Condemn or Approve (pt 2)

[jeremyp]

You think the same morals today applied back then. You are mistakenly misrepresenting what Brownie is saying...

It's not me that claims that

a) God is eternal and unchanging and

b) Morality flows from God.

God hasn't changed but the moral values and mankind has.
Hence the changing of man and society means you cannot judge what happened then by todays standards.
God has remained the same throughout. It isn't God but the world and man which is being discussed.


EXAMPLE: Todays laws and society would not allow you to sacrifice your daughter or any person for victory in war.
God does not want and never has wanted those things.

There is at least one recorded instance in the Bible of something like that happening. If God did not want it, why didn't he stop it?

[Khatru]

God hasn't changed but the moral values and mankind has.

Hmmm...perhaps you're right and the Bible god never changes his mind.  After all, we have Numbers 23:19 which tells us...

"God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?"

There, that's clear enough.

Wait a minute - what's this?  Judges 2:18 tells us...

"And when the Lord raised them up judges, then the Lord was with the judge, and delivered them out of the hand of their enemies all the days of the judge: for it repented the Lord because of their groanings by reason of them that oppressed them and vexed them."

OK, looks like we have a contradiction here.  The above scriptures can't both be right.  Let's look elsewhere and see what the Bible says about whether your god repents...

 Genesis 6:6 which clearly says:

"And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart."

Genesis 6:6

"And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them."

Genesis 6:7

It's clear enough. In fact, God didn't just repent making man but he also repented having made the animals. Poor animals - what did they ever do?

Want some more?

"And the Lord repented of the evil which he thought to do unto his people."

Exodus 32:14

"It repenteth me that I have set up Saul to be king: for he is turned back from following me, and hath not performed my commandments. And it grieved Samuel; and he cried unto the Lord all night."

1 Samuel 15:11

"And Samuel came no more to see Saul until the day of his death: nevertheless Samuel mourned for Saul: and the Lord repented that he had made Saul king over Israel."

1 Samuel 15:35

"And when the angel stretched out his hand upon Jerusalem to destroy it, the Lord repented him of the evil, and said to the angel that destroyed the people, It is enough: stay now thine hand. And the angel of the Lord was by the threshing place of Araunah the Jebusite."

2 Samuel 24:16

" Therefore now amend your ways and your doings, and obey the voice of the Lord your God; and the Lord will repent him of the evil that he hath pronounced against you."

Jeremiah 26:13

"Thus hath the Lord God shewed unto me; and, behold, he formed grasshoppers in the beginning of the shooting up of the latter growth; and, lo, it was the latter growth after the king's mowings.

2 And it came to pass, that when they had made an end of eating the grass of the land, then I said, O Lord God, forgive, I beseech thee: by whom shall Jacob arise? for he is small.

3 The Lord repented for this: It shall not be, saith the Lord.

4 Thus hath the Lord God shewed unto me: and, behold, the Lord God called to contend by fire, and it devoured the great deep, and did eat up a part.

5 Then said I, O Lord God, cease, I beseech thee: by whom shall Jacob arise? for he is small.

6 The Lord repented for this: This also shall not be, saith the Lord God."

Amos 7:1-6

"And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not."

Jonah 3:10

There you have it - plenty o scriptures showing that your god repents.

[Hope]

But so is your description in this thread.

Precisely, which was why I wrote it in the way I did - to show the biased nature of Khatru's original proposition, which some here seemed quite happy to support.

The Biblical god did some absolutely terrible things that you seem to have forgotten. Even his so called compassion seems to be confined to murdering his own son/himself and telling everybody to accept that as some sort of altruistic act or die.

Nice red-herring, jeremy.  Not sure about you, but as a parent, I have often paid the penalty for things that my children have done (pecuniararily) wrong, especially when they have been without money (we didn't give large sums of pocket money).  Are you suggesting you'd be happy to see any children of yours who had done this kind of thing forced to pay up from their non-existent funds?  I realise that Floo loves to say that she always made her children pay for their own errors, but just how many parents refuse to help their children when they get into trouble?

[jeremyp]

Precisely, which was why I wrote it in the way I did - to show the biased nature of Khatru's original proposition, which some here seemed quite happy to support.
Nice red-herring, jeremy.  Not sure about you, but as a parent, I have often paid the penalty for things that my children have done (pecuniararily) wrong, especially when they have been without money (we didn't give large sums of pocket money).

But this is God we are talking about. If it wasn't God that made it up, who created the rule that says God has to sacrifice himself to save us?

I notice you totally omitted to deal with the first half of my post.

[ippy]

You think the same morals today applied back then. You are mistakenly misrepresenting what Brownie is saying...

God hasn't changed but the moral values and mankind has.
Hence the changing of man and society means you cannot judge what happened then by todays standards.
God has remained the same throughout. It isn't God but the world and man which is being discussed.


EXAMPLE: Todays laws and society would not allow you to sacrifice your daughter or any person for victory in war.
God does not want and never has wanted those things. He sacrificed his son so mankind could live. But more importantly it was his sons own decision to do it.

4 assertions.

ippy