The God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament sows the same character-not so for the God of the muslims. It's a matter of interpretation. To my mind the God of the OT and the God of the NT look like very different characters to me, but then again I have no vested interest in having them look like the same God. The OT God looks very much more like the Egyptian God upon which Yahweh was based, but the NT God seems to have evolved into the less hands-on and smiting deity that we're more familiar with today. A man walking through a field at dusk comes across a coil of speckled rope in the grass and, mistaking it for a snake, develops fear. Even though a snake appears vividly to his mind, that snake does not exist from its own side. It is merely a projection of his mind, imputed by conceptual thought in dependence upon the rope. Other than this, no snake can be found because neither the coil of rope as a whole nor any part of it is a snake.
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Post by joelhaldeman on Dec 16, 2004 7:25:03 GMT -5
It's a matter of interpretation. To my mind the God of the OT and the God of the NT look like very different characters to me, but then again I have no vested interest in having them look like the same God. The OT God looks very much more like the Egyptian God upon which Yahweh was based, but the NT God seems to have evolved into the less hands-on and smiting deity that we're more familiar with today. A man walking through a field at dusk comes across a coil of speckled rope in the grass and, mistaking it for a snake, develops fear. Even though a snake appears vividly to his mind, that snake does not exist from its own side. It is merely a projection of his mind, imputed by conceptual thought in dependence upon the rope. Other than this, no snake can be found because neither the coil of rope as a whole nor any part of it is a snake. The gods worshiped in Eqypt are nothing like Yahweh. In egypt there was no supreme God and Lord of all the universe. The egyptians were polythiests. Much different then the One and only God of the Old and New Testament who has never changed. He is the same loving and just God in both testaments. The example of the snake was a man being mistaken. The object never did anything that made it look like a snake or smell like a snake or move like a snake. Were talking about a completly different situation in which God shows through his actions as well as tells his people that he does not change. He is not something we simply observe from a distant and make assumptions about. He has directly interacted with people and indirectly to produce his own book about himself. When the hose starts writting a book about his nake life and hissing then you have an argument.
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Post by Areopagite on Dec 16, 2004 8:56:15 GMT -5
Satori, The God of the OT and the NT is the same. Joel is correct when he says "He is the same loving and just God in both testaments". God is loving as well as just in the OT and NT. How do you figure that the God of the OT and the God of the NT are different deities?
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Post by Satori on Dec 16, 2004 9:02:40 GMT -5
The gods worshiped in Eqypt are nothing like Yahweh. In egypt there was no supreme God and Lord of all the universe. The egyptians were polythiests. Much different then the One and only God of the Old and New Testament who has never changed. The first time the name 'Yahweh' (known as 'The Spirit of Mount Horeb') is mentioned definitively in history is in Egyptian records from about 1,300 BC (although there's loose evidence of his mention as long as 1,600 years before that), where it is recorded that a tribe called the Shasu took that particular God, from the many that existed at the time, as their tribal deity. The Bible records Yahweh as being appointed to the Israelites thus: " God has taken His place in the assembly of the gods, He declares His judgment among the gods" [Psalm 82]. The literal translation of the 'the assembly of Gods' is ' Sons of El' and bene'el was a court of gods with El being the 'God of the Paramount'. It was El who appointed Yahweh as the 'God of Israel'. Eventually, though, the Israelites craved more 'weight' for their own God and religion, and Yahweh became a monotheistic 'standalone' somewhere between 900-600 BC (most likely under the rule of King Joshua), finally removing Baal (a god for whom the Israelites had much respect until then) from the scene. However, going back a bit, Moses needed a god to inspire the exodus and he formulated a new and enlarged concept of Deity (derived from all his former beliefs), which he wisely decided to proclaim to his people as an expanded concept of the old tribal god, Yahweh. Moses frowned upon the belief in other gods as he needed to weld his (and thus Yahweh's) own supremacy, but Baal and many other gods still survived in early Judaism for quite some time. Yahweh may not have originally been Egyptian, but it was the Egyptian concept of Yahweh - the war god - that Moses built upon. Well I don't read it that way, so we'll have to agree to disagree. Okay then, this is another take on the snake story. A man walking through a field at dusk comes across a burning bush and, not undestanding it, develops a belief in god. Even though the work of a god appears vividly to his mind, that god does not exist from its own side. It is merely a projection of his mind, imputed by conceptual thought in dependence upon an explanation for the burning bush. Other than this, no god can be found because neither the burning bush as a whole nor any part of it is the work of god. I don't think He has though. Certain people in history have said he has and others chose to believe them. Why doesn't he just knock on everyone's door and say "here I am and I'll prove without a doubt I'm a god". You would probably say it's because He wants our faith ("blessed are those have have not seen yet have believed" etc.); I just see that as a convenient get-out. Again, we're not likely to agree here.
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Post by Satori on Dec 16, 2004 9:18:50 GMT -5
Satori, The God of the OT and the NT is the same. Joel is correct when he says "He is the same loving and just God in both testaments". God is loving as well as just in the OT and NT. How do you figure that the God of the OT and the God of the NT are different deities? Well in reality there aren't any deities at all of course, merely interpretations and beliefs, but let's assume for one moment that we were talking about 'real' deities. For one thing - in common with Yahweh's origins as a war god - the god of the OT was a much more active god, smiting this, that and the other and supposedly leading wars. The god of the NT is much less actively involved god and - one might assess - a much more peaceful god. Of course they may not be actual different gods - it could be that God is just choosing to behave differently - but this comparison arose from the fact that Joel said that Allah is definitely a different god. My point was that the OT and NT gods could be interpreted as different on the same grounds. Perhaps Allah is the same god as the OT and the NT god but just revealing himself differently as he did in the NT (compared to the OT). Personally I think it's all cack in terms of 'absolute' reality, but in order to take part in possibly intriguing conversations with you guys I have to make certain compromises in order to put us on something resembling a similar outset from which to discuss things. Otherwise it would just be: Christians: "God is ace". Me: "God doesn't exist". Result: End of conversation.
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Post by desertfox on Dec 16, 2004 17:18:39 GMT -5
if there is a God, he certaintly has protected the Israelies if you look at the modern history of Israel. There are atleast 3 ocassions when they should have been wiped out. I think that the only country that profited from iraqi oil is France under the oil for food program. www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,132832,00.html
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Post by joelhaldeman on Dec 26, 2004 23:55:02 GMT -5
Bush was named man of the year by Time Magazine. I am baffeled. Why is the "liberal media" so conservative these days?
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Post by bobarian on Dec 30, 2004 19:37:13 GMT -5
Satori -
I would say that God is Allah, but that Muslims don't have the right conception of Allah. Like, both you and me can know Bill. You may believe he has three heads and is a CIA operative. I don't. We believe different things about the same person, but I'm right and you're wrong (for the sake of the illustration, of course.)
I agree with Jared, though, that there is no difference between the OT and the NT God. I think people only make that claim who do not understand the depth of biblical theology. On the surface they seem different, but taking the Bible as a whole there is a lot of unity. God is very warlike in the NT (Jesus turning over the tables in the temple?) and very peaceful in the OT ("You are my shepherd, I shall not want. You maketh me to lie down in green pastures, you restore my soul...") Same applies vice versa.
Anyway, nice talking to you, hope what I said makes sense, because to me it makes a lot of sense in a senseless world. OK, enough cheesy parallel structure.
Peace in Christ.
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