You're right, I should have specified "Christian fundamentalism" on that last line, since that's what I'd been talking about up to that point. I dropped the ball with that last line, and will amend it.
This having been said, I do have to ask: If those stories about divinely-mandated (or indeed executed) genocide are meant to be metaphor, then what in the world worthwhile thing are they meant to be metaphors FOR?
It's weird, though, isn't it, that even though Lot WAS judged as righteous, the city was destroyed anyways. Granted, he was ordered to leave and the city wasn't destroyed until he was gone, but that seems like a weasely kind of way to get around keeping your word.
But yeah, between the mindless, horrific violence of the old testament and the threat of eternal-torture-in-hell-for-anyone-who-disagrees-with-us of the new testament, I always say, even if I could be convinced that the christian god were real, I could never worship such a malign and evil being. My morals would prevent me from doing so.
This is why the Bible should never be taken literally. In the Old Testament, God did the smiting and stoning thing, and yet in the New Testament, he was all for peace and love and being benevolent.
The Bible thumpers don't realize is that even IF the Bible really were the word of God, it been passed down from human to human for hundreds of years; it's bound to have been changed from its original state to what it is now. People in power probably changed its content to fit what they deem as appropriate.
You're on the right track, in a sense, though it's a bit more complex than that. The very early books of the bible are an interesting case; schollars in the field have identified in the original language of the early books of the bible five separate writing styles. Interestingly enough, it's not even that, say, one book is in one style and another in another; different styles can be found even on the same page. The bible that we see today is the product of five separate sets of mythology which got chopped up and stitched back together, Frankenstein-style, some time after the Babylonian exile. This accounts for a lot of the bizarre inconsistencies which so riddle the early books (such as on the first page of Genesis where you see not one but TWO conflicting versions of the creation of Adam and Eve).
Christian apologists amuse me. "It was only a metaphor!" But then, how are we to distinguish between what is supposed to be taken literally, and what isn't? Admitted some of it is just stories seems only one cognitive step away from realizing it is all just stories.
I've often asked such people "can you show me the guide book to which parts of the bible are meant to mean what it says it means and which parts don't mean anything remotely like what it actually says?"
I have yet to see this guidebook, and this makes me fairly jealous, since they are plainly intimately acquainted with it.
The non-metaphorical parts are the parts you agree with. The others parts are metaphors meaning "Be a good Christian (by following the parts you agree with) and you won't burn in hell forever".
I admit I've cynically come up with similar formulations in the past, such as "If it would be convenient for your purposes for X to be true, then X is true. If it would be inconvenient for your purposes for X to be true, then X is obviously meant to be taken as symbolic, and only a fool could ever suggest otherwise."
that was great writing on your part, for a few lines I was confused!
yes, the inconsistencies of god's character was enough to persuade me against believing as well: "Did he smile his work to see?/ Did he who made the lamb make thee?"
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This having been said, I do have to ask: If those stories about divinely-mandated (or indeed executed) genocide are meant to be metaphor, then what in the world worthwhile thing are they meant to be metaphors FOR?
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But yeah, between the mindless, horrific violence of the old testament and the threat of eternal-torture-in-hell-for-anyone-who-disagrees-with-us of the new testament, I always say, even if I could be convinced that the christian god were real, I could never worship such a malign and evil being. My morals would prevent me from doing so.
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The Bible thumpers don't realize is that even IF the Bible really were the word of God, it been passed down from human to human for hundreds of years; it's bound to have been changed from its original state to what it is now. People in power probably changed its content to fit what they deem as appropriate.
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I have yet to see this guidebook, and this makes me fairly jealous, since they are plainly intimately acquainted with it.
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The non-metaphorical parts are the parts you agree with. The others parts are metaphors meaning "Be a good Christian (by following the parts you agree with) and you won't burn in hell forever".
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yes, the inconsistencies of god's character was enough to persuade me against believing as well: "Did he smile his work to see?/ Did he who made the lamb make thee?"
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