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"John the 12th survived being boiled
in oil and was exiled to patmos because they thought he could not
be killed."
Do you have "their" word for that? Why didn't they try
hacking his head off with a sword, axe or big knife? I've never
known that method of killing to fail, at least not on anything smarter
than a chicken. What you are quoting is a legend or myth that even
the Catholic church these days doesn't like to baldly state as history.
They (the Romans) knew he could be killed but they knew that this
would be futile, sending him to Patmos to do hard labour was a much
better move, why kill a troublemaker and make a martyr and a cause
when you can make him a slave, put him out of sight and make him
do something for the good of the Empire? It's what Machiavelli would
do. Making martyrs is a very silly way to behave, smart torturers
do their work in private, no witnesses on the side of the torturee,
even second rate torturers like Lynndie England know the rules.
"If you concocted a story--would you
be willing to be torchered (sic) and die for it?"
Like Joseph Smith was? He wasn't tortured but he was murdered,
and it was his newly invented religion that made him a target of
the mob, which for Mormons is good enough to declare him a martyr.
Lots of people have died for their own lies, of course many more
have died for the lies of others, especially religious lies. Dying
isn't a test of anything. Palestinians and Iraqis are doing it all
the time, just look at the TV.
Besides, just because you make something up it doesn't follow that
you believe it was a lie and you are sorry to have said it. The
most successful liars are those who sincerely believe they are telling
the truth. People can also get trapped in lies. It happened to me
once "you really are in pain, aren't you? You're not just saying
that to get out of school?" I had my healthy appendix taken
out. Since then I've had a lot of respect for the truth.
There have been many martyrdoms for many religions. Many of those
martyrdoms are just deaths or murders with good public relations.
Sikhs and Muslims seem to be just as prone to it as Christians.
In Sri Lanka the Hindu Tamil Tigers practice suicide bombings and
other forms of martyrdom. Buddhist monks often burn themselves to
death as a political protest, indeed people kill themselves in gruesome
ways without any strong belief system at all. Are all these acts
proof that the believers believed in the right thing? No. Do you
think that those prepared to kill themselves in buses in Tel Aviv
show that Islam is superior to Judaism or do you think it simply
shows that the Palestinians are desperate? Does it prove anything
at all? Many acquaintances of the 9-11 hijackers didn't think they
were particularly devout Muslims. Were the kamikazes martyrs or
dupes? Communists and Nazis have killed themselves or died for their
causes. There have even been martyrs for environmentalism.
Christianity began with Paul/Saul of Tarsus. We do not have a definitive
and reliable account of his death. He might have disappeared from
history and died in obscurity, he might have been executed as a
common criminal or just another atheist like all the so called Christian
martyrs at the time of Nero. Yes, the Christians were not killed
for believing in the true god that the Romans were afraid of and
secretly knew was real, they were killed for not believing in the
Roman gods, for not worshipping the Emperor as a god.
I challenge you to show me the evidence. Don't point me at a book
that rehashes all the same old lame and many times refuted “evidence
for Jesus”. Show me contemporary accounts written by ANYBODY
AT ALL about Jesus written before Jesus was claimed to have died.
Show me accounts of Jesus written by non-Christian Jews who were
themselves alive in 32 AD. They need not be eye witnesses, I'd be
fairly satisfied with people who were simply alive at the right
time. There are none. This challenge has been issued dozens of times
and is never answered.
I have not seen a single person I know to be an atheist with a
clear and rational set of beliefs convert to Christianity.
Show me the books or articles written by "Josh McDowell -
convinced atheist".
He says he used to be an atheist.
I could say I used to be a Satan worshiper. Where is the evidence?
Claiming one used to be an atheist and now embrace the religion
embraced by the largest book buying market in human history just
when you want to start selling books strikes me as a little bloody
convenient.
Lots of people go through a phase in their life in which they stop
being interested in religion and probably don't believe in any gods.
This is not the same thing as being "a true atheist" in
the same way that going to church sometimes and vaguely believing
in God is not the same thing as being "a true Christian".
I have not seen any evidence of Josh McDowell, C.S. Lewis or any
of the other lauded "ex-atheists"
actually being atheists. Isn't it strange that people who write
about their "new" Christianity ad nauseum didn't write
a word about their atheism? It seems very much more likely that
these people were far more apathetic and agnostic than they were
atheist, that they had an absence of a positive religious belief
rather than a strong belief that the stories of gods were all wrong.
There are probably a hundred apathetic and disenchanted atheists
to every convinced atheist. Those people who work out a solidly
atheist worldview do not succumb to the lures of religions.
The Bible and the "Scriptures" are just old books, myths
from a tribe that I bet isn't even your tribe. American Christians
are a laughing stock for anybody with a rational education.
"If I am wrong I haven't lost anything!!!
But, If you are wrong!!!!"
What? Your ever loving god will see I regret not believing in him?
What a wonderfully grown up and admirable jealous psychopathic bastard*
he is(n't).
"you have a lot at stake."
What if the real god is Allah or Zeus or Odin? You have just as
much to lose as anybody in the "believe in the right god or
you're screwed" game. There are thousands of gods you deny
and actively despise. In contrast I treat them all as equals. If
the universe is run by a jealous and spiteful god who tortures people
for all eternity for believing the wrong thing you could be just
as much a victim as the rest of our species. And if there isn't
a god, there isn't any afterlife you have wasted your life pursuing
a worthless prize. There are millions of possible alternative scenarios
here other than the simple crude dichotomy you suggest.
Here are just a few:-
There could be a real god who you have heard about and dismissed
as a myth who takes it out on anybody with a clear belief in a
false god.
There could be a real god who hates gullible people who believe
in gods without evidence.
There could be a real god who doesn't care what you do as long
as you have fun.
There could be a real god who doesn't care what you do who tortures
everybody after they are dead regardless of how they lived their
life because he can.
There could be a real god who hates being worshipped and punishes
anybody who attempts to worship.
There could be a real god who wants to be worshipped but who
can't communicate with any prophets and takes out his frustration
on either everybody or just those who seem particularly smug about
worshipping the wrong god via false prophets.
There could be a real god who tortures people entirely at random
regardless of how they have lived their lives.
There could be a real god who tortures people at random regardless
of how they have lived their lives but makes a special point of
picking on people with certain religions, especially yours.
Every god that has ever been postulated could be real and you
meet the god you believe in.
Every god that has ever been postulated could be real but everybody
meets a god they don't believe in.
A random number of postulated gods are real.
Gods are real but the afterlife is a time share.
Life is a great big test and when you die the gods will all piss
themselves laughing at your gullibility.
God could be real, he could be planning to save the world and
all who believe in him but Christianity could be a diabolical
snare.
The god you meet after death could be a racist and really pissed
off that you are worshipping a Jewish god.
The universe could be run by a tribal jealous god who chose another
tribe, perhaps a tribe that your ancestors exterminated.
There could be a real god but no afterlife and no prizes for
believing the right things, or the wrong things.
Or one of the worst possibilities, Christianity is correct and
you do spend an eternity with nothing to do except worship God.
Heaven and Earth pass away and you live for ever bored beyond
belief with no prospect of relief with nothing to live for, no
challenges or needs, and no prospect of release even through dying.
So what if you are wrong? It all depends how you are wrong, doesn't
it? Once you postulate the possibility of gods and eternal torment
nobody can have peace of mind except through bloody-minded faith,
which might be the worst strategy to actually avoid a bad fate.
Only those people who are up to their necks in a single religion
which dominates their culture can view the possibilities as being
"either my irrational beliefs are right or nobody's irrational
beliefs are right".
This is another of the classic arguments for Christianity which
have been done to death in debate over the years, it is best known
as Pascal's Wager.
http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/pascal.html
http://www.mwillett.org/atheism/pascal.htm
http://www.mwillett.org/atheism/classic.htm#pascalswager
Martin Willett
http://mwillett.org/
* Was Mary married to the Holy Spirit? I think not.
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