Pope: Gayness as dangerous as the rainforest being destroyed.

[Comrade Tovya]

appolose said:

Comrade Tovya said:

appolose said:

 

 

 

Okay, you kind of confused me by writing your responses in my quote, but I will try and break it down if I can...

A) I think we are still not seeing eye-to-eye on something.  I'm not talking about what makes a man righteous, I'm saying simply that the Bible does not say, "When you die, and if you are righteous, you will go to heaven"

That's popular belief only, and is not scripturally founded.  The Catholic Church started this doctrinal belief in going to heaven, 1700-years ago... it's just not Biblically founded.

B) Back to my original point... it's one of the biggest reasons why Christians have such a tough time prostelitizing Jews with any success.  The simple belief that a servant of God (Satan) would have the ability to make war on a being that omnipotent and all-powerful is just absurd.  Satan would have no more power to make war on God than myself.  Both us and angels are little more than fleas on a dog in comparrison.  The dog scatches, and we fall off, because we are powerless before an almighty being. 

And I know this a mere human who has never been before the almighty presence of the supreme being... therefore an angelic being who spends his entire existence before his power would no this even more than I.  Even the thought of "making war on God" is just silly.  It's not possible, and it quite comical really.

C) And God is quite specific about not being able to be within the presence of evil. Just one example is when God walked with Moses on Mt. Sinai.  Only he was considered righteousness enough to be before God... not even Aaron was given that honor, and he was the Lord's own priest.  Still, only Moses was considered righteous enough to be in the presence of God.  And if Satan really is this evil being, he would be standing before God (I'm pretty sure Aaron was a little bit more righteous than the Christian version of Satan)

D) And you are wrong when it comes to righteousness as well.  Christianity teaches that all men are "born into sin" and need attonement to be considered righteous before God.  This is not what God originally said.. once again, this is another fabricated doctrine of the original Church.

The Tanach teaches us that God doesn't change... he is the same from the beginning to the end.  Mankind never needed a "new" covenant to replace the original one God made with man (at Sinai for Jews, and post-flood for goyim) because the original plan for mankinds redemption has always been good enough.  the Jewish scripture is very specific when it says that God is not a man that he would change his mind, nor a breaker of promises.  He gave each of us guidelines of righteousness long for Jesus walked the Earth, and those guidelines were promised to be such forever.  If that is not true, than he is a liar, and then there is no God.

And as for your last point that the god-man Jesus sacrificed himself, and that God thought that was okay, is just wrong.  The very act of human sacrifice is an abomination to God (abomination=just about as bad as it gets).

And God only expects us to follow rules that keep us pure and holy... therefore, since God himself is pure and holy, he wouldn't break that rule either, otherwise, he himself would no longer be without blemish. 

Human sacrifice is just wrong no matter how you paint it... it always has been an abomination and always will be.

A) It can be directly inferred that they will.  It says faith makes you righteous, and if you die with faith, then you must also die with righteousness.  Therefore, the righteous will go to heaven.

B) That assumes that Satan actually knew about God's omnipotence.  While it seems obvious that he would know, there is no way to tell how things worked in the spiritual realm.  Satan could have rebelled without knowing that God could defeat him.  Also, Satan could have known but done it anyway; perahps he thought God wouldn't resist (whatever kind of "war" it was).  These are not absurd suggestions; we would know nothing about how the spiritual realm works, so we can't really make large assumptions about it.

C) Actually, that's an example of evil not being in the presence of God, not the other way around.  Of course, that doesn't solve the problem, but just clarifies it.  Anyways, you assume that this must be a universal standard, and that this is a standard, because: 1. It merely says Aaron wasn't righteous enough to see God, not why he had to be righteous.  For example, perhaps unrighteous humans are killed by God's presence (which could happen).  Also it doesn't say all evil couldn't be in God's presence, just not the semi-righteous Aaron.

D) Some parts of Christianity do indeed teach that men are born sinners; others don't.  Calvinism teaches the former.  I, an Arminian, believe the latter.  Whatever the answer is, however, we both agree that "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" (Romans something).  As such, all need redemption.  I would argue that the Christian doctrine of salvation does not necessarily count as a new covenant, it's actually what was promised all along (and I'll just leave it at that, because that would take forever to exegete), so nothing may be replace in that sense.

E) That directly contradicts the verse about laying down ones own life, though.  The connotation of the human-sacrifice verse is strictly referring to one sacrificing another (I will posit).  Also, God doesn't necessarily submit to the rules he gives out; some are merely commands for our well being, so he would not need to heed them.  He can even kill us indiscriminately (I think), and that would be fine because everything is His, and He only told that law to us, not himself (I'm not ssaying that God can do what he calls abominations, just clarifying God and law (and I'm not saying that all human sacrifice is an abomination, just one against the other, so God can do it)).

 

A) I agree with a lot of what you say, but like I said, the Bible doesn't say that "heaven" is the desitination of the righteous.  It never says that one time... that's one of the funny things to me really.  The protestant churches broke off from the mother church (Catholic Church) but they continue to repeat the same jargon that was passed at the Catholic, "Counicl of Nicea".  It's not Biblically founded that the desitination of the righteous is Heaven.  It's just popular belief.

B) Now I agree with the assumption that the spiritual is unbeknownst to us... but to say that a being whose sole purpose for creation (the service of God) could actually make the concious choice to rebel against him is just not logical.  I think we will just have to agree to disagree on this one... there's just no way that I'll ever believe that angels made war on God, it's just not logical.

C) Right, right, but you are missing my very small and simple point.  Forget everything else for just a moment.  Do you believe that Aaron, or Satan is more righteous according to your Christian ideology.  I think it goes without saying that Aaron is more revered than the "evil" Satan... Therefore, if the "semi" righteous Aaron is unfit to be in the presence of God, then the complete opposite of righteousness, the Christian version of Satan, certainly could not stand before the almighty.  If Satan is even a little bit righteous (therefore allowing his presence in heaven, and standing before God) then there is no way this guy made war on God. 

D)  The Bible, prior to J.C. walking on the Earth, never once stated that men were born into sin... once again, this false doctrine was fabricated by the Council of Nicea.  Prior to that meeting, the concept of "original sin" didn't exist.  Moses walked with God before he even performed the sacfifices of attonement, and God saw that he was still righteous.  Sacrifice has never been a rock hard requirement for righteousness.  Please don't ask me to explain the original meaning of the Temple sacrifices, because that a 35-page lecture in itself.  Just believe me when I say as a guy who was raised in a Torah observant home that I know a thing or two about it.

E) I know where you are going with this, but it doesn't work.  According to the Christian Bible, J.C. clearly states (according to Matthew, Mark, Luke, & John) that he is a human sacrifice to make "blood attonement" on the "alter" for the sins of mankind.  That's not the same thing as jumping in front of a bullet to save a mans life... that is honorable.  But God more than once punished the Israelites for sacrificing their children for attonement.  He said it was a pagan and detestible practise... and "abomination".