whose depiction though?
Any of them. The existence of believers is not a reliable indicator of what they believe in.
It can be seen that certain atheists have not only caricatured Christianity and other religions but have presented their ignorance of religion as a virtue.
Sometimes, yes. The child who points out the naked emperor is to be lauded, not criticised.
This is not condusive to forming an accurate depiction.
On the contrary, pointing out the various self-contradictions, the equally meritless claims of various sects and creeds and cults, the obvious nonsense of some of the claims about reality and the stark differences between what we actually see and what we'd expect to see if any of it were true is the key to forming an accurate depiction.
But again the engagement to discuss what a religious person means by becoming a better person has been lacking leaving us with Caricature, partly evidenced by your cliché here of ‘’heavenly reward’’.
Are you of the opinion that the majority of religious believers do not think there is some sort of spiritual benefit to 'compliant' behaviour with the particular edicts of their creed? Hindus, Buddhists and Sikhs do not see ascension through reincarnation to Nirvana? Christians and Muslims do not see some notion of heaven for the chosen? That's not a caricature, that's one of the cornerpins of the con-job that is religion - "you get a reward, but I can't show it to you just yet, you'll have to trust me on this".
What are you thinking here? I’m thinking of God as the reward but I’m not sure that’s how you understand it. Religious people as mercenaries is an avowedly atheist position IMV
'God as the reward'? What does that even mean? You've already got a god, how is that a reward? Or do you mean entering the presence of god - surely that's the afterlife? You might do good deeds purely for their own benefit, and not regard the potential for divine reward (or you might be a Calvinist and think that the two are unrelated) but you are not the only religious person, and the majority of the believers I've met are of the opinion that religion is, amongst other things, instruction on how to access that post-death reward scheme.
That would be your idea of omnibenevolence or some official definition of omnibenevolence?
All-loving, but some get a reward and some don't, because of a trait that wasn't asked for? Or, if you're a Calvinist, just because. Playing favourites, or setting the game up so that some lose is not all-loving, regardless of how you define it.
The problem is of course whose idea of benevolence should we adopt?
It's not a problem at all. Whether it's the Hindu/Buddhist 'oneness with the universe' or a Christian 'entering the presence of god' the point is that some are offered and some are denied for things that they have no direct control over - the game is rigged, and that's not the act of any sort of universal benevolence. If there were two rewards, suited to the person you are, that would be an alternative, but that's not what's being suggested.
And that comes down to choice.
Not really. According to the Christian mythos God had already tried that with the angels and saw how that went, but went back and tried it again - that's a problem with the 'all-knowing' bit.
Even on a human level the idea of a not very benevolent person mentoring a more benevolent person has obvious drawbacks and that is before we consider the non measureability of benevolence.
So you agree that the self-avowedly jealous, violent, misogynistic god who sets rules for crops and haircuts but accepts slavery and sexual servitude should probably not be put in charge of who gets the reward? Or am I misreading that?
O.
