well i'll have to look all the verses up but it says he made some for destruction and some for salvation most for destruction it seems huh?

Yeah I think if you are only utilizing the bible and the very same men who set out to proliferate this new religion, eh, probably not going to be the best resource.

Besides do we really require the re-hashing of the "no false gods before me" rhetoric? Thats all you will find in the bible. That alone should be indicative that something else existed. Why worry about "false gods/Goddeses unless there were in fact FALSE GODS and GODDESSES?

well for sure the bible even names them in many cases

Well it is just simple common sense. If experience does not teach you anything or add anything to your life then you are not changing or learning. We are learning programs. We change and adjust our programing with new input and experience.

If I were the same person now as I was when I was 19 years old or 10 years old or 5 years old people would call me retarded.

I can't conceive of anyone not coming to this same conclusion if they were to think about it. If you want me to compare it to something, then compare it to a robot that does not have a learning program installed. It would be the same, react the same, act the same, and function the same today as it was when it was first created 50 years ago.. as long as it was maintained in operational order.

jb

Isaiah 45:7
I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.


Job, Chapter 25

2 "Dominion and fear are with God; he makes peace in his high heaven. 3 Is there any number to his armies? Upon whom does his light not arise? 4 How then can man be righteous before God? How can he who is born of woman be clean? 5 Behold, even the moon is not bright and the stars are not clean in his sight; 6 how much less man, who is a maggot, and the son of man, who is a worm!"

Job, Chapter 12:

13 "With God are wisdom and might; he has counsel and understanding. 14 If he tears down, none can rebuild; if he shuts a man in, none can open. 15 If he withholds the waters, they dry up; if he sends them out, they overwhelm the land. 16 With him are strength and wisdom; the deceived and the deceiver are his. 17 He leads counselors away stripped, and judges he makes fools. 18 He looses the bonds of kings, and binds a waistcloth on their loins. 19 He leads priests away stripped, and overthrows the mighty. 20 He deprives of speech those who are trusted, and takes away the discernment of the elders. 21 He pours contempt on princes, and looses the belt of the strong. 22 He uncovers the deeps out of darkness, and brings deep darkness to light. 23 He makes nations great, and he destroys them: he enlarges nations, and leads them away. 24 He takes away understanding from the chiefs of the people of the earth, and makes them wander in a pathless waste. 25 They grope in the dark without light; and he makes them stagger like a drunken man.

Job, Chapter 4:

17 'Can mortal man be righteous before God? Can a man be pure before his Maker? 18 Even in his servants he puts no trust, and his angels he charges with error; 19 how much more those who dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust, who are crushed before the moth. 20 Between morning and evening they are destroyed; they perish for ever without any regarding it. 21 If their tent-cord is plucked up within them, do they not die, and that without wisdom?'

Who is he that can speak, and it happens, when the Lord command it not? 37
Out of the mouth of the Most High proceedeth not both evil and good? 38

Exodus 32:14...

And the LORD repented of the evil which he thought to do unto his people.

Amos 3:6...

6 Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid? shall there be evil in a city, and the LORD has not done it?

response on another thread by draco:

the word you quote as "evil" in Isaiah 45:7 is actually translated as "calamity". this is not the same as moral evil. most people do not desire moral evil, but often (unknowingly)bring calamity upon themselves.
the other verses you quoted do not say that moral evil comes from God either. calamity,on the other hand,was definitely what befell Job.

my response to the above:

you don't consider calamity to be "moral evil"? Well your partly right about the word - it is in strong's <07451> the word ra-rah it is used as evil 442 times through out the OT. the diaglott, LXX, Douay's, Young's tranlation. Stephanus, KJAV, and all the other older bibles i have access to translate it to say "EVIL" it is used here and in genesis and lamentations and elsewhere and is all the same Hebrew word.

As a noun it is used to describe evil, distress, misery,injury and lastly calamity. But if you cant see they all are EVIL actions then there is something wrong.

Because the newer bibles have used "calamity" just shows me that they will do whatever is necessary to keep there god holy and pure as the driven snow. It's not like this is some "new revelation" of the various words that it can refer to, it's man's attempting to make it so that he can cover gods ASSS! god don't need no help - gods fugged up enough, let him cover his own asss.

It's just like when they changed the word "replenish" to >fill< which makes no sense at all - he says to Adam and eve and replenish the earth meaning to RE-FILL or replenish or re-populate, and then now it's supposed to mean fill - ain't buying it!

The exact same word is used in the case of god telling Noah to replenish the earth - and it can mean no other than to refill re-populate since everyone was drowned/killed by the flood!!

I'm sure this will continue till they have changed every contentious thing that's found buy others to debate and argue over as has been done for thousands of years now - good luck with that.

to Draco 7 - thnx for this info - i will use it in other post for sure.


Edited by tribo on Fri 10/17/08 11:36 PM

While you may see this as an example of what you are refering to - you are sighting this passage to support a pretext. It is not the context of scripture that God "creates" evil. Also - the text is setting up the extreme of opposites to illustrate a point. The opposite you want this to refer to is "good" - however the text states "peace". Not the same thing. In the NIV the text is translated "I bring prosperity and create disaster". In light of what Isaiah is writing about - this understanding is not that to which you are refering to in your OP.

In order to get an accurate picture to you OP - one should study out the idea of Good and evil, and how these terms are referenced or related to God - to see if in fact this passage is refering to God creating evil. To fully satisfy your interpreteation, shouldn't the passage say "I created evil"? For that is what you are wanting me to interpret it as saying. I can't agree with your conclusion on the interpretation of this passage supporting your argument that this is a biblical concept - it only supports your pretext.

However - for the sake of argument - I will return to my former post of accepting for the moment that evil is something that exists beyond a lack of rightiousness, and re-introduce the idea of your posturing some alternative action on God's part that would have eliminated man's ability to be evil, without having to give up freedom of choice. Since - if I'm not mistaken, you find that he is a fool and lacks in wisdom for having allowed this into creation in the first place.

Penn & teller are magicians - not comedians, yet they continue to attempt to be such. Carlin was not a comedian - he was a satirist. I just didn't find his idea of "humor" to be funny. Some things were - but he let his politics get in the way of his telent. And by the way - I felt the same way about Penn & Teller and Carlin when I was an atheist - so your presumption that my being a christain is the basis for this belief is a false. You shouldn't make assumptions when you don't know the facts.

Jeannie;

Your post is true only because you refuse to accept the generally accepted syntax for the word "sin". It is an accepted term used by the religious and irreligious alike, and when the term is used it is generally understood what is meant. Stop being so "legalistic" and respond to what is being referenced. You're starting to sound like a "fundie".

When taken out of context - you are correct.

However, Tribo is speaking of biblical concepts of "evil" here - and is quite aware of what I am refering to when I say that evil is the falling short of being rightious. I was not refering to the word in any other way other than the biblical idea of rightiousness - as it is used to refer to Abraham, or Jesus.

I like that one. I'll have to remember it.

As to the angels (or more accurately demons for the sake of our discussion) it seems, from scripture - that they serve a purpose, as it were, in the plan of God - and that purpose is to effect a separation of man from God. Though it is really unclear that had He chosen to destroy the demons that man would still not chose to commit unrightious acts. We know that hell was created for the demons - but from Revelation we also know that they are to play a major part in the final days. I wouldn't attempt to presume that I am in full understanding of the why of this - just the what of it.

As to the authorship of the bible, I've given more than idol thought to this, and have heard the argument from both sides on the validity of inspiration - and why certain books are were accepted into cannon while others were not. I will agree with you on there having been an agenda at the council of nicea - though I think it was a fairly worthy one. If a particular "book" - say one of Enoch as compared to Jude, did not somehow aline itself with the consistant theme of all of the books of scripture, (that of the coming of Christ - or his having arrived), it was not included in cannon. However - I think it is a particular fallacy of man's to consider that one should only read the bible as it exists out of the council of Nicea. I would not suggest that you not read Enoch because they didn't include it in cannon. But by the same token - I would strongly suggest that if something were written in Enoch (which admittedly I have not read) that did not aline itself with exegesis from the other books of the bible - then I would be reluctant to accept it as inspired - and I would not reference it as a point of contradiction to disprove those books whih are considered inspired. I do agree with you on the gnostic books though - because they are inconsistent with historical christian concepts, and we have the letters of John to attest to their inconsistancies with what Jesus taught. As to the Revelation of Peter - if I'm not mistaken, it is believed to have been written some two hundred years after Peter was crucified. That would not stop me from reading it though. (which admittedly, I have not read this either).

I think there is merit to the passages of scripture that state that it is the Holy spirit who leads one to the truth (that being the testimony of Jesus), so for one who is spirit filled, discernment should not be an issue in reading any of the books that are not considered cannon. If only to get a better sense of history, and the traditions of the time. I may be wrong in this - but I sense that a difficulty you are having is in the agenda of those who determined what should be included in the bible, rather than those who acctually wrote it. I see no logic in assuming that Matthew, Mark, Luke or John maintained an agenda in writting their accounts. There's just no logical reason for thnking they would have chosen to do this, as it represented a threat on their lives to merely aline themselves with the sect in the first place. Why would they do that in order to propigate a myth? Also - the background of each of these men, and their motivation for the accounts that they gave are not related. It isn't even clear that Luke had ever even met John.
Then there's Paul. What would have caused him to go from persecuting the new sect to being it's most verbose supporter. And to the Gentiles no less! He was after all a Pharasee. What reason would any of these authors have for creating and continuing a myth?

I think it is irrelivant that the council of Nicea determined which books are cannon, and which are not. Eventually - I'll read them all. I find that there is more than enough information to absorb in the New Testament alone, and am fairly certain that I will not live long enough to have gleaned all there is to offer in just the four gospels themselves. I find that I could spend the rest of my days just reading the Proverbs and Ecclesiates and still wouldn't get it all absorbed. The reason I say this is that it is more than just reading these things for understanding - but they come into play so much more vividly in how they are applied. When I was first learning how to play bridge, I read all of the books on bidding and play, and understood them as written - but I did not master the game until I started playing it and appled what I had read. And there are only 52 cards to know in that game. However, the possibilities and applications of them are vertually infinite. It stands as a valid analogy in my mind to understanding scripture and applying it. And having gone through the process with something i mastered - helped reason out what was necessary in dealing with the bible. In taking this approach - inspiration of scripture no longer seems like a far fetched assertion. But that is my experience with the bible.

I will say this though - I am not unfamiliar with the doubts that you express. I felt the same way about the bible for many years. But I had someone tell me once - that if I had these doubts, I should just ask God to clarify them for me as I read the scripture - and if He was who He said He is, He would open my minds eye to understanding the basis of the doubt, and if it was even worth holding onto them. That seemed a pretty fair and reasonable approach. For me - it worked. It seems to me - to attempt to read scripture in any other way is a fruitless endeavor - for one is certainly not going to fool God by attempting to read scripture with the intention of disproving it and thinking they are going to understand it at the same time. That presumption is a total disreguard for God, and is certainly mocking Him. It is mere folly to think that one could attempt to do this and come out on the end of it with understanding the intent and spirit of scripture. All one is left with in this circumstance is confusion and lack of understanding, because - though some passages may support their pretext's other's will stand in direct contradiction - so they are left with having to reject a great percentage of what they're reading, without the opportunity to even finish it - let alone see how it all plays out. Then all they are left with is the opinions of what other's have of the bible, rather than one dirived from experiencing it. And isn't that even worse than rejecting those who claim to have authored it through inspiriation as opposed to accepting the conclusions of those who have formuated opinions about it who are not?

Coffee;

I don't think Tribo is implying the blame is on God - just the responsibility of it's existance. To that means, I believe he is right. However, being resposibile for the existance of something does not hold one accountable to the outcome of it's application.

Well for one thing - none of the disciples obtained power, they maintained control over no one, and they certainly did not accumulate wealth.
As a matter of record - they were imprisoned, stoned, fed to lions, and crucified for their "agenda". Kind of underminds your hypothesis of those idea's.

All of the civilizations who existed prior to them. I would wager a guess they all died.

Eljay, some Christians were indeed thrown to the lions but not nearly the number that they would have us believe. Not all of them were Christians. The vast majority put to death by the Romans were captives and that could have been anyone. And most of them were considered criminals because of desecration of temples, not just because they were Christians.

And "they all died" is not an answer.

In Isaac Asimov's book about the Bible, he explains that, in those days, many people believed every small area of land had its own god. It was a common practice, when moving into a new area, to throw away one's old idols from the previous place, and to get new ones depicting the new local gods.

Asimov maintains that the prohibition against worshipping other gods stems from this belief.

That would sound like a plausible or possible explanation. Mainly what I am irritated with is the idea that nothing really existed prior to Christianity which is clearly indicative of someone who is simply in denial. In fact not all Christians believe that to be the case and it seems to be an assertion entertained primarily by the proponents of the "Young Earth" theory.

Man's interpretation of the biblical idea of righteousness.

Is it possible that there may be room for interpretation from perspectives other than Christian?

...Or is this club so exclusive that the book is closed?