'Twas a good try at a religious non-debating topic, but it's all downhill from here
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On topic: What are the consequences (if any at all) of the belief/ discovery that God has a wife? Does this happen to change any core principles of Christianity?
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DarkPlasmaBall
United States43777 Posts
'Twas a good try at a religious non-debating topic, but it's all downhill from here ![]() On topic: What are the consequences (if any at all) of the belief/ discovery that God has a wife? Does this happen to change any core principles of Christianity? | ||
Igakusei
United States610 Posts
On March 24 2011 03:32 bball wrote: how do you find evidence for god's wife when there is no evidence for him at all... It's evidence that some unspecified number of ancient Hebrews believed that their choice god had a wife, not evidence that the actual god that they believed in had a wife. | ||
WhiteDog
France8650 Posts
Man... god is a slave just like me. | ||
DoctorHelvetica
United States15034 Posts
On March 24 2011 03:33 DarkPlasmaBall wrote: Well, we lasted 7-8 pages before talking about proving the existence of God (which isn't the point of the thread). 'Twas a good try at a religious non-debating topic, but it's all downhill from here ![]() On topic: What are the consequences (if any at all) of the belief/ discovery that God has a wife? Does this happen to change any core principles of Christianity? The most important core principle: monotheism. Although it is likely this is some form of sensationalist writing. There were many hebrew gods in the Old Testament, but they were considered idols. It's quite possible Asher falls under this camp, probable even. | ||
SnK-Arcbound
United States4423 Posts
On March 24 2011 03:33 DarkPlasmaBall wrote: Well, we lasted 7-8 pages before talking about proving the existence of God (which isn't the point of the thread). 'Twas a good try at a religious non-debating topic, but it's all downhill from here ![]() On topic: What are the consequences (if any at all) of the belief/ discovery that God has a wife? Does this happen to change any core principles of Christianity? God does have a wife. The wife is the church of god (literally), but not an actual wife (allegorically). The purpose of God making people was so that they would either choose to be with him and do like him, or not. He'll be with the ones who want to know him. God having a wife is true, however saying it is some goddess is false. God's relationship towards the church is different from marriage, but it needs to be relayed to us in means that we can understand. | ||
DarkPlasmaBall
United States43777 Posts
On March 24 2011 03:42 DoctorHelvetica wrote: Show nested quote + On March 24 2011 03:33 DarkPlasmaBall wrote: Well, we lasted 7-8 pages before talking about proving the existence of God (which isn't the point of the thread). 'Twas a good try at a religious non-debating topic, but it's all downhill from here ![]() On topic: What are the consequences (if any at all) of the belief/ discovery that God has a wife? Does this happen to change any core principles of Christianity? The most important core principle: monotheism. Well there existed the acknowledgement of multiple gods in the Bible; it was just the case that the Christian God didn't want his followers worshipping any other god besides him. Heck, it was even his first commandment! So that being said, I don't think that his wife would change the principle of monotheism, unless Christians started worshipping her as well. | ||
JiYan
United States3668 Posts
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DarkPlasmaBall
United States43777 Posts
On March 24 2011 03:43 SnK-Arcbound wrote: Show nested quote + On March 24 2011 03:33 DarkPlasmaBall wrote: Well, we lasted 7-8 pages before talking about proving the existence of God (which isn't the point of the thread). 'Twas a good try at a religious non-debating topic, but it's all downhill from here ![]() On topic: What are the consequences (if any at all) of the belief/ discovery that God has a wife? Does this happen to change any core principles of Christianity? God does have a wife. The wife is the church of god (literally), but not an actual wife (allegorically). The purpose of God making people was so that they would either choose to be with him and do like him, or not. He'll be with the ones who want to know him. God having a wife is true, however saying it is some goddess is false. God's relationship towards the church is different from marriage, but it needs to be relayed to us in means that we can understand. I don't think that the church's relationship with God is exactly the type of "God's wife" relationship that the OP is talking about. Perhaps someone else could chime in on this topic, as I need to go to class now ![]() Regardless, I think discussions like these are steps in the positive direction to keeping this thread open (rather than debating the validity of religion or God's existence), in my humble opinion. | ||
Dagobert
Netherlands1858 Posts
On March 23 2011 11:58 gongryong wrote: you should read Rorty and Vattimo's Future of Religion instead. That's gotta be a very short book. | ||
Igakusei
United States610 Posts
On March 24 2011 03:42 DoctorHelvetica wrote: Show nested quote + On March 24 2011 03:33 DarkPlasmaBall wrote: Well, we lasted 7-8 pages before talking about proving the existence of God (which isn't the point of the thread). 'Twas a good try at a religious non-debating topic, but it's all downhill from here ![]() On topic: What are the consequences (if any at all) of the belief/ discovery that God has a wife? Does this happen to change any core principles of Christianity? The most important core principle: monotheism. Although it is likely this is some form of sensationalist writing. There were many hebrew gods in the Old Testament, but they were considered idols. It's quite possible Asher falls under this camp, probable even. The issue under discussion is whether or not they were always considered idols. A lot of people replying in this thread have a view of the Bible that it is exactly what it says it is, which answers the question rather cleanly from a superficial point of view. From a historical critical viewpoint however, there is significant evidence of assumed polytheism in the Bible itself, one type of which I posted on the last page. There are other lines of evidence such as the types of stories told (e.g. Abraham and his immediate descendants interacting personally with a tangible God vs Yahweh guiding later Hebrews as a pillar of cloud/fire and generally interacting in more removed/intangible ways), and how they correlate to the types of stories told by other contemporary religions. The evidence doesn't support the assumption that Abraham's descendants always believed that there was only one God and the others were simply idols, but that's an assumption that most Christians are raised with and many of the posters here seem to be working from. | ||
wadadde
270 Posts
On March 24 2011 03:43 SnK-Arcbound wrote: Show nested quote + On March 24 2011 03:33 DarkPlasmaBall wrote: Well, we lasted 7-8 pages before talking about proving the existence of God (which isn't the point of the thread). 'Twas a good try at a religious non-debating topic, but it's all downhill from here ![]() On topic: What are the consequences (if any at all) of the belief/ discovery that God has a wife? Does this happen to change any core principles of Christianity? God does have a wife. The wife is the church of god (literally), but not an actual wife (allegorically). The purpose of God making people was so that they would either choose to be with him and do like him, or not. He'll be with the ones who want to know him. God having a wife is true, however saying it is some goddess is false. God's relationship towards the church is different from marriage, but it needs to be relayed to us in means that we can understand. The wonderful thing about religious opinions/theories about the nature of the world (= god, the universe and everything human) is that it's completely open to speculation. Since nothing can ever be tested, attractive speculation becomes the highest form of truth. Let's hope we can all laugh about how playful and ultimately pointless these speculative adventures grounded in dogma are. Obviously science does go beyond mere speculation. It's just unfortunate that we cannot study things that don't seem to exist. Does Santa have a wife? Damn, science fails again. | ||
Butterz
688 Posts
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Jswizzy
United States791 Posts
On March 24 2011 04:07 Igakusei wrote: Show nested quote + On March 24 2011 03:42 DoctorHelvetica wrote: On March 24 2011 03:33 DarkPlasmaBall wrote: Well, we lasted 7-8 pages before talking about proving the existence of God (which isn't the point of the thread). 'Twas a good try at a religious non-debating topic, but it's all downhill from here ![]() On topic: What are the consequences (if any at all) of the belief/ discovery that God has a wife? Does this happen to change any core principles of Christianity? The most important core principle: monotheism. Although it is likely this is some form of sensationalist writing. There were many hebrew gods in the Old Testament, but they were considered idols. It's quite possible Asher falls under this camp, probable even. The issue under discussion is whether or not they were always considered idols. A lot of people replying in this thread have a view of the Bible that it is exactly what it says it is, which answers the question rather cleanly from a superficial point of view. From a historical critical viewpoint however, there is significant evidence of assumed polytheism in the Bible itself, one type of which I posted on the last page. There are other lines of evidence such as the types of stories told (e.g. Abraham and his immediate descendants interacting personally with a tangible God vs Yahweh guiding later Hebrews as a pillar of cloud/fire and generally interacting in more removed/intangible ways), and how they correlate to the types of stories told by other contemporary religions. The evidence doesn't support the assumption that Abraham's descendants always believed that there was only one God and the others were simply idols, but that's an assumption that most Christians are raised with and many of the posters here seem to be working from. Well even some early Christians supported the idea that more Gods existed. Marcion had a huge following and he was excommunicated in the second century from the church because he was teaching that Yahweh was a lesser malevolent god that made the Earth when El wasn't looking. As a matter of fact the canonizing of the books of the Bible is a direct response to Marcion's work on making his own canon. | ||
Facedriller
Sweden275 Posts
I'd gladly skullcrush a creationist. User was warned for this post | ||
Igakusei
United States610 Posts
On March 24 2011 04:14 Butterz wrote: Remove this thread please Why? It's been pretty civil so far... On March 24 2011 04:19 Facedriller wrote: I bet that there are some dumbass creationists in here. I'd gladly skullcrush a creationist. Goddammit, you're trying to prove me wrong. Let's try to keep this thing on-topic and avoid posting inflammatory one-liners that can't do anything but degrade the quality of the thread. | ||
billyX333
United States1360 Posts
seriously, why are people trying to turn this thread into another god debate | ||
kn83
United States6 Posts
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Jswizzy
United States791 Posts
On March 24 2011 04:31 kn83 wrote: The fact that the ancient Jews worshiped many gods is no hidden secret, hell Christians and Jews themselves didn't try to hide this fact at all. Most people don't seem to know ( which many religious scholars point out) that monotheism, polytheism, pantheism and others are purely modern concepts that largely had no meaning to people in ancient/medieval times ( the words themselves were coined by Western Europeans in 17th-18th centuries, with no earlier parallels ). Also, many scholars of today pointed out that the rejection of Asherah (a foreign deity) had mostly to do with the Jews ethnic conflicts with the Canaanites and not with theology (the Jews still had female deities that they still worshiped afterward). Also, Asherah was said to by El's wife, not Yahweh (YHWH, who was considered the absolute, ineffable, beyond any relation, genderless, etc if your in to metaphysics). Yahweh was the center of attention because he's the "essence" of God (hence his "personal" name). Going back to the first point, the many gods and goddess of ancient Israel are in fact the numerous names/attributes of God/YHWH in Orthodox Judaism (one of the names, Elohim, is in fact plural, that's why God refers to himself as "we" in parts of the Bible, he's ALL of the gods, not one among others). When you think about it, its no different from Hinduism ("truth is one, but it is known by many names" says the Rig Veda). In light of all this if you're not a literalist, you could read the 2nd commandment as "don't cling to anything except me". If you were to translate these names in Arabic, you'd get the 99 names of Allah in Islam ( Muslims DO worship the same God, this shouldn't even be a debate). The issue about the Christian trinity is not that Jews and Muslim actually think Christians worship 3 gods (Mormons kind of do though), its a debate over God's essence. The sensationalism around this issue is based on pure feminist crap about Abrahamic religions "suppressing" the feminine (completely ignoring the fact that sexism exist in ALL religions and the whole of human culture in general, see Pandora's Box in Greek Mythology for example). I think that explains everything. I am not really buying the whole Hindu thing. It contradicts the fact that all the Gods found in the Bible even Yahweh existed in the Canaanite pantheon before the formation of Israel. There is no evidence to believe that Yahweh was anything but a local storm God. All the Gods at that period of time were tied to locations and even Yahweh was tied to a mountain. | ||
CursedRich
United Kingdom737 Posts
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wadadde
270 Posts
On March 24 2011 04:31 billyX333 wrote: studying ancient texts/belief systems =/= believing the ancient texts/beliefs seriously, why are people trying to turn this thread into another god debate Absolutely! But there's no chance in hell that many would reply to new evidence about the beliefs of some ancient people if it didn't have some significance for us now. People inadvertently care about core truths. There's no way to talk sensibly about any of this without addressing how absurd the fascination is. Well, maybe there is a way, but it entails ignoring the elephant in the room. That's hard. | ||
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