Textual analysis of Old Testament

Quote: FrGamble

An example of this is Evenbob continuing to think science and God are in competition. .

Religion used to squash science so there
would be no competition. Religion and it's
superstitions cannot compete with common
sense and what science stands for.

Quote: Evenbob

Religion used to squash science so there
would be no competition.

Quick go out and read another history book, preferably one on the history of science.

Religions support science just fine, until science contradicts the beliefs of the religion.

Look at geocentrism: a life of house arrest for Galileo, and the continuing fights to this day over evolution.

Quote: Nareed

Let's see:

Adam and Eve disobey Jehovah, he kicks them out of the house and gives them an awful existence

Existence isn't awful and immediately after the fall He promises them and us that evil, the cause of all this mess, will be ultimately defeated.

Quote:

He messes with their minds and scatters them all over the world.

Do you think having different languages and cultures is a bad thing? You also have to recognize the extent to which humanity will try to use technology to solve all its problems. Like the tower it will only crush us eventually. Have you noticed how modern communication and social media have led to serious problems in relationships and hurt the very act of being human. I'm not of course saying that social media is bad but it is the lens in which too many people live there lives and while it feels like we are all connected we are never more alone and separated.

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Humanity displeases Jehovah, he drowns them all and all the animals on Earth.

This Biblical take on the Epic of Gilgamesh adds the story about the utter depravity of humanity. It is not just that they displeased God, He can handle it, it is that they were tearing each other to shreds, murder, corruption, rape, evil abominations everywhere you looked. Not a good man was left. It was a merciful way to save the human race through the good family of Noah.

Quote:

Satan proposes a bet, Jehovah takes it, Job and his family suffer horribly. When Job dares question the high and mighty, he gets a mean-spirited tongue-lashing.

You have a vested interest it seems in thinking that God reminding Job that His love is present even when worldly things are not going his way is a tongue-lashing. It is Job's friends you tell Him that God has abandoned Job and that he should just give up on life that get a real tongue-lashing. You also continue to think this is a real story when it is obviously written as fiction.

Quote:

Do I go on? Do I need to go on?

Yes, because everything you have said is a twisted distorted and incorrect reading of the text.

Quote: FrGamble

God reminding Job that His love is present

There's that horrible twisted thing you call
'gods love' rearing it's ugly head again. I
am sooo thankful you and your Church and
your perverted ideas of what love is no
longer run things. Humanity wised up and
said enough is enough.

Love remaining present in suffering is a horrible thing? Can you explain what you mean?

Quote: FrGamble

Love remaining present in suffering is a horrible thing? Can you explain what you mean?

Why do I always have to explain this to
you. The love you say god manifests
isn't real love, it's a twisted perversion of
love. It's the selfish self centered wishes
of greedy men using the word to bend
people to do their will. God wiped out
10K innocent people out of love. God
caused this or that horrible thing to
happen out of love. When you really love
something you don't destroy it, as the
god in the Bible is wont to do. It's a word
that has no business ever coming out of
a Christians mouth. Not with the bloody history
of their gods church hanging around their necks.

What hangs around our necks is a symbol of a God who died for us so that we could live forever. A God who desires to set us free from the consequences of selfishness and greed that cause us so much pain. God saves us form horrible things out of love and gives us hope, not only hope now in the midst of the sufferings and struggles of life, but hope for all of eternity. Don't you dare for a moment think that the Lord who truly loves us did not endure the pain and sorrow of what it is like when your own children whom you love more than anything else disobey you, deny you, and do their own thing in the process destroying themselves, each other, and the world. Thank God that His love is unconditional and will never end. Even when we sin and cause so much grief upon ourselves God is always there to forgive us, help us, encourage us, teach us, and set us free from guilt and shame. If you have another word besides love for what it means to sacrifice everything for the good of the other I would wonder what it is?

It is true that humanity has had and continues to have a bloody history. It is precisely the word of love that Jesus Christ, Himself a victim of violence, speaks from the cross that we need the most. To know we are forgiven, to know we are family, and to know through the truth of the Resurrection that evil will ultimately be defeated.

Quote: FrGamble

What hangs around our necks is a symbol of a God who died for us .

He wasn't a god and he didn't die
for anybody. He died because he
was a public nuisance and was
convicted as such. It sure doesn't
take much to send you into a ranting
tailspin of religious nonsense, does it.
Preach preach preach, it falls on deaf
ears around here. Your gods love is
perverted in every way, because it
has nothing to do with any god. It's
the will of greedy controlling men
that you preach, god has nothing to
do with it. It's what you want that's
important, what the Church want's.
All cloaked in the false mantra of
'gods love'. Sickening is what it is.

Quote: FrGamble

You have a vested interest it seems in thinking that God reminding Job that His love is present even when worldly things are not going his way is a tongue-lashing.

If you think Jehovah telling Job the equivalent of "Who are you to question me, you miserable worm," is a reminder of hoe much he loves Job, then 1) you've no idea what love is and 2) you wouldn't know morality if it kicked you.

Perhaps it's time to evaluate the progress of the war. I thought discrediting your cult would be enough. Now I'm beginning to think it must be destroyed, set on fire and ground into dust.

Maybe your methods will work: hate the religion, not the believer.