₦airaland Forum

Gotta love Revelations.

A book that almost got thrown out of the Bible and refers to the Fall of the Roman Empire is still used by people today as a basis for fear.

I think originally it started out as a control thing. The Jews were one of the first monotheistic religions (though not nearly as early as the Bible made out). By sticking to the one god, it enabled them to stick together better as a group. If you've got lots of gods, you've then got lots of opportunities for different sects to arise and vie for power over each other.
So one god meant that everything was supposed to be centralised and unified.

But as viewed in the Books of the Prophets in the Bible, that didn't always work out as they planned.

I'm well aware of the references to multiple gods in the Bible.

But Christian fundamentalists always tend to overlook them and say there is only one god - not one true god.

And whilst I personally agree with you that it's all down to your own individual view, that is not the way that Christianity views it. You're not allowed to decide that view for yourself. You're told that it is so and that's the way it's got to be!!!

There is no such thing as universal righteousness.

It's yet another relative perception.

On the question of one GOD, on the contrary the bible recognizes the existence of smaller gods the only difference is that they are not worthy of worship.

Then by your statement there one can only assume that Christianity is a polytheistic religion and not the monotheistic one it's supporters claim it to be.

Can we (humans) know and comprehend the nature of reality? I submit that we can.

I got to pull you up on that one, Huxley. There's absolutely no way you can comprehend the nature of reality. You might be able to comprehend the nature of your perceived reality, but that's a massively different thing.

And even if you could perceive reality, what if there are infinite realities? In that scenario, you are never going to recognise the end result simply because there isn't one!!!

Please take the time to read this first post and pray that prayer to God at the bottom of it if you haven't yet.

Or alternatively - don't.

Some Christians and Muslims spend so much time chasing after Heaven, they forget that there's a life here on Earth.
They're also so busy worrying about wether they'll go to Heaven and Hell, they never notice God. All they see is the carrot and the stick -

Christian: I'll follow you, but only because there's a reward in it for me.
or
Christian: I'll follow you, but only because I'll get hurt if I don't.

How about following God just because He is for a change?

My biggest problems are with 3). Can any of the claims of religions be rationally defended? I think the answer to this is overwhelmingly NO.

Although I'd agree with you that there's a lot that can't be defended or shouldn't be defended, I don't think that one can say everything is bunk.
Take the basic precept of Christianity which is Love itself. And what is Love? Is it not the only Truth? That, in my book is worth defending.

Now you may say that there is no such love and that it's only a few synaptic responses produced in response to our day to day surroundings. But I prefer to think that there is much more to it than that. And that's why I say "All is not lost". Yet.

How did you come to be so interested in these matters? How do you generally approach such matters - philosophically, scientific rationalism, etc, etc?

I'm interested simply because I believe that it's such a big issue. But neither can I just blindly follow the herd, so I question the "established" order and recognise the holes where I see them. I've also dabbled in Quantum Mechanics when that's become relevant!!!

In one sense, my approach is no different that yours. I hit the textbooks on most subjects that have anything to do with religion - philosophy, history, science, sociology, etc. In the other sense, I also try to look for spiritual answers and see how they apply to me.
I don't see religion as a closed book as many do and recognise that if it doesn't adapt and we don't adapt, there's a good chance it will cause even more misery to humanity than it already has. That's not to say that it's all bad - I do recognise that religion can be very beneficial and am often on the receiving end of that side myself!! But dogma should be classified as a crime against humanity. It goes against everything it is to be human and that's why I debate against it when it rears it's ugly head.

Good luck with this one, Huxley.

Rest assured, there will be plenty of long posts making false accusations against you, but if you ask a simple question, it will be answered very, very vaguely or ignored altogether. All the while she will bleat the same thing over and over again, even when you've made your point in rebuttal as plain as can be. But then bleating is the habit of a sheep isn't it?

She's basically like any other brain-washed drone - if it doesn't fit her agenda, she'll either lie about it, create a cloud of bullshit to hide the reality or just flat out ignore it.

If I ask simple questions, and they refuse and constantly decline to oblige, a point comes when I post a terse auto-response notifying them that I would no longer pay them any attention.

I'm not interested in "obliging" simply because it has no relevance whatsoever to my argument. I haven't propounded Diabolical Mimicry in any way at all other to say that you haven't used it in what little response you gave to my Giglamesh query. I don't know if you've noticed, but that actually doesn't put me on a different side of the fence.

Your problem is that you want people to argue on things that have no relevence to the subject in hand.
As you're the one who brought the subject of Marcion back to the fore, I merely asked you the simple questions.

Why do I need to use the contents of Galatians in my argument? What relevance do they have to my argument?

That's neither irrelevant or dodging the issue is it? I'm returning to the issue that you bought up and addressing the point that you made.

I've explained to you why Timothy and Gandy are of no interest to me, so you now have three choices. You can answer the questions regarding Marcion. Explain to me why Timothy and Gandy are of any relevance to any of my argument and why I should involve them in my argument or you can just repeat your so-called "terse" posts over and over again.

Heh!!! So you're out of excuses huh?

You know, you remind me a lot of a Yahoo boy. They start out by sending a beautiful format in their first email. It's well written, quite lucid and pretty convincing if you don't know anything about 419. But when you've had that format and start questioning them, they start back-pedalling and reason and logic go out of the window in all their following correspondence. Eventually when you tell them that you know it's a scam, they just repeat "No it's not. Send me the money" over and over again.

OK. I'll wait until you come up with another format.

All you've done is quoted back my own post. You haven't answered the question. Why not?


And how many times do I have to tell you I'm not interested in Timothy and Gandy? That's between you and Huxley and has nothing whatsoever to do with my argument. Why keep repeating it?

I wonder why you keep pushing that same logic and then coming back to complain about it. If you paid any close attention yourself, would this argument have dragged on to this time? You and I disagree with Marcion, QED - but no, you would not want to leave it at that and that is why you have been coming back again and again to that same point. My simple premise was for you to settle this issue for yourself by going to the text and defending Marcion's postulations from there, if you can't let the matter be. If you're disinclined thereto, what logic are you then seeking to advance for what you can't defend? How logical is it for you to ask others to do something you're so disinclined to do yourself?

What's that meant to be? It's certainly not a justification that my argument should rest on the contents of Galatians.
All it contains is the assertion that I should defend Marcion's Galatians yet again. It's simple repetition of the kind I've already addressed.

Where is the reasoning behind the idea that I should "go to the text and defend Marcion's postulation's from there"? I see absolutely zero of an explanation in that paragraph you've quoted.  

So I'll ask you again.

Why do I need to use the contents of Galatians in my argument? What relevance do they have to my argument?

IMO, Aethists are just as brainwashed as they propose christians to be. They have just as much faith in their "coming from nothing" theories, preach just as much - howbeit even more smugly.

Actually, that's simply not true. And I say that as a non-atheist.

It's the religious drones of this world who are always trying to shove their beliefs into the faiths of others who are the problem. The vast majority of atheists are merely countering and defending against this attack. The majority of atheists I've met and talked to certainly do not seem to be "brain-washed". In fact totally the opposite. They make the decision to be atheist without having people shove that view down their throat and whilst actually having to defend against converting religions. Granted, that choice is not one I would pick for myself, but to accuse them of preaching as much as Christians or of being brain-washed does a big disservice to a large part of the human race and is entirely contradictory.

That's certainly not to say that there isn't a type of fundamentalist atheist out there. But compare their numbers to the amount of fundamental Christians spouting their stuff and it's minimal.

*Takes deep breath*

Why should I?" and "I feel no need to either justify or condemn them" are not demonstrating any serious concerns. If I were using such dodges, we know how you would gloat at that.

Tell you what. Explain to me what relevance the contents of Galatians has to my argument. Explain to me why I need to justify it when I don't even believe Marcion's take on it (as I've repeatedly told you).

And I wouldn't gloat. You've already dodged, ducked and dived the issues repeatedly in this thread. I've been too busy shaking my head in amazement at how you think you're getting away with it to be bothered with gloating.

So Bastage, all you could proffer to bail out the duplicity of Timothy and Gandy is this lame complaint?

Why is it a lame complaint? Personally I couldn't give a crap about Timothy or Gandy and I feel no need to either justify or condemn them as they're not even a part of any argument I'm interested in or involved in. It's like you keep harping on about Marcion - the contents of his version of Galatians were of no relevance whatsoever to my argument. "Oh but you should argue about the contents of Galatians, Bastage!!". Well duh. Not if they don't have anything to do with my proposition whatsoever.

Why do you want me to justify issues that are either totally irrelevant to my argument or which I don't even believe in??!!!

So like I said, deal with Huxley and then come back on the Gilgamesh subject if you can. Be warned though. I don't intend to debate with you as much as I did over the Marcion issue if you resort to the same tactics of smoke-screening, lying and making lame accusations.

What happened to your Marcion, Bastage?

I got bored of repeating myself and arguing with somebody who either wasn't reading a thing that I wrote or just chose to tell lies about what they read.

But anyway, 

You often like to dash from one issue hysterically to something else

could you show me where Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy quoted Tertullian

You tell me to stick to the subject and then go off on a tangent of your own. Make your mind up - you can't have your cake and eat it.

So, deal with Huxley and then when you're ready, come back and explain to me how the connections between Gilgamesh, Noah, Enuma Elish and the creation story in Genesis are mere figments of my imagination (it's on topic as you've clearly floated over to "mimicry" so no lame accusations of pulling things off course, cheers.)

Ciao for now!!!

BWAHAHAHA!!!!!

The connections between the Epic of Gilgamesh and Noah and between the Enuma Elish and the creation story are "misquotes"?

OK. That explanation has got me convinced that you're right and all those scholars are wrong.

LMAO. Even the most misguided fundamental Christian apologists very rarely go for the misquote angle. They much prefer the Diabolical Mimicry excuse. But that's just as easily blown out of the water.

You don't have to be disturbed about pilgrim.1, no really. If anyone has a complaint, they would have raised them; so far, it seems you're the only one shouting about what you are so disinclined to investigate for yourself.

Please don't be so arrogant and do give your ego a rest. You don't disturb me. Well, no more than any other brain-washed drone who refuses to seek truth.
I'm merely pointing out that in the two examples I gave, the Bible copied from older sources.

No crackpot theory: it's totally and utterly mainstream. The vast majority of Biblical scholars, both Jewish and Christian also believe the same and the evidence is overwhelming.

I'm not disinclined to investigate the examples I've given. I've already investigated them thoroughly. Again you make assertions based on your own ignorance.

Of course Christianity copied from other religions!!!

Take Pilgrim's argument that the OT is as relevant to Christianity as the NT.

In that case, how does one explain the story of Noah against the older Epic of Gilgamesh? How does one explain away the Enuma Elish?

To have tried to constantly assert it as if to mean that Catholics "stamped-out" the Jews - that was called to your attention

I didn't say that. I specifically used the words "tried to". I've already pointed that out. As usual I have to repeat the same thing over and over again. It doesn't matter a dot whether you referred to all religions or just the Jews. The fact is that I never said it about either. You seem to take delight in being an idiot.


Now I really am done with you. People can see for themselves how you lie and twist and just repeat the same crap over and over again.

Sorry. Couldn't resist posting again to defend myself.

Now you're concentrating on semantics and the words "stamped out". I first used them here:

Nestorianism survived simply because the Catholic Church did not have the reach to stamp it out.

When I discussed other religions and the Catholic Church and posted the links regarding Jewish persecution, I stated:

Are you honestly saying that the Catholic Church has never persecuted and stamped or tried to stamp out opponents?

You're stating that I said that all religions have been stamped out when it's quite plain that I didn't. Otherwise I wouldn't have bothered with the word "tried" would I?

Now you may resume normal service by reverting back to your world of fantasy where you read things that aren't there and ignore the words that are.

Interesting fact is that most UK prostitutes are actually Eastern European.

Dem gon put local girlz outta bizness!!!

Of the latest three.

The top one has "Posed by model" in the corner.
The second isn't of the UK.
The third does look like the UK.

But shit. That chick could be waiting for a bus!!!

The moral of this thread (at the beginning at least), was to show Nigerians back home that the UK may not be all it is made up to be in the minds of Nigerians. C'mon, let's be honest with ourselves.

And there's absolutely no problem with that. The problem comes when the poster fabricates his evidence to prove his point.

And Pataki is absolutely correct. Those are not UK numberplates. The excuse that they may just be tourist cars is a poor one. Those vehicles are driving on the right. In the UK, they drive on the left.

Reading "stamped-out" into the text is one thing; finding that same thing in the text is quite another.

You're a joke.

Even when the evidence is in front of your eyes, you refuse to accept it. Are you seriously telling me that the text I've posted from Wikipedia doesn't show that the Catholic Church destroyed Catharism?

I think anyone who reads the passages I posted regarding the Cathars will be able to see that they weren't just persecuted but stamped out. What happened was way beyond persecution and any independent can see that.

I'm done with you. I simply can't be bothered to converse with somebody who defies reason and treats facts with such contempt.

I'll leave the last word to you. You can post a sarcastic comment about how I "ran away" or how you win, but we both know that your reasoning and logic are totally and utterly flawed.

Ciao!!!

Please, where are the examples of "stamped-out" in those links? Persecuted, they did - but stamped-out. . . please show where, just incase we missed it.

From the first link.

"Innocent III declared a crusade against Languedoc, offering the lands of the schismatics to any French nobleman willing to take up arms. The violence led to France's acquisition of lands with closer cultural and linguistic ties to Catalonia (see Occitan). An estimated 200,000 to 1,000,000 people died during the crusade.
The Roman Catholic Church had always dealt vigorously with strands of Christianity that it considered heretical, but before the 12th century such groups were organized in small numbers, around wayward preachers or small localized sects. The Cathars of Languedoc represented an alarmingly popular mass movement,[4] a phenomenon that the Roman Church had not seen for almost 900 years, since Arianism and Marcionism in the early days of Christianity.
The area was reconquered by 1229, and the leading nobles made peace. After 1233 the Inquisition was central to crushing what remained of Catharism. Resistance and occasional revolts continued, but Catharism's days were numbered. Military action ceased in 1255. In the end, the Albigensian Crusade killed an estimated 1 million people, not only Cathars but much of the population of southern France.
A campaign started in 1233, burning vehement and relapsed Cathars wherever they were found, even exhuming some bodies for burning. Many still resisted, taking refuge in fortresses at Fenouillèdes and Montségur, or inciting small uprisings.
The Cathar strongholds fell one by one. Montségur withstood a nine-month siege before being taken in March 1244. The final holdout, a small, isolated, overlooked fort at Quéribus, quickly fell in August 1255. The last known Cathar burning occurred in 1321."

But then if you'd have bothered to read the link you would have seen this.
I think that anyone who actually read the link would have a hard time not believing that it speaks about Catharism being stamped out by Catholicism.

And just so you don't try to wriggle out of yet another truth:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cathar

"The Catholic Church regarded the sect as dangerously heretical; faced with the rapid spread of the movement across the Languedoc region and the failure of peaceful attempts at conversion, which had been undertaken by Dominicans, the Church launched the Albigensian Crusade to crush the movement.
he independence of the princes of the Languedoc was at an end. But in spite of the wholesale massacre of Cathars during the war, Catharism was not yet extinguished.

In 1215, the bishops of the Catholic Church met at the Fourth Council of the Lateran under Pope Innocent III. One of the key goals of the council was to combat the heresy of the Cathars without explaining exactly what that heresy originated with: the Cathar's interpretation of the doctrine of the resurrection as meaning, "reincarnation".

The Inquisition was established in 1229 to uproot the remaining Cathars. Operating in the south at Toulouse, Albi, Carcassonne and other towns during the whole of the 13th century, and a great part of the 14th, it finally succeeded in extirpating the movement. Cathars who refused to recant were hanged, or burned at the stake. [6]
From May 1243 to March 1244, the Cathar fortress of Montségur was besieged by the troops of the seneschal of Carcassonne and the archbishop of Narbonne. On March 16, 1244, a large and symbolically important massacre took place, where over 200 Cathar perfects were burned in an enormous fire at the prat des cramats near the foot of the castle.
After several decades of harassment and re-proselytizing, and perhaps even more importantly, the systematic destruction of their scripture, the sect was exhausted and could find no more adepts. The leaders of a Cathar revival in the Pyrenean foothills, Pierre and Jacques Autier, were executed in 1310. Catharism disappeared from the northern Italian cities after the 1260s, under pressure from the Inquisition. After 1330, the records of the Inquisition contain very few proceedings against Cathars. The last known Cathar prefect in the Languedoc, Guillaume Bélibaste, was executed in 1321."

What better example of "stamped out" do you need?

I must admit that I'm getting bored of you.
You still post vaccuous statements and half-truths when presented with facts.

Both the Assyrian and Byzantine churches were "CATHOLIC";

Very misleading. After the schism regarding the Nestorians, the Assyrian Church ceased to be regarded as Catholic.

If you're speaking of "Catholic persecutions", your allegations apply to both of them.

No it doesn't. That's like saying a wife and a husband divorce and the wife is then guilty of attacking herself when they've split up. Even to the dumbest person, that simply doesn't make sense.
After the Schism, the Assyrian Church ceased to be Catholic. What was the schism caused by if not their support for the Nestorians? Why would they choose to then persecute the Nestorians? They even became the Nestorian Church!!

That people edited documents does not mean that Marcion should do so and then claim that what he had edited were the 'true' teachings of Paul

No? Isn't that what all churches have done before and since?

If that was irrelevant, I don't see how your constant recourse to this issue is of any relevance

I've already explained why it's irrelevant. Let me repeat it yet again to you - the fact that you disagree with Marcion does not make him a heretic. Do you honestly need me to keep repeating myself or are you just being stupid?

I don't take such ideosyncracies as establishing any arguments.

It's not idiosyncratic. It's a plain, cool, hard, set in concrete fact. Or do you disagree with the very evidence that sits before your own eyes? Or is your Bible written in the original Hebrew, Coptic and Aramaic? "Idiosyncracy" is probably the wrong word though. The fact I've laid out is the opposite to an idiosyncrasy.

My dear, if Islam has nothing to do with this, please throw it out! What part of that don't you understand?

Who said it has nothing to do with this? I didn't. I merely pointed out that you are confused as to it's relevance. Which part of that don't you understand? And there's no denying the fact that Nestorians were given sanctuary in Islamic nations. They reside there to this day.

"The Assyrian Church of the East refused to drop support for Nestorius or to denounce him as a heretic" - does that sound like the Catholic Church (the collective body of Catholics) was calling for the "stamping out" of Nestorians? Please understand something here: The Catholic Church was split into two groups: the Assyrian and Byzantinian churches

The Assyrian Church ceased to be the Catholic Church with it's support of Nestor. It's as simple as that. You keep saying that the two sides were the "same". Utter trash. If they were the same, there would not have been a schism. Again you defy logic.



The only confusion here is the one you're trying to create to prove your dubious point.

My "major" associates know the time that I may be making Salah. So they give me my space

They offer you the tolerance which you deny to those who don't follow your beliefs.

"Can a Christian be demon possessed? No question polarizes the Christian community more than this one, and the tragedy is that there is no absolutely biblical way to answer it , the word translated as 'demon possession' never occurs in Scripture after the cross, so we are left with no theological precision as to what demonization would constitute in the Church Age" [Neil Anderson, Released From Bondage (San Bernardino, CA: Here's Life, 1991), pp. 15,16].

You might want to add this one to your armoury.

http://www.evilbible.com/