Does a Christian embrace his humanity?

@kevcvs57

Read my post again I’m saying it’s hard to bbbelieve that any god figure would go to all the trouble of creation just in order to have a few billion manufactured entities adore it whilst adhering to a manual of instruction.

I understood it well the first time.
I think this you raise is a another issue.

By doing away with God you don't do away with a "manual".
You just claim another author/s of one.
And I would say each alternative one proposing a manual for man is quite proud.

This is an issue of "I don't like the Creator you propose".
This is " I would prefer another Manual author less egotistical"

That is of course presupposing that God is egotistical to tell us what makes us work properly and what doesn't.

But before I adopt the presupposition God is egotistical, I ask you a more basic question. From where do you derive a notion that humans are any higher or more unique then cockroaches ? And if you don't have such a thought then say so.

Remember I’m agnostic about the existence of God or gods I’m saying your god as presented by you is a ridiculous construct. It’s only your arrogance that causes you to be offended on your constructs behalf.

I will remember it then from this point.

Now my being offended could be just another dodge and excuse from you, evading my question. Do you think human beings have some bestowed dignity above the hyaena or the orangutan ?

If so, why is that not arbitrary bias toward your own species?
And if you feel we are all on the same level of "dignity" by existence - then say so.

You do that clearly for me and I'll prepare to discuss your "manual" problems or " No like a God wanting worship" problem.

As a preliminary I would say there IS no command to worship God the Creator to Adam and Eve immediately after their creation. There is no command to do hardly anything except to [for his own good] watch what he EAT.

Do you see in early Genesis God commanding worship ? Where?

As I read the Bible I see the realism of worshipping God ONLY after man is deceived to waste his devotion on a lying, slandering, deceiving, God & man hating enemy of truth. Then after THAT train wreck of allowing sin and death into man's being do I see a need to turn away from the destroying self worship which has brought all heart ache to the world back to REALISM "It is He [God] who has made us and not we ourselves."

Apparently kevcvs57 is bothered that God has a manual that demands worship.

Read Genesis 1 and 2 and there is no command I can see of God demanding worship of the first man and woman created.

He told Adam to tend to the garden Paradise and guard and keep it.
I see no command that he worship God.

I see God warn Adam that eating the forbidden tree of the knowledge of good and evil will cause him to DIE. That is God's responsibility to warn Adam.
Even there it is just "Watch what you eat". I see no demand of worship of God.

The initial instructions of God were to guard the lovely paridise setting he was placed in, name the other animals, multiply and replenish the earth, and not to eat of a certain tree.

He was placed before something mysteriously called "the tree of life" . He was not commanded even to eat of it. It seemed a forgone conclusion that it was to man's benefit to partake of a "tree of life".

One life and death command - do not eat of "the tree of the knowledge of good and evil". For eating of that no matter how tempting, how attractive, how inviting, would lead to his dying.

Somebody point out to me the instructions for man to worship God in Genesis 1 and 2.

When man ate the forbidden tree God came to man asking him where he was. He came wanting pleasant fellowship and communion with him as before.
No worship there either - only companionship.

Now to be fair, after sin and death infested and corrupted man ruining him and causing corruption to ravish him and his desendents, ok, THEN we have God coming in to tell man how to worship God.

kevcvs57 resents this as some kind of arrogance of egotism on God's part and on those who want out from sin and death.

@sonship said
@kevcvs57

Read my post again I’m saying it’s hard to bbbelieve that any god figure would go to all the trouble of creation just in order to have a few billion manufactured entities adore it whilst adhering to a manual of instruction.

I understood it well the first time.
I think this you raise is a another issue.

By doing away with God you d ...[text shortened]... s are any higher or more unique then cockroaches ? And if you don't have such a thought then say so.

No I don’t claim another authority other than our innate social nature which incorporates all the social skills required for a social existence. None of us are perfect social entities hence there is no such thing as the perfect society but there is absolutely no requirement for a manual handed down from above and the idea that parts of the manual are geared towards pleasing or not displeasing the manufacturer is why I instinctively feel that dogma based spiritual belief systems are false.

@sonship said

Remember I’m agnostic about the existence of God or gods I’m saying your god as presented by you is a ridiculous construct. It’s only your arrogance that causes you to be offended on your constructs behalf.

I will remember it then from this point.

Now my being offended could be just another dodge and excuse from you, evading my question. Do yo ...[text shortened]... to the world back to REALISM "It is He [God] who has made us and not we ourselves."

Do you see in early Genesis God commanding worship ? Where? We see that Cain (the first human born), we see that he murdered his brother Abel because he became jealous, when God was pleased with Abel's worship and sacrifice more than his own.
In Genesis it says that God walked with Adam and Eve often in the Garden of Eden.

There is no command to do hardly anything except to [for his own good] watch what he EAT.
You are wrong here. [Genesis 2:15 NKJV] 15 "Then the LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it."

@KingDavid403

We see that Cain (the first human born), we see that he murdered his brother Abel because he became jealous, when God was pleased with Abel's worship and sacrifice more than his own.
In Genesis it says that God walked with Adam and Eve often in the Garden of Eden.

If you notice my post a little more carefully, I specified Genesis chapters 1 and 2. Those chapters are the original arrangement for humanity upon creation. Cain and Abel are in chapter four..

Maybe you didn't notice. Or maybe I was editing before you noticed.

Now to be fair, after sin and death infested and corrupted man ruining him and causing corruption to ravish him and his descendants, ok, THEN we have God coming in to tell man how to worship God.

Cain and Abel are AFTER the fall of the initial parents of all mankind.
This is now REMDIAL instructions that man might be reconciled to God from whom he has been terribly estranged and alienated.

@kevcvs57

No I don’t claim another authority other than our innate social nature which incorporates all the social skills required for a social existence.

But is this the answer to the question of whether or not there is innate dignity of humans over cockroaches?

Let me ask you this way. Is Evolution marching towards a higher and higher level of dignity - mankind being the known top of the ladder ?

Or does Evolution randomly place all of the living things on one level with none more valuable and none less valuable ? That is a binary question I think.

None of us are perfect social entities hence there is no such thing as the perfect society but there is absolutely no requirement for a manual handed down from above and the idea that parts of the manual are geared towards pleasing or not displeasing the manufacturer is why I instinctively feel that dogma based spiritual belief systems are false.

It seems that you have only substituted in a respective "manuals" produced by
imperfect societies with those requirements. Aren't they "handed down" as well ?

Ie, "We don't need God's manual. Instead there are manuals with requirements from various imperfect societies." So there is a manual for Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, Expansionist United States, Colonizing England, etc. Go against any one of those manual's requirements and you are in trouble just as much.

So tell me then, On what right did the other societies besides Hitler's Germany have authority to pass judgment on the genocide of Nazism ? Weren't the Brown Shirts and the Storm Troopers and German citizens simply following the requirements of their society's manual ?

What basis did the other societies, the one's winning the Second World War, have to collectively decide Hitler's Germany had a wrong manual ?

Wasn't the implication that there was SOME " innate" transcendent authority above ALL societies which made the Nazi requirements "Crimes against Humanity" in an overall universal sense? Did not the societies appeal to the authority of requirements transcending all societies?

Why, the Nazis were just going by Darwinian Survival of the Fittest to weed out weaker races that their supreme race be free to advance to the fullest extent without interference.

@sonship said
@kevcvs57

No I don’t claim another authority other than our innate social nature which incorporates all the social skills required for a social existence.

But is this the answer to the question of whether or not there is innate dignity of humans over cockroaches?

Let me ask you this way. Is Evolution marching towards a higher and higher l ...[text shortened]... weaker races that their supreme race be free to advance to the fullest extent without interference.

I believe Evolution has given us the ability for abstract thought and the concepts of dignity and perfection stem from that ability. Wether we choose to indulge or aspire to attain the realisation of those concepts is a personal choice. But like all personal choices they are influenced by our life experiences and to varying degrees our genotypes and physical environments. You believe that these were conferred upon us by a higher being after they moulded us from clay and deposited us in a garden, unless your citing genesis as an allegory. I do not believe cockroaches posses the ability for abstract thought but I suppose I could be wrong, do you want to claim that they do?

@kevcvs57

I believe Evolution has given us the ability for abstract thought and the concepts of dignity and perfection stem from that ability. Wether we choose to indulge or aspire to attain the realisation of those concepts is a personal choice.

I would like to know if this thought and choosing you speak of is a totally material phenomenon.

Do you believe that given enough time material combined in such a way as to eventually produce thought and self awareness?

And is our "choosing" to be credited to will or just the combination of atoms to produce that effect ? I mean after so much reduction could you locate a "good" atom to effect a good choice and a "bad" atom to effect a bad choice?

I am trying to see how much of a materialist you are.

But like all personal choices they are influenced by our life experiences and to varying degrees our genotypes and physical environments. You believe that these were conferred upon us by a higher being after they moulded us from clay and deposited us in a garden, unless your citing genesis as an allegory.

If you are committed to a materialist view in earnest then there is no choice, for there is no free will. The collision or combination of atoms produce that effect, no credit at all to anything other than chance and natural selection.

I do not believe cockroaches posses the ability for abstract thought but I suppose I could be wrong, do you want to claim that they do?

I only know that biologically roaches are more likely to survive.
Sometime look up a movie (if you haven't already) call "The Hellstrom Chronical" . It is a kind of docu-drama based on science.

A lone scientist argues with a skeptical culture trying to inform them that insects have the upper hand over human beings when it comes to the ultimate inheritance of the earth.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0067197/

When you allude to the better moral choices of abstract thinking, one philosopher of science, Michael Ruse would say this altruistic behavior is just a survival mechanism. There is to him only an illusion of goodness or badness morally but only what facilitates survival.

If the society deem through abstract thinking some ethnic minority should be exterminated, there is nothing actually wrong with that to the consistent evolutionist.

" The position of the modern evolutionist . . . is that humans have an awareness of morality . . . because such an awareness is of biological worth . Morality is a biological adaption no less than are hands and feet and teeth . . . Considered as a rationally justifiable set of claims about an objective something, ethics is illusory. I appreciate that when somebody says "Love thy neighbor as thyself," they think they are referring above and beyond themselves . . . Nevertheless, . . . such reference is truly without foundation. Morality is just aid to survival and reproduction, . . . and any deeper meaning is illusory."

The right choices or indulgence you speak of, if you are a consistent materialist / evolutionist has no inherit nobility. It is just atoms fizzing giving an illusory effect of you making good or bad choices. And moral truth is of no value only what enhances survival.

So how is a colony of humans any sense higher then a colony of termites?
Abstract thought or not, both are simply fizzing atoms to have their species
survive.

Does Evolution need a creature with its abstract grasping mind smart enough to make a weapon that can wipe out all other life on the planet ?

I’m saying your god as presented by you is a ridiculous construct.

What was the single most "ridiculous" thing Jesus said or did ?
My God is the man Jesus Christ.

"In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. "(John 1:1) "And the Word became flesh and tabernacled among us . . . " (v.14)

What is the most ridiculous thing about Jesus you know ?

@sonship said

I’m saying your god as presented by you is a ridiculous construct.

What was the single most "ridiculous" thing Jesus said or did ?
My God is the man Jesus Christ.

"In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. "(John 1:1) "And the Word became flesh and tabernacled among us . . . " (v.14)

What is the most ridiculous thing about Jesus you know ?

Everything we are told that Jesus said is here say. So a better question would be what is the most ridiculous thing that’s been said about, or, subscribed to Jesus.
Given that he’s not here to defend himself I’d rather not discuss him on a personal level. The writers of the Bible have twisted reality to suit there own patriarchal and imperial agenda why should I believe any of the words that they’ve placed in a long dead mans mouth.

@sonship said
@kevcvs57

I believe Evolution has given us the ability for abstract thought and the concepts of dignity and perfection stem from that ability. Wether we choose to indulge or aspire to attain the realisation of those concepts is a personal choice.

I would like to know if this thought and choosing you speak of is a totally material phenomenon.
...[text shortened]... of atoms produce that effect, no credit at all to anything other than chance and natural selection.

“ I would like to know if this thought and choosing you speak of is a totally material phenomenon.”
It is so self evident that we are material beings that I do not understand why you need to ask the question. Your denial of reality is not evidence of another reality.
Why do you believe that their is an alternative to the reality you see around you everyday and why are so arrogant that without a shred of evidence for your own version you demand that your opponent explains why they believe what their senses, and your’s, is telling both of you.

@kevcvs57

Everything we are told that Jesus said is here say. So a better question would be what is the most ridiculous thing that’s been said about, or, subscribed to Jesus.

What other ancient person who said notable things do you think we have more textural reason the believe that that person's words are probably accurately represented ?

If you argue that we have no idea what Jesus said, are you more sure Socraties said what is ascribed to him, or Tiberius Caesar said what was ascribried to him, or Homer said what was ascribed to him?

If you look into it we have more reasons to think the words of Jesus are well attested to than the words of any other person in antiquity.

Please name that person who you believe we MORE likely have accurate representation of what that person said in history going back that far.

Here is a sample of early writers who quoted the New Testament and their closeness to the events who are not Gospel writers:

Justin Martyr (c. A.D. 100 - 165) quoted the Gospels 268 times

Irenaeus ( A.D. 125 - 203) quoted the Gospels 1,038 times

Clement of Alex. ( A.D. 155 - 220) quoted the Gospels 1,014 times

Origen (A.D. 185 - 254 ) quoted the Gospels 9,231 times

Tertullian (A.D. 160 - 220) quoted the Gospels 3,822 times

Hippolytus (A.D. 175 - 235) quoted the Gospels 734 times

Eusebius (A.D. ? - 339 ) quoted the Gospels 3,258 times

That is a total of 19,368 quotations from the New Testament within slightly over 300 years of the earthly ministry of Jesus.

I think it is the CONTENTS of the words and deeds of Jesus which cause you to want to surmise today we have no idea what His words were. I don't think you exercise as much skepticism about the life and words of anyone else from history that far back.

And I think you should recognize this prejudice and the bias of the skeptics who influence you to to think "Nobody knows WHAT Jesus said." We know. Some of us prefer that we did not know.

Given that he’s not here to defend himself I’d rather not discuss him on a personal level.

Part of His words is that after His resurrection people would know Him on a personal level. That is part of His teaching. And the Acts and the epistles confirm that others had this experience.

Paul for example who wrote some 13 of the 27 books of the NT.
Here is a breakdown of the same authors quoting the Apostle Paul relying on his expertise and confirmation of the experience of Christ being possible.

Justin Martyr quotes Paul 43 times
Irenaeus quotes Paul 499 times
Clement of Alexandria quotes Paul 1,127 times
Origen quotes Paul 7,778 times.
Tertullian quotes Paul 2,609 times
Hippolytus quotes Paul 387 times
Eusebius quotes Paul 1, 592 times

That's 14,035 quotations during that close in time to Paul, referring to his testimony and teaching that it was possible to experience and personally know Jesus Christ in His resurrected state in the form of the Spirit of Christ.

The writers of the Bible have twisted reality to suit there own patriarchal and imperial agenda why should I believe any of the words that they’ve placed in a long dead mans mouth.

If you do not know what Jesus SAID then how do you know His words were TWISTED? You have to have the straight story before you can point out how the TWISTS differ. Your argument is self refuting. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

Check some other opinions, I would suggest.