Heaven, Hell, and the multiverse
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I actually was wondering this myself yesterday. One thought could be that God created Satan so we would have to prove our worth. He gave us the free will to chose our own paths, good or evil. Without creating Satan, people would have to decide between Heaven and well something else that just wasn't really too bad. ;) He can't just let everyone into Heaven, because there's limited seating. That's not His fault because there was Heaven before God. Oh, no wait.. :confused: more questions.... Trollslayer wrote: when people talk about the bible what do they mean ? Regarding the Bible, I see your point too. I've had conversations with devout Christians who tried to explain it. The story I got was basically this, the Bible is a collection of sixty-something books, written by different people at different times. However, the stories all match-up. The fact that they were collected and match-up so well, is proof that the work was inspired by God. Also, it says so right in the Book, that it is the word of God. My thought was that it sounds all very cyclical. The Bible is the word of God, because it says its the Word right in the Bible. And that is indisputable because after all it is the Word of God....... There is definitely a point where a person has to take a leap of faith that what seems like it might fit, actually does. BW "Gandalf. Yes. That is what they used to call me. Gandalf the Grey. *I* am Gandalf the White." - Gandalf the White
CP Book ClubIt's a shame that churches on the whole shrink away from such questions. Questions are good. The world should have thinking Christians, not dumb Christians. Now, the first question deals with man's free will versus God's sovereignty. Free will declares that man makes his own independent decisions. God's sovereignty declares that God is in control of everything. That seems to be a contradiction. How can God be in total control, yet man exercise his own independent free will? The question has been floating around for a few centuries, but has yet to see a satisfactory answer. What we do know is that these two contradictory ideas seem to coexist in some manner or another. The closest human example I could find is described in Romance of the Three Kingdoms, a semi-historical Chinese novel. Zhuge Liang was described as a man who could predict the actions of his opponent's actions. Because of his foreknowledge, he could devise plans that controlled the battlefield and manipulated allies. Total control and free will in coexistence. Okay, so why did God create Satan and his gang knowing the results would be bad. The Bible doesn't give an answer, but here's my theory. Free will can be used for good or used for evil. Some guys used free will for good, and they're the angels. Some guys used free will for evil, and they're the demons. Creating anything with free will entails a certain amount of risk. I guess it's something similar to raising children. You still want children even though you know they can bring grief and trouble. Our next question deals with the authenticity of the Bible. For all books of antiquity, religous or not, you get a feeling for authenticity by the age and number of copies. Caesar's Gallic Wars has 8 or 9 copies written 1000 years after Caesar's death. I don't hear many people complain about the authenticity of Gallic Wars. Now we come to the New Testament, a grand champion best seller from antiquity. The NT has thousands of copies with ranges of age similar or better than Caesar's Gallic Wars. I think it's a reasonable conclusion that the Bible is in good shape. Okay, so we know that the Bible is pretty much the same thing the 1st century church was reading. How do we know that it is these 66 books that are the inspired Word of God? Actually, that's not a very relevant question. Of all the Christian sects, Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox, I have yet to hear of one sect which currently contests the selection of the 66 books in the Bible. The disputes are so underwhelming, no one ev
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For whatever reason I was thinking about the universe and God. I was thinking that there are multiple universes. The one we live in, Heaven, Hell, and several others. Heaven is the original universe, and quite a nice place at that. God rules over it, and the other universes, with the one exeption being Hell. Each of the universes has a sort of Gateway back to Heaven, but not to the other universes. One nice day, when God was creating Hell, and deciding who should rule over it, Lucifer, a mere cherubum, got this notion that he should be the overlord. However, he was not high-ranking enough to warrant the position. So he revolted, and took it over anyway, much to God's dismay. There was a bit of a war over this, and in the end God decided to close the Gateway to Hell, so that the Devil could no longer come back. The problem with this was that Gateways could not be undone, but they could be "rerouted". So Our Universe was created, as a buffer between Heaven and Hell. Angels were sent here as well, to guard the Gateway between Heaven and Earth and the Gateway between Hell and Earth. So the Devil continuously tries to take over our universe so that he might eventually get back to Heaven, and rule the whole shebang. Any chance this is the real story? :~ BW "Gandalf. Yes. That is what they used to call me. Gandalf the Grey. *I* am Gandalf the White." - Gandalf the White
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It's a shame that churches on the whole shrink away from such questions. Questions are good. The world should have thinking Christians, not dumb Christians. Now, the first question deals with man's free will versus God's sovereignty. Free will declares that man makes his own independent decisions. God's sovereignty declares that God is in control of everything. That seems to be a contradiction. How can God be in total control, yet man exercise his own independent free will? The question has been floating around for a few centuries, but has yet to see a satisfactory answer. What we do know is that these two contradictory ideas seem to coexist in some manner or another. The closest human example I could find is described in Romance of the Three Kingdoms, a semi-historical Chinese novel. Zhuge Liang was described as a man who could predict the actions of his opponent's actions. Because of his foreknowledge, he could devise plans that controlled the battlefield and manipulated allies. Total control and free will in coexistence. Okay, so why did God create Satan and his gang knowing the results would be bad. The Bible doesn't give an answer, but here's my theory. Free will can be used for good or used for evil. Some guys used free will for good, and they're the angels. Some guys used free will for evil, and they're the demons. Creating anything with free will entails a certain amount of risk. I guess it's something similar to raising children. You still want children even though you know they can bring grief and trouble. Our next question deals with the authenticity of the Bible. For all books of antiquity, religous or not, you get a feeling for authenticity by the age and number of copies. Caesar's Gallic Wars has 8 or 9 copies written 1000 years after Caesar's death. I don't hear many people complain about the authenticity of Gallic Wars. Now we come to the New Testament, a grand champion best seller from antiquity. The NT has thousands of copies with ranges of age similar or better than Caesar's Gallic Wars. I think it's a reasonable conclusion that the Bible is in good shape. Okay, so we know that the Bible is pretty much the same thing the 1st century church was reading. How do we know that it is these 66 books that are the inspired Word of God? Actually, that's not a very relevant question. Of all the Christian sects, Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox, I have yet to hear of one sect which currently contests the selection of the 66 books in the Bible. The disputes are so underwhelming, no one ev
Emcee Lam wrote: For all books of antiquity, religous or not, you get a feeling for authenticity by the age and number of copies. There is authenticity of bible as in "is it really a book written a long time ago?". Yes it is. There is authenticity of the message that bible communicates, for example "where there really miracles, God, Jesus Christ and so on?". I am sorry, but this is the first time I hear that the number of copies and age of a book is an evidence of anything other than popularity of the book. It says absolutely nothing about authenticity of the message of the book. Emcee Lam wrote: Caesar's Gallic Wars has 8 or 9 copies written 1000 years after Caesar's death. I don't hear many people complain about the authenticity of Gallic Wars. There are plenty of myth and stories that are describing events that happened way before alleged Christ existence. Do we consider them all to be true? No. We only consider the events that have substantial evidence to support them to be historically true: archeological findings, cross-reference with multiple independent sources and so on. My guess (I am not a historian) is that there are plenty of evidence supporting the story that Gallic Wars really happen. My understanding (again I am not a historian) is that this is no the case with the story that bible conveys.
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Emcee Lam wrote: For all books of antiquity, religous or not, you get a feeling for authenticity by the age and number of copies. There is authenticity of bible as in "is it really a book written a long time ago?". Yes it is. There is authenticity of the message that bible communicates, for example "where there really miracles, God, Jesus Christ and so on?". I am sorry, but this is the first time I hear that the number of copies and age of a book is an evidence of anything other than popularity of the book. It says absolutely nothing about authenticity of the message of the book. Emcee Lam wrote: Caesar's Gallic Wars has 8 or 9 copies written 1000 years after Caesar's death. I don't hear many people complain about the authenticity of Gallic Wars. There are plenty of myth and stories that are describing events that happened way before alleged Christ existence. Do we consider them all to be true? No. We only consider the events that have substantial evidence to support them to be historically true: archeological findings, cross-reference with multiple independent sources and so on. My guess (I am not a historian) is that there are plenty of evidence supporting the story that Gallic Wars really happen. My understanding (again I am not a historian) is that this is no the case with the story that bible conveys.
I probably didn't do a good job of explaining this. Please, let me try again. I was describing the approach used to determine if a historical document of today is the same as the original document written by the author from antiquity. By the aforementioned measure, we believe that the history of Thucydides, history of Herodotus, and Aristotle's poetics are substantially the same document written by the original author. Since the New Testament has vastly greater copies and even better dating, it's probably safe to conclude the NT is also substantially unchanged. Now as for the message within the Bible. Can we count that as reliable? Did Jesus really perform these miracles? Was Jesus miraculously resurrected? Is Jesus really God? Treating all questions would take too much time. Let's just examine one of the questions, Jesus resurrection. Christianity is founded on Jesus resurrection. Resurrection establishes the Godhood of Jesus. It also establishes Christian salvation and thus Christian theology. Without resurrection, there would be no Christianity. If one wants to challenge Christianity, this would be the right place. So what happened through the ages? What has been the results of challenging the resurrection of Christ. Results have been underwhelming. From the 1st century Jewish pharisees to our current century scholars, the results of challenges have been underwhelming. I have yet to see anything shake the foundations of Christianity. There were plenty of opportunities in the 1st century, and nothing happened. There are plenty of opportunities in our current century, and not even a stir. This is such a non issue, that I have yet to hear of a Christian who has lost sleep over this question. The lack of a proper counter to claims of Jesus resurrection is not really proof. I was attempting an abbreviated explanation as time does not permit me to write much. Also published books do a much more comprehensive analysis. I would recommend books by Josh McDowell, an anti-Christian turned Christian.
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I probably didn't do a good job of explaining this. Please, let me try again. I was describing the approach used to determine if a historical document of today is the same as the original document written by the author from antiquity. By the aforementioned measure, we believe that the history of Thucydides, history of Herodotus, and Aristotle's poetics are substantially the same document written by the original author. Since the New Testament has vastly greater copies and even better dating, it's probably safe to conclude the NT is also substantially unchanged. Now as for the message within the Bible. Can we count that as reliable? Did Jesus really perform these miracles? Was Jesus miraculously resurrected? Is Jesus really God? Treating all questions would take too much time. Let's just examine one of the questions, Jesus resurrection. Christianity is founded on Jesus resurrection. Resurrection establishes the Godhood of Jesus. It also establishes Christian salvation and thus Christian theology. Without resurrection, there would be no Christianity. If one wants to challenge Christianity, this would be the right place. So what happened through the ages? What has been the results of challenging the resurrection of Christ. Results have been underwhelming. From the 1st century Jewish pharisees to our current century scholars, the results of challenges have been underwhelming. I have yet to see anything shake the foundations of Christianity. There were plenty of opportunities in the 1st century, and nothing happened. There are plenty of opportunities in our current century, and not even a stir. This is such a non issue, that I have yet to hear of a Christian who has lost sleep over this question. The lack of a proper counter to claims of Jesus resurrection is not really proof. I was attempting an abbreviated explanation as time does not permit me to write much. Also published books do a much more comprehensive analysis. I would recommend books by Josh McDowell, an anti-Christian turned Christian.
Emcee, I was not trying to start a debate on validity of Christian believes. I don't think that either one of us can present any substantial (at least in the eyes of the other) evidence for validity or not validity of any of the key events described in the bible. Thank you for book recommendation. Peace. Kostya.
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I probably didn't do a good job of explaining this. Please, let me try again. I was describing the approach used to determine if a historical document of today is the same as the original document written by the author from antiquity. By the aforementioned measure, we believe that the history of Thucydides, history of Herodotus, and Aristotle's poetics are substantially the same document written by the original author. Since the New Testament has vastly greater copies and even better dating, it's probably safe to conclude the NT is also substantially unchanged. Now as for the message within the Bible. Can we count that as reliable? Did Jesus really perform these miracles? Was Jesus miraculously resurrected? Is Jesus really God? Treating all questions would take too much time. Let's just examine one of the questions, Jesus resurrection. Christianity is founded on Jesus resurrection. Resurrection establishes the Godhood of Jesus. It also establishes Christian salvation and thus Christian theology. Without resurrection, there would be no Christianity. If one wants to challenge Christianity, this would be the right place. So what happened through the ages? What has been the results of challenging the resurrection of Christ. Results have been underwhelming. From the 1st century Jewish pharisees to our current century scholars, the results of challenges have been underwhelming. I have yet to see anything shake the foundations of Christianity. There were plenty of opportunities in the 1st century, and nothing happened. There are plenty of opportunities in our current century, and not even a stir. This is such a non issue, that I have yet to hear of a Christian who has lost sleep over this question. The lack of a proper counter to claims of Jesus resurrection is not really proof. I was attempting an abbreviated explanation as time does not permit me to write much. Also published books do a much more comprehensive analysis. I would recommend books by Josh McDowell, an anti-Christian turned Christian.
Emcee Lam wrote: I would recommend books by Josh McDowell I read More Than a Carpenter. Very interesting. The question of Lord, Liar, or Lunatic, seems to cover it. He has some compelling ideas, which apparently worked to convert himself. I believe his initial intent (on different book i believe) was to actually disprove Christian beliefs, right? Not very successful at that, though. :-D Are into apologetics at all, Emcee? BW "Gandalf. Yes. That is what they used to call me. Gandalf the Grey. *I* am Gandalf the White." - Gandalf the White
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Emcee, I was not trying to start a debate on validity of Christian believes. I don't think that either one of us can present any substantial (at least in the eyes of the other) evidence for validity or not validity of any of the key events described in the bible. Thank you for book recommendation. Peace. Kostya.
Neither was it my intent to start on a debate. You ask questions. That is good. Only by asking good questions, can one bring confidence to the beliefs that he holds. I only wish that Christians would ask questions of the degree that you have demonstrated.
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Emcee Lam wrote: I would recommend books by Josh McDowell I read More Than a Carpenter. Very interesting. The question of Lord, Liar, or Lunatic, seems to cover it. He has some compelling ideas, which apparently worked to convert himself. I believe his initial intent (on different book i believe) was to actually disprove Christian beliefs, right? Not very successful at that, though. :-D Are into apologetics at all, Emcee? BW "Gandalf. Yes. That is what they used to call me. Gandalf the Grey. *I* am Gandalf the White." - Gandalf the White
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Just to let you know, "Abraham's Bosom" refers to Paradise. Tartarus is the torment part of Hades. Also, the word Hades is also used as a reference to Tartarus. There are also references in the Old Testament to "lowest Sheol" (sometimes translated hell) and "high sheol" (again, sometimes translated hell). These refer to torment and paradise respectively. Jason Gerard qeou kai kurios Iasou Cristou doulos
I've been reading Bulfinch's Mythology a little today and found this reference to Tartarus. thought is was interesting the name was the same. "Jupiter, with his brothers and sisters, now rebelled against their father Saturn and his brothers the Titans; vanquished them, and imprisoned some of them in Tartarus, inflicting other penalties on others" BW "Gandalf. Yes. That is what they used to call me. Gandalf the Grey. *I* am Gandalf the White." - Gandalf the White
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I've been reading Bulfinch's Mythology a little today and found this reference to Tartarus. thought is was interesting the name was the same. "Jupiter, with his brothers and sisters, now rebelled against their father Saturn and his brothers the Titans; vanquished them, and imprisoned some of them in Tartarus, inflicting other penalties on others" BW "Gandalf. Yes. That is what they used to call me. Gandalf the Grey. *I* am Gandalf the White." - Gandalf the White
Yes, the concept of Sheol is similar to Hades in Greek Mythology. Tartarus being the place of Torment in Hades in Greek Mythology, the word is used in Scripture to refer to Torment in Sheol since the concept is similar and the New Testament was written in Greek. Jason Gerard qeou kai kurios Iasou Cristou doulos