I'm sorry Cowboy, but it's only your version of "God" that I reject. Just like you reject Zeus.

You're right, there are plenty of people even in this forum that have shown me God. Most of them have been Witches. A few have been pagans of other sorts. And of course there have been wise sages who have offered me the Eastern Mystical picture of God as well. As far as I can see Paganism is far closer to God that your egotistical picture of God could ever be.



That's contrary to what you biblical fables claim. They claim that your God is a jealous God who lusts to be worshiped and becomes jealous when he's not on center stage. It's all about HIM and his lust to be worshiped and obeyed.

Nothing in your picture is for US. Except perhaps if you believe that Jesus was the sacrificial lamb sent by God to pay for our sins, but you've rejected that notion. From what you've told me, the whole crucifixion was just a misfortune aside, when your God's real purpose was to simply try to communicate with us better than he had previously through the Torah.

And evidently your theory may very well be correct, because if you believe the entire cannon that you call the "Gospels", then Jesus' mission to communicate with us was indeed cut short since he had to then come back as a ghost to convert Saul in to Paul to finish saying what he evidently never had a chance to finishing saying.

Your poor God has all kinds of problems communicating with humans. He can't even make an appearance in person without getting nailed to a pole.

Like I say, have him drop by for a cup of tea, I have much to offer him that would save him a whole lot of headaches. He should have never instructed people to kill heathens in the first place. He can hardly blame them for having nailed him to a pole when he basically commandment them to kill anyone who disagrees with his original writings in the Torah.

What was he thinking?

Just have him drop by for tea. It can't hurt.

Tell him the Moon Goddess drops by for tea all the time, and She truly does have infinite wisdom. Tell him to drop the "macho act" and listen to what the women have to say for once. It'll do him good. Ask any Wiccan, they'll tell you that their Goddess doesn't have anywhere near the problems that the Hebrew male-chauvinistic God has.

If your God could just open his mind a little tiny bit he could learn a lot. He really needs to get over his jealous problems.

Nothing in your picture is for US. Except perhaps if you believe that Jesus was the sacrificial lamb sent by God to pay for our sins, but you've rejected that notion. From what you've told me, the whole crucifixion was just a misfortune aside, when your God's real purpose was to simply try to communicate with us better than he had previously through the Torah.

If your God could just open his mind a little tiny bit he could learn a lot. He really needs to get over his jealous problems.

I do not simply post in threads... I speak this also in life outside the net... Yep. I have been threatened with bodily harm, in one case with a baseball bat.

I have even been 'ejected' from a Roman Catholic church by a priest (who used some very unchristian language... Simply because I said I needed no one to 'interceed' between me and god not even Jesus.

I have been 'shouted' our of a Baptist 'bingo' parlor... The man running it (I have no idea what they call their priests) stated that 'Jesus would want you to dig deep into your wallets and buy tickest... Which cause me to say if jesus was their he would think 'money lenders' had once again over run the temple.

Muslim extremists are more quick to resort to violence... But Christian extremists do exist.

as far a 'verbal' violence and attempted intimidation in these threads. I have been called a lier. I have been repeatedly threatened by some version of 'hell' many times...

I even got called the anti-christ once in a thread...

Truth spoken elicits either a further research by the receiver... Or that receiver gets angry and responds with idioicy.

Cowboy wrote:

It's all for us. And why are you lying? I never said Jesus WASN'T the sacrificial lamb for God. I never once claimed contrary to that. And no God wasn't trying to communicate with us "better" per say. The coming of Jesus was the completion of the old testament, the tora. Jesus was here giving us the new covenant. That was his sole purpose on earth, to give us the new testament and complete the old... complete the tora. I honor the great gift Jesus gave us with every bit of my sole existence.

If you could just get off your high horse a little tiny bit you could learn a lot. You really need to get off your pride trip

Cowboy wrote:

I sincerely sympathize with you Adventure. These "Christians" should not have done as such. They were not acting upon how Jesus has instructed us to be. I apologize for their misbehavior.

I sincerely sympathize with you Adventure. These "Christians" should not have done as such. They were not acting upon how Jesus has instructed us to be. I apologize for their misbehavior.

Why are you so anxious to call people liars and use religion to cause animosity and division between people?

I'm not lying about anything. Either Jesus was sent to died on the cross to "pay" for the sins of man or he was not. You have previously refuted that notion claiming that it was humans who decided to crucify Jesus and it wasn't God's plan at all. '

Clearly you need to make up your mind about what your religion actually stands for. Either Jesus died to pay for our sins, or he didn't. And if he did, then that had to have been God's plan, it most certainly couldn't have been an accident that humans just decided to kill his messenger.

The idea that Jesus was the sacrificial lamb of God, and that God gave his only begotten son to PAY for your sins is the central theme of Christianity. You refuse to acknowledge this when confronted with it, and then when I acknowledge that you refute it, you call me a liar?

It's not my fault that you can't make up your mind what your religion actually stands for.



Before you try to remove the speck from your brother's eye you should try removing the log from your own.

You want to talk about a "pride trip", you really need to look in a mirror.

You claim to be the "Servant of God".

You claim to have absolute knowledge that God exists, you have no need for "faith".

You claim that only your interpretations of the Hebrew scriptures should be accepted as the "correct" interpretations of the "Word of God". In fact, you are so extremely adamant about this point that you renounce all other Christians who don't agree with your views as being "False Christians". You renounce the entire Christian Crusades as being "False Christianity", you renounce the Witch Burnings as being "False Christianity" as well. You completely reject the bulk of the history of the religion as having been nothing more than "False Interpretations of Christianity".

So all throughout history men who have dedicated their entire lives to this religion were all wrong according to you. Including Popes, Kings, Bishops, Monks, you name it. Cowboy has it right, and all those people had it all wrong.

And then you have the audacity to tell someone else that they are on a "pride trip" just because they point out the contradictions and utter absurdities in these religious fables?

At least I confess that all my views are indeed my own views from my own life's experience and study of world religions.

Sounds to me like if anyone is on a "pride trip" it's you in your self-conviction that you speak for God with absolute authority and no need to even have any faith since you claim to have absolute divine knowledge.

Until you can acknowledge the faith-based nature of spiritual views there truly isn't much sense in even conversing with you because as long as you are under the delusion that you hold absolute knowledge of God you'll forever be on a 'pride trip'.

You've got to recognize that spiritual beliefs are all faith-based. That must come first.

You claim that only your interpretations of the Hebrew scriptures should be accepted as the "correct" interpretations of the "Word of God". In fact, you are so extremely adamant about this point that you renounce all other Christians who don't agree with your views as being "False Christians". You renounce the entire Christian Crusades as being "False Christianity", you renounce the Witch Burnings as being "False Christianity" as well. You completely reject the bulk of the history of the religion as having been nothing more than "False Interpretations of Christianity"

That's a really good point right there Cowboy, and you should truly stop and consider this deeply.

What do you honestly stand for? The moral teachings of Jesus? Or Christianity as a dogmatic organized religion?

Because they are not one in the same thing.

I'll stand behind the moral teachings of Jesus (not Paul though!).

But that's a far cry from supporting the hatred and hypocrisy of the religion that stole the copyright on the teachings of Jesus.

You seem to be confusing Jesus with Christianity.

I just watched a lecture by Deepak Chopra last night where he pointed out that Jesus was not a "Christian". Christianity was a religion that came much later and grew from rumors about Jesus.

In fact, according to the Hebrews Jesus wasn't a "Jew" either (at least not in the religious sense of upholding the Torah as the Word of God). In other words Jesus didn't even support Judaism really.

So from a religious perspective Jesus was neither a Jew, nor a Christian.

In fact, if we exam the teachings that have been attributed to him via the gospels, it certainly appears that his spiritual views were far more in harmony with Buddhism than with Judaism.

So if you want to support the teachings of Jesus you should be supporting Buddhism, not Christianity.

What do you honestly stand for? The moral teachings of Jesus? Or Christianity as a dogmatic organized religion?

In fact, according to the Hebrews Jesus wasn't a "Jew" either (at least not in the religious sense of upholding the Torah as the Word of God). In other words Jesus didn't even support Judaism really.

Cowboy wrote:

I stand for the teachings of Jesus. I don't follow any dogmatic organized religion, i'm not baptist, i'm not mormon, i'm not catholic, i'm not pentacostal, i'm not anything of such. I'm a Christian. Now lets look at the root word of that, "Christ". Christian in the exact meaning means Christ Like. As in doing as Jesus would do when confronted with something in our lives.

Matthew 5:17
Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.

You're just kidding yourself it you think you aren't following an organized dogmatic religion.

Look at what you just! You just quoted from a specific dogma using chapter and verse numbers to illustrate your beliefs.



Here your quoted from an author named Matthew who wrote his set of rumors about what he thought Jesus stood for and might have said.

Moreover, many of your quotes come from books in the Bible that were written by Paul. Those ideals and teachings didn't even remotely come from Jesus.

All you're doing is supporting the dogma of the King James collection of fables. That's dogma.

In fact, it's impossible for you to actually follow the teachings of Jesus because Jesus never gave you that option. All that we know of the man named Jesus come from hearsay rumors from people like Paul who were indeed trying to create a "Dogmatic Church" using the rumors of Jesus as his backing and his own claims of having met the ghost of Jesus in person.

But that's not unusual for mortal men to make those kinds of claim. Look at you, you've said many times that you know the Bible is true. No need to have faith, you have some sort of divine knowledge over and above all other mortal men.

I ask you, where is Jesus quoted as having taught anyone to support the Torah as the verbatim word of God? I challenge you to find any such teaching in the Bible. On the contrary Jesus always referred to the Torah as "Your Law" when he spoke with the Pharisees whom he called hypocrites.

Matthew claims that Jesus said that he did not come to change the laws, but if that's true then Jesus lied, because he most certainly did change the laws.

In the Old Testament God commanded men to judge each other and stone sinners to death. Jesus taught just the opposite. Jesus taught that we should judge no one and he cleverly refuted the stoning of sinner to death by demanding that only those who are without sin cast the first stone.

So Jesus changed the laws.

In the Old Testament God instructed people to seek and eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth in revenge for hostile actions taken against them. Jesus taught just the opposite. Jesus taught to turn the other cheek and forgive those who trespass against us.

So Jesus changed the laws.

So if Jesus said that he did not come to change the laws, then he lied. Why bother lying about such things? If Jesus wanted to change the laws he should have just said so. Clearly there's something amiss in these stories.

This is why I personally don't believe everything that people like Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John wrote about Jesus. And I totally dismiss everything that was written by Paul which is about 75% of the whole New Testament.

When you support the biblical dogma as the "word of God" (which you most certainly do because you're quoting from it all the time), you are not merely following the teachings of Jesus, but instead you're supporting an entire organized religion (i.e. the King James Version of Christianity). That didn't even exist until 1600 years after the death of Jesus.

Also Jesus never prophecized that some guy name Paul would continue his teachings because his life would be cut short before he had enough time to say everything. That just isn't even included in these myths.

So there's really no reason whatsoever to hold the writings of Paul up as the "Teachings of Jesus", yet you do this all the time. In fact, you have to do it to support your bigotry against homosexual because if you refer only to direct quotes of Jesus you can't even support that kind of bigotry.

So you're not just supporting the teachings of Jesus, but you're also supporting the teachings of Paul as though they are also the teachings of Jesus.

In short, you're supporting a whole dogmatic religion which you have just claimed that you aren't doing.

You're just another "Bible Thumper" no different from any other Bible Thumper. You may claim to be different in certain ways because you may disagree with various conclusions and interpretations of other Bible Thumpers. But welcome to reality, because no two Bible Thumpers ever agree on everything.

So no, Cowboy, you're not teaching the teachings of "Jesus", all you're doing is supporting the dogmatic religion that grew out of those rumors.

In fact, it would be impossible for you to teach the teachings of "Jesus" because you weren't there and you have no clue what the man actually stood for, or what he was trying to actually say.

All you can do is Thump your Bible and pretend that you're different from all the other Bible Thumpers. But, trust me, they all have convinced themselves that their interpretations trumps yours, just as you have convinced yourself that your interpretations trump theirs.

You're no different from any other Bible Thumper.

You're just kidding yourself it you think you aren't following an organized dogmatic religion.

Look at what you just! You just quoted from a specific dogma using chapter and verse numbers to illustrate your beliefs.



Here your quoted from an author named Matthew who wrote his set of rumors about what he thought Jesus stood for and might have said.

Moreover, many of your quotes come from books in the Bible that were written by Paul. Those ideals and teachings didn't even remotely come from Jesus.

All you're doing is supporting the dogma of the King James collection of fables. That's dogma.

In fact, it's impossible for you to actually follow the teachings of Jesus because Jesus never gave you that option. All that we know of the man named Jesus come from hearsay rumors from people like Paul who were indeed trying to create a "Dogmatic Church" using the rumors of Jesus as his backing and his own claims of having met the ghost of Jesus in person.

But that's not unusual for mortal men to make those kinds of claim. Look at you, you've said many times that you know the Bible is true. No need to have faith, you have some sort of divine knowledge over and above all other mortal men.

I ask you, where is Jesus quoted as having taught anyone to support the Torah as the verbatim word of God? I challenge you to find any such teaching in the Bible. On the contrary Jesus always referred to the Torah as "Your Law" when he spoke with the Pharisees whom he called hypocrites.

Matthew claims that Jesus said that he did not come to change the laws, but if that's true then Jesus lied, because he most certainly did change the laws.

In the Old Testament God commanded men to judge each other and stone sinners to death. Jesus taught just the opposite. Jesus taught that we should judge no one and he cleverly refuted the stoning of sinner to death by demanding that only those who are without sin cast the first stone.

So Jesus changed the laws.

In the Old Testament God instructed people to seek and eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth in revenge for hostile actions taken against them. Jesus taught just the opposite. Jesus taught to turn the other cheek and forgive those who trespass against us.

So Jesus changed the laws.

So if Jesus said that he did not come to change the laws, then he lied. Why bother lying about such things? If Jesus wanted to change the laws he should have just said so. Clearly there's something amiss in these stories.

This is why I personally don't believe everything that people like Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John wrote about Jesus. And I totally dismiss everything that was written by Paul which is about 75% of the whole New Testament.

When you support the biblical dogma as the "word of God" (which you most certainly do because you're quoting from it all the time), you are not merely following the teachings of Jesus, but instead you're supporting an entire organized religion (i.e. the King James Version of Christianity). That didn't even exist until 1600 years after the death of Jesus.

Also Jesus never prophecized that some guy name Paul would continue his teachings because his life would be cut short before he had enough time to say everything. That just isn't even included in these myths.

So there's really no reason whatsoever to hold the writings of Paul up as the "Teachings of Jesus", yet you do this all the time. In fact, you have to do it to support your bigotry against homosexual because if you refer only to direct quotes of Jesus you can't even support that kind of bigotry.

So you're not just supporting the teachings of Jesus, but you're also supporting the teachings of Paul as though they are also the teachings of Jesus.

In short, you're supporting a whole dogmatic religion which you have just claimed that you aren't doing.

You're just another "Bible Thumper" no different from any other Bible Thumper. You may claim to be different in certain ways because you may disagree with various conclusions and interpretations of other Bible Thumpers. But welcome to reality, because no two Bible Thumpers ever agree on everything.

So no, Cowboy, you're not teaching the teachings of "Jesus", all you're doing is supporting the dogmatic religion that grew out of those rumors.

In fact, it would be impossible for you to teach the teachings of "Jesus" because you weren't there and you have no clue what the man actually stood for, or what he was trying to actually say.

All you can do is Thump your Bible and pretend that you're different from all the other Bible Thumpers. But, trust me, they all have convinced themselves that their interpretations trumps yours, just as you have convinced yourself that your interpretations trump theirs.

You're no different from any other Bible Thumper.

All you can do is Thump your Bible and pretend that you're different from all the other Bible Thumpers. But, trust me, they all have convinced themselves that their interpretations trumps yours, just as you have convinced yourself that your interpretations trump theirs.

You're right Abra :o. I think we should throw out everything that we call "history". All the history books, every document because EVERY BIT of it is hearsay rumors. We weren't there to see if this stuff actually happened, so in turn it's just like the things in the bible. Glad you've given me this revolution man. Everything we know today that was told to us about yesterday is ALL garbage, you're brilliant man, truly brilliant.

Actually some of that isn't that far off, a lot of our history has been tampered with, and what we know history to be isn't neccessarily the case. But that's another discussion.

So with that, why does one give what is considered "history" more credit then what is in the bible? Is there some favoritism in there? What one doesn't wishes to not be true and what one wishes to be true?

There's just as much favoritism going the other way too you realize, if not more.

Cowboy wrote:

You're right Abra :o. I think we should throw out everything that we call "history". All the history books, every document because EVERY BIT of it is hearsay rumors. We weren't there to see if this stuff actually happened, so in turn it's just like the things in the bible. Glad you've given me this revolution man. Everything we know today that was told to us about yesterday is ALL garbage, you're brilliant man, truly brilliant.

Cowboy wrote:

Not exactly. When taught through school in history class there wasn't certain parts of the history they taught that I refused because I didn't think it was true. I've given quite a bit of "religions" possibility of being true. Even down to studying greek mythology. Not one of them touched my heart and soul but Christianity. When I read out of the bible I feel as if it's taken me to a different place, like i'm not in my living room anymore. All other things i've read weather it be a story out of a book, history, or anything else I just felt like I was reading just that.... a book. The bible is alive just as you and I. The paper doesn't make it alive, the cover doesn't make it alive. But the living message inside of it is just that, alive.

That good!

You are personally drawn to the biblical stories. There's nothing wrong with that. They touch you on a deeply emotional and intuitive level, and you apparently agree with all the actions and behavior of the God that is being described. In your mind you can justify, explain, and accept everything that is in these stories.

That's what religion is supposed to be!

In fact, this is what Wicca teaches. Go to what calls to you!

If the biblical stories call to you then they are right for you.

Where you lose it, is when you try to push these stories onto everyone else by accepting and believing the tenet that anyone who doesn't accept the Bible is rejecting God.

IMHO, this is one of the saddest things about the biblical fables. It's truly a shame that they are based on a jealous God and take the stance that only those who embrace the biblical story will be accepted by God.

You need to realize also that this is the same stance taken by Judaism and Islam as well, they too are based on a jealous God, and thus it's important to worship their doctrines as the "word of this very same God".

So now the world has at least three major religions at each others throats because they are all based on the very same jealous God, yet they all have different doctrines that they associate with the "WORD" of this single jealous God.

It's really the jealous God thing that truly spoils the whole thing.

Also there's nothing wrong with you saying that you find the story to be emotionally and intuitively moving, and that you personally feel that it simply must be true, and this is why you have such deep faith in it.

There's nothing wrong with any of that.

But when you start "arguing" that it is indeed the absolute true word of God and that you "know" this to be true, and you're constantly putting down all other religious beliefs and faiths, save for your "ONE TRUE FAITH", then it becomes nothing more than a source of ugliness and hatred toward anyone who doesn't agree with it.

Just say it's "RIGHT FOR YOU", and quite trying to shove it down the throats of others as the "ABSOLUTE CONFIRMED WORD OF GOD".

That's when it loses any beauty it might potentially have and becomes extremely ugly and obnoxious.

You need to learn to preach it from a perspective of JOY and FAITH, and not try to beat it down the throats of others by demanding that you know for certain that it's true.

But when you start "arguing" that it is indeed the absolute true word of God and that you "know" this to be true, and you're constantly putting down all other religious beliefs and faiths, save for your "ONE TRUE FAITH", then it becomes nothing more than a source of ugliness and hatred toward anyone who doesn't agree with it

Cowboy wrote:

Now you're just trying to give Christianity a bad name. ALL religions, I don't care if it's Buddhism, Catholicism, atheism, or any other belief. They ALL claim to be THE WORD of God and or the truth, if that particular religion doesn't have a "god(s)" So what you're saying is ALL beliefs in this area are ugly, hatred. Weather it's mysticism, Christianity, Wicca, and or any other belief.

No, this isn't true at all.

Buddhism doesn't claim to be the "Word of God".

It certainly doesn't contain an element of jealously claiming that if you fail to embrace Buddhism God won't like you.

Catholicism IS Christianity. Protestants are the people who protested against the Church (the Body of Christ).

It's only Protestant arrogance that has them renouncing Catholicism as not being "True Christianity".

Wicca also doesn't claim to be the "Word of God". And it also doesn't claim that God will not like you if you fail to become a Wiccan.

So you're knowledge of other religious and spiritual views is extremely lacking.

Only the Abrahamic religions that are based on the Old Testament fables hold out God to be a jealous God, and claim that only their texts represent the "Word of God".

You're totally mistaken if you are under the belief that this kind of jealous exclusion of non-believers is fundamental to all spiritual and religious beliefs. It simply isn't true.

And it's most certainly not true of Atheism.

How could it be true of atheism? Atheist don't even recognize the existence of a God, how could they claim to have the "Word of God".

Nope, sorry Cowboy, but once again you're in denial of the very dogma that you support. You support a jealous-based religious dogma that renounces all those who refuse to accept it as being heathens who have voluntarily used their free will choice to knowingly turn away from God. They are guilty of the only unforgivable sin actually. Blaspheme of the Bible by renouncing it and in denial that Jesus was "The only begotten son of God" who was sacrificed to pay for their sins.

Only the Abrahamic religions hold out the jealous God thing, and Christianity drives the concept home with Jesus himself. To deny that Jesus is LORD is to reject God, according to most Christian evangelists and proselytizers.

Jesus is the "ONLY WAY" to God, deny Jesus and you deny God.

Period amen.

This all comes from the basic fundamental theme that the Biblical God is a jealous God who demands that no other Gods be placed before him (not even the absence of any God!) Even atheists are deemed to have "rejected" this God if they don't acknowledge this religion.

Buddhism and Wicca don't even remotely make any such claims or accusations about non-believers of Buddhism or Wicca. Not even close.