Keep your Theist/Atheist arguments here

[Bruce Tuncks]

Don't the Jews just have the old testament? Where their  god character is the most wicked character in all fiction?

Maybe that's why murder and raping and child molestation are not in the ten commandments.

AND, OME, if I was god then the bible would contain fewer wicked ideas and maybe a reference or two to things that were unknown to ordinary scribes of those days...  like germs for example.

 

[Bruce Tuncks]

Is not the trinity a form of polytheism? 3 gods and one god as it suits?

[spacesailor]

I have, seen a five fingered woman !.

BUT 

She considered it a Curse,  and would happily have one cut off.

I have only Four fingers,

With

Three segments each,

And

Count in Twelve,s.

TWELVE COMANDMETS,

GOD

That would be awfull !.   LoL

spacesailor

 

[facthunter]

Isn't the Holy Trinity a concept of Constantine and He proclaimed it because on one else would make a decision. The later formed Islam was firm on "no God but Allah".   Nev

[Bruce Tuncks]

Yep Nev, I think that the council of Nicea was the place where Christianity was born, and this was at the command of Constantine who wanted a religion suitable for conquered people. " blessed be the meek, for he shall inherit the kingdom of heaven" is a lot better from the rulers point of view  than " for how can men die better, than facing fearful odds/ For the ashes of his fathers, and the temples of his gods"  stuff that the old Romans had.

[facthunter]

The Father , the son and the holy ghost do take a it of explaining. Religion is very much a matter of each to his own. Mine's bigger than yours and death to the non believers. god willing. What could be more simple? Nev

[willedoo]

On 21/02/2021 at 5:59 PM, facthunter said:

Isn't the Holy Trinity a concept of Constantine and He proclaimed it because on one else would make a decision. The later formed Islam was firm on "no God but Allah".   Nev

The Holy Trinity is the big sticking point with Muslims in regard to Christianity. They believe there's only one God, the same God that they and the Christians worship. They just call him by the Arabic name. Muslims revere and respect both Muhammad and Jesus as prophets, but draw the line at Christians worshiping Jesus as one and the same with God. To them it's blasphemy. I think Christians have a different idea about what the Trinity means, but Muslims just see it as people worshiping a prophet. In their eyes, not much better than the Idolators that Muhammad kicked out of Mecca to found Islam.

[facthunter]

There's much money made from the Mecca experience which is compulsory at least once for each Muslim.  Images of Mohammed are forbidden and after him no other prophet is going to happen. Unless you are Bahai or such..  Nev

[Bruce Tuncks]

Bahai or mormons both came after islam. Like " the war to end all wars" it was wishful thinking to say mohammed would be the last prophet.

Just how they are called prophets, when they came up with nothing at all beyond what was known to any scribe in those days, is a mystery to me.

[Bruce Tuncks]

Well I helped start a school called trinity college and I never found out about the trinity. So I asked this guy I knew who had done a phd in philosophy and who lived in trinity gardens, a suburb of Adelaide. He said the answer was to enquire who or what put that wicked question into my head.

An anglican priest I knew who was building a plane had a different answer " A divine mystery" said he.

So I still don't know.

[nomadpete]

What? You mean there isn't a religion to end all religions?

[willedoo]

On 24/02/2021 at 3:04 PM, facthunter said:

Images of Mohammed are forbidden

I think they would see that as idolatry. Originally Mecca was inhabited by idolators. I can't remember whether Mohammed got disillusioned and left or whether he was booted out. From memory he went to Medina and when he had enough converts, was able to go back and sack Mecca. He had no trouble getting converts as it was religion at the point of a sword. They would ride into an area, and the local men would be given a choice. Join us or we cut your head cut off and take your women and camels and anything else you own.

 

When you think about it, it's a no-brainer. Get your head cut off, or ride around cutting other people's heads off and taking their women and camels. In those days becoming a Muslim was the smart choice. He had no shortage of mates when he arrived back at Mecca. Straight into the temple and smashed all the idols and statues. The idolating priests were given the choice to convert or die and they couldn't get their Muslim caps on quick enough.

 

I think the ban on idolatory is why mosques have nothing in them and no pulpit. The only one I've been in was on a ship and if you didn't know better, you would swear it was the ship's dance hall.

[Bruce Tuncks]

Did you hear about the exploding prayer mats being sold?  Prophets are going through the roof.

[Jerry_Atrick]

Well, at the risk of thread "drift"...

 

 

 

[old man emu]

The design of the boat as the one we picture Noah building is probably a European interpretation from some time after the rise of Mediterranean sea trade.  It is likely that the origins of Noah were in the areas drained by the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.

 

 

Noah's Ark was more likely to be based on the Kuphar. A kuphar  is a type of coracle or round boat traditionally used on the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in ancient and modern Mesopotamia. Its circular shape means that it does not sail well against the current, as it tends to spin, but makes it safe, sturdy and easy to construct. A kuphar is propelled by rowing or poling. 

 

The word "kuphar" is derived from the Arabic word "quffa", meaning a basket woven from reeds and leaves. The boat visually resembles a basket and is used for a similar purpose: transporting fruits, vegetables, and other goods. At Genesis 6:16 God says to Noah, " Make thee an ark of gopher wood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch." "Gopher" is a transliteration of the word "gofer", a word not otherwise known in the Bible or in Hebrew. It could have come from the Assyrian word " giparu," reeds. Which in light of the method of construction of a kuphar is more likely.

 

And now for the Sixty-Four dollar question.

 

According to the Bible, how many of each type of animal did Noah take onto the Ark?

 

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

3 hours ago, old man emu said:

And now for the Sixty-Four dollar question.

 

According to the Bible, how many of each type of animal did Noah take onto the Ark?

Is this an episode of QI question?

 

Zero. It is a fable... [edit[ and a feeble fable at that

 

Edited February 27, 2021 by Jerry_Atrick

[old man emu]

6 hours ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

It is a fable...

Indeed it is.

 

Although the story of Noah in the Hebrew Bible has become the most well-known flood myth in Western culture, it shows the influence of earlier narratives from Mesopotamia. The nineteenth-century Assyriologist George Smith first translated a Babylonian account of a great flood, and further discoveries produced several versions of the Mesopotamian flood myth.

 

The version closest to that in Genesis appeared in a 700 BC Babylonian copy of the Epic of Gilgamesh. Many scholars believe that this account was copied from the Akkadian Atra-Hasis, which dates to the 18th century BC.  In the Gilgamesh flood myth, the highest god, Enlil, decides to destroy the world with a flood because humans have become too noisy. The god Ea, who had created humans out of clay and divine blood, secretly warns the hero Utnapishtim of the impending flood and gives him detailed instructions for building a boat so that life may survive.

 

Both the Epic of Gilgamesh and Atra-Hasis are believed to have originated in the Sumerian creation myth—the oldest surviving example of such a flood-myth narrative, known from tablets found in the ruins of Nippur in the late 1890s.

 

But that is not the question to be answered. 

9 hours ago, old man emu said:

According to the Bible, how many of each type of animal did Noah take onto the Ark?

So your reference source is the Judeo-Christian holy book. Treat the book as a piece of literature for the purposes of answering the question.

[Jerry_Atrick]

Definitely a QI question...

 

I can't answer it.. I haven't read a novel since I was about 5 - little golden books. I managed to pass HSC English without reading any of the novels.. I am not about to start now..

 

To quote our evangelical Christian mate on the Ark video, it was two... But of course, the QI sirens would be sounding.. According to this post (https://www.blueletterbible.org/faq/don_stewart/don_stewart_736.cfm), it was seven..

 

No wonder the ark was a USD$100m loss...

 

 

[facthunter]

Just another Bottom of the Harbour spiv scheme? What about marine creatures? The ark was out of bounds for them and if the whole world was flooded just where did that colossal amount of water go to?  . Also with such a restricted gene bank  to draw on  to  reproduce from the species would be of pretty ordinary quality.   Half of them would have eaten the other half. It's logistically ridiculous. Happened just before yesterday when everything was  like it is now (except technology). What about disease from the dead and rotting bodies of the rest of the world?   Nev

[spacesailor]

Hold your breath, till that stink sinks ,,

THOWN OVERBOARD

 For those marine creatures with rejection problems.

spacesailor

[pmccarthy]

It wasn't ALL animals, just the valuable farm animals. Goats, sheep, cattle, pigs, camels etc. easily carried. Ye of little faith.

[spacesailor]

PIGS !.

Only two of those Dirty Pigs.

The rest were/are in Politics with their noses in the trough. LoL

spacesailor

 

[old man emu]

5 hours ago, facthunter said:

where did that colossal amount of water go to

Since the Flood story is said to have originated in the Sumerian creation myth, and the Sumerians lived in the Tigris-Euphrates region,

 

colossal amounts of water from a particularly severe flood would have drained into the Persian Gulf. Proof of such a flood would come from the discovery of unusually large amounts of flood debris which could be dated to between 5500 and 4000 BC. Another hint would come from the discovery of the effects of extremely high precipitation as either rain or snow in the the mountains of the Armenian Highlands in that period.

 

Another possibility is a meg-tsunami from a meteorite impact. A possible suspect is the Burckle crater, an undersea feature about 29 kilometres (18 mi) in diameter, in the southwestern Indian Ocean. The Holocene Impact Working Group researchers think that it formed about 5,000 years ago (c. 3000–2800 BCE), during the Holocene epoch.

A mega-tsunami from an impact there would surely send water up through the Gulf of Oman and Persian Gulf. Nobody has determined which way the flood waters came.

 

 

[onetrack]

You all forgot, the Bible says it rained for 40 days and nights, non-stop. That cuts out Tsunamis from meteorite hits. And to add to that, Genesis also says, "the fountains of the great deep were broken up".

This line appears to refer to subterranean aquifers bursting out from the ground - quite possible, with a seismological event. But Genesis fails to mention any earthquake, so more mystery there.

 

Of course,, "Evan Almighty" has already shown us exactly what happens when it comes to building an Ark without proper engineering qualifications, and properly draughted plans, while you argue with the designer and suppliers.

 

It seems odd that no-one has gone looking for recent sediments and signs of flooding within the last 6000 years in the M.E.

And of course, Genesis says nothing about where the Ark ended up, even though the true believers are convinced it's on Mt Ararat. Where the mention of Mt Ararat came from, is anyones guess.

 

I think it's more likely the Ark was pulled apart for building materials, or eaten by termites, thus adding to the eternal mystery.

[old man emu]

Ancient facts become the basis of ancient myths and ancient myths fall victim the "Chinese Whispers, a meaning that is often invoked as a metaphor for cumulative error, especially the inaccuracies as rumours or gossip spread, or, more generally, for the unreliability of human recollection or even oral traditions. I believe that ancient myths and legends have at least some grain of fact in them. It is the task set us to rummage through the inaccuracies and failed recollections to find that grain.

 

If I simply said to you that a piece of land was flooded, wouldn't your first thought, from your experience, be that there had been a lot of rain? If I said that the bathroom was flooded, wouldn't you think that a water tap had been left on, or a drain blocked? Those are two types of flooding I would expect you to know. However, how experienced are you in flooding by tsunami? I'm sure that it has only been in recent years as global communication has allowed the instant reporting of events that you have experienced tsunamis. Well, at least most of us. So if there was a sudden flooding of the land isn't it likely that a few generations after it occurred the cause of the flooding would be attributed to rainfall?

 

Tradition credits Moses as the author of Genesis, as well as the books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and most of Deuteronomy, but modern scholars, especially from the 19th century, onward see them as a product of the 6th and 5th centuries BC. We know that the Flood story dates from four to five thousand years before the suspected time of Moses around 1250BC.

41 minutes ago, onetrack said:

It seems odd that no-one has gone looking for recent sediments and signs of flooding within the last 6000 years in the M.E.

But they have, and found evidence. https://www.theguardian.com/science/2000/sep/14/internationalnews.archaeology Marine archaeologists have found the first evidence of a people who perished in a great flood of the Black Sea that has been linked with the story of Noah's ark. OK, the findings were in the Black Sea, but people do move about. About 7,000 years ago, according to geological evidence, the rising Mediterranean sea pushed a channel through what is now the Bosphorus, and then seawater poured in at about 200 times the volume of Niagara Falls. The Black Sea would have widened at the rate of a mile a day, submerging the original shoreline under hundreds of feet of salty water.