How does that affect me?

[Bradygg]

[QUOTE=paralreg;1310483]

You quote my words as garbage because there has never been a religion that has not abused its followers and you are unable to accept that perhaps you should indeed cast out the moat from your own eye before you seek the speck in mine. However I wish you and yours all well and bid you a good bye as it now appears very clear to me that you do not want a friendship from God but a crutch to lean on and a whipping boy for the bad times. My God is not your God because we are two different people with different attitudes I talk to God, Mutter in a disgruntled fashion to God, I ask god for help I know it won't give because it can't. But I still do these things over and over but my God remains with me and I know that and in that knowing is everything I need from God. I never sing to it, I never shout at it, I never kneel before its image, I never call it lord, and in return it supports me in my daily life and is always there to listen. Can you truly say the same?



I am sorry my friend but that is exactly what it is!!!! Christianity is and always has been the tool of the ruling classes from the crusades to our wars they were all "just" because we had God on our side and a whole network of greedy power hungry religious maggots propagating this fallacy and sending millions to die IN A GOOD CAUSE AND GODS NAME.

re·li·gion

[ri-lij-uhn]
noun1.a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, especially when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.

That's why I say it's garbage... whether you like it or not, what you have is a religion. So for you to say that religion is corrupt, well...

[paralreg]

As I have said through out our exchange I accept your religion as right for YOU with all its limitations and preconceived ideas. Whereas your mind should be both enlightened and enlarged by God it is instead bound by ritual religion this is little if any more than automaton worship, comfort Christianity, if you want to say I have a religion that's OK, but it is a religion I follow under mine and Gods terms, not other men's conditions. If I am encumbered by such governance I am unaware of it other than my acceptance that the very laws of our land that we live under are formed from the Christian religion and I am sure that any open minded person could without bias go through these and show how Gods laws, as scribed by man, have been cherry picked to aid the causes of the rich and powerful and worsen the standing of the poor and weak while the "Church" wrings its hands in gods name and rapes the poor for ever more of what precious little they have or face the fires of damnation or some such drivel.

While our discourse has been progressing as I knew little of the Lutherans I have taken the time to learn, being raised a Methodist, I am a little acquainted with Martin Luther and his general view point. BUT AHHHH! The Lutherans, the Lutherans! As I look, admittedly at this time only little more than superficially, it seems to me the actual adherence to original precepts is shallow to say the least with more of a kinship to the fictional Lex rather than the actual Martin. As I say I have made but a brief foray into the modern Lutheran doctrines and maybe over time I may find differently, God alone knows. However for yourself and what you hold dear, my God and I wish you all well.

[Bradygg]

As I have said through out our exchange I accept your religion as right for YOU with all its limitations and preconceived ideas. Whereas your mind should be both enlightened and enlarged by God it is instead bound by ritual religion this is little if any more than automaton worship, comfort Christianity, if you want to say I have a religion that's OK, but it is a religion I follow under mine and Gods terms, not other men's conditions. If I am encumbered by such governance I am unaware of it other than my acceptance that the very laws of our land that we live under are formed from the Christian religion and I am sure that any open minded person could without bias go through these and show how Gods laws, as scribed by man, have been cherry picked to aid the causes of the rich and powerful and worsen the standing of the poor and weak while the "Church" wrings its hands in gods name and rapes the poor for ever more of what precious little they have or face the fires of damnation or some such drivel.

While our discourse has been progressing as I knew little of the Lutherans I have taken the time to learn, being raised a Methodist, I am a little acquainted with Martin Luther and his general view point. BUT AHHHH! The Lutherans, the Lutherans! As I look, admittedly at this time only little more than superficially, it seems to me the actual adherence to original precepts is shallow to say the least with more of a kinship to the fictional Lex rather than the actual Martin. As I say I have made but a brief foray into the modern Lutheran doctrines and maybe over time I may find differently, God alone knows. However for yourself and what you hold dear, my God and I wish you all well.

While our congregation was originally inspired by Martin Luther, and we do uphold him as a great man. We do not, however, follow the man. Instead, we walk WITH him. For the only priesthood we need is Jesus.

I can't help but have sympathy for you and your religion. It sounds so lonely. It is much easier to walk with others then by yourself. Due to the lack of a name for your RELIGION, I'm going to give you one. You shall be now known as - from me anyway - Ingredisolumian(Walk Alone). Has a nice ring to it.

[paralreg]

While our congregation was originally inspired by Martin Luther, and we do uphold him as a great man. We do not, however, follow the man. Instead, we walk WITH him. For the only priesthood we need is Jesus.

I can't help but have sympathy for you and your religion. It sounds so lonely. It is much easier to walk with others then by yourself. Due to the lack of a name for your RELIGION, I'm going to give you one. You shall be now known as - from me anyway - Ingredisolumian(Walk Alone). Has a nice ring to it.

I have to say I think your sympathy for me is but a reflection of your apathy towards God, a common enough trait among the religious where it is all to often the practice to follow the diktats of the religion rather than the word of God.
I have not walked alone for many years God lightens my life, lengthens my stride and shortens the road before me and is always there to comfort and guide me should the road steepen or I start to loose my way. I have friends aplenty many in God and many not so Godly I value none above the other for whether they choose to admit it or not we are all the children of God and should respect each other in that light. I realise that you find the concept of friendship even kinship with God worrying even frightening as it is a tremendous leap of faith to go from follower to friend, but the fear is ours, God waits now and will always wait with open arms for us to take that leap.

[Bradygg]

I have to say I think your sympathy for me is but a reflection of your apathy towards God, a common enough trait among the religious where it is all to often the practice to follow the diktats of the religion rather than the word of God.
I have not walked alone for many years God lightens my life, lengthens my stride and shortens the road before me and is always there to comfort and guide me should the road steepen or I start to loose my way. I have friends aplenty many in God and many not so Godly I value none above the other for whether they choose to admit it or not we are all the children of God and should respect each other in that light. I realise that you find the concept of friendship even kinship with God worrying even frightening as it is a tremendous leap of faith to go from follower to friend, but the fear is ours, God waits now and will always wait with open arms for us to take that leap.

so if you say that the bible isn't the word of God, then what pray tell, is? I don't really understand how it is apathy towards God to believe Christ died for us so we can be saved.

[paralreg]

so if you say that the bible isn't the word of God, then what pray tell, is? I don't really understand how it is apathy towards God to believe Christ died for us so we can be saved.

HOOKAY! Here we go, my take on it, this may not be unique to me, so if others claim ownership of this concept when I have laid it down as it seems to me, that's fine, I have all I need.
To my mind when a child is born and it takes its first breath with that breath comes the spirit of God which is either denied or allowed to develop within us as it has in you and I, for even though our concepts differ we are still if you like "Of God". With this in mind consider the good gentlemen of the biblical times being GOOD men they felt this particle of God within them as most good people do some call it conscience, some a gut feeling, its that innate knowing right from wrong that I sure you agree we all have even if some choose to ignore it. These long gone men interpreted the world around then with this innate spirit and attributed all creation to God (Genesis is actually a fairly accurate and cleverly compressed description of the big bang and some evolutionary theories) and wrote the bible as they believed God would have done it, but they lived in violent and troubled times where lives were short and slavery and evil etc commonplace, these things they knew deep inside were wrong and wrote the bible to bring a powerful entity, God, to bear on the evil doers. They then backed up this concept by creating miracles and wondrous happenings these brought the Bible and its teachings of kindness and love to the masses, I doubt the miracles as actual miraculous happenings as most can be reasonably explained within the context of the times. I will not argue about Christ being the Son of God neither you, I, nor anyone can say that beyond any doubt, particularly as he asked God to forgive his killers as in "forgive them FATHER for they know not what they do" or some such he was very important and became the catalyst of change in this world but I do not feel there is truth in the trinity, God is God and Christ if you like was its son for me no more, therefore to worship Christ effectively, for his death, often tends to leave the real power, God, a poor second in many Christian followings. But, I do believe in the ethos of Christs teachings of love and repentance and so on. Today with the input from Jesus, the Saints and Martyrs etc the Bible has become a very very good "How to Live" book and people following its teachings are usually good people but there are many that see this philosophy as a cherry, ripe and ready to pick, say for instance the McGripplers, this group was founded by Isaac McGripple in the late 1900's and promised the people that if they donated to the gripplathon crusade then God would reward them many times over and because the people were poor they donated a penny and some got 2 pennies back (about a third would) this was spread as a modern day miracle and more contributed and so on and on. The trouble is that because of age these groups and I count Catholicism as one have become acceptable even respected to such a degree that the pennies no longer go out to the poor even as a ruse, now its only the promises of riches in Heaven. Today we have many crusades, campaigns and blessings or healings all penny pinching frauds in my humble opinion.

There is little to be gained from carrying this dialogue any further for perhaps we are both far too entrenched in our own concepts. I certainly do not understand the concept of congregations, churches, singing and often shouting, communion and wine and bread, and holy Masses. It all seems too contrived and cumbersome to me, I will shut of my computer and go to bed, there I may lay and talk to God, perhaps even ask if I have spoken truth in this missive, I hope I have but there is only one who KNOWS.

As Dave Allen used to say "Good Night and may your God go with you".

[paralreg]

I intended to add but my PC went durr that I did of course make up the McGripples, a Gripple is actually a gismo made in Sheffield and is used for joining wires such as fence wire etc and has as far as I know no religious principles.

[Plutonium]

Well, trinity was in the Bible.

Where?

Translators simply marked it as a typo. They thought it was bad grammar. So the way I'd see it is that Christianity was led astray then came closer to it's original christianity in the late 1700s.

There have been numerous translations of the Bible into English and other languages. The text in its original language is also available. I do not know of one single one in which the Trinity appears. True, there are passages that can be interpreted in a Trinitarian way, but there are others which would be very difficult to fit with Trinitarian doctrine.

Even today there isn't complete agreement on the Trinity. The Orthodox Church holds that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father only, while the western churches hold that he proceeds from the Father and the Son (the 'filioque' clause). If you look at the Bible, you will find that the Orthodox position is more scripturally correct.

I would recommend you to read "Lost Christianities" by Bart Ehrman. It looks at all the different varieties of Christian belief that existed in the first few centuries. The faith that we know today was merely the version that ultimately won out. And there wasn't even agreement on what books should be included in the New Testament. It was not until the fourth century AD that the 27 books of the current New Testament came to be accepted. Why is the Apocalypse of Peter, which describes the torments of the damned in hell, not included, but the Apocalypse of John (the Book of Revelation), which describes the end of the world, is in there? Incidentally, I believe that Luther regarded the latter as not being canonical, so there isn't even complete agreement there.

Lost Christianities: The Battles for Scripture and the Faiths We Never Knew: Amazon.co.uk: Bart D. Ehrman: Books

When I say what a christian is, I'm saying what the Bible states. The Jehovah witnesses have their own bible, they re"translated" an ENGLISH BIBLE. That is pretty much a huge No-no. You can't translate something if it isn't from it's roots.

I'm not familiar with the background to the New World translation. However, JW's I have encountered seem to be more 'clued up' than your average Christian about the original languages of the Bible.

I would say that a number of translations used by 'mainstream' Christians are pretty bad as well: the paraphrased versions are not telling you what the Bible says, but how the translater has interpreted it and how he wants you to understand it. I'm talking about some well accepted versions such as the Good News Bible and the New International version.

There is no agreement on what the Bible states anyway. There's one Bible, but many Bible-believing churches. Why?

Mormons deny the Bible. They state it's the word of God, but in the same breath, call it flawed and corrupt. Just as the Jehovah witnesses proclaim.

Well the Mormons, as I understand it, believe that the church fell into a state of error and apostasy within living memory of Christ, and was only re-established in its correct form when Joseph Smith found the tablets with the Book of Mormon on. Who am I to say that this is wrong?

[paralreg]

Translations of any text depend for their accuracy on the diligence and ability of the translator and to argue on the origins of this or that bit of texts translation is merely a futile waste of time that could be put to better use defining what God is, for a start. My thoughts are I hope well expounded throughout this thread and I hope needs no more attention, but where did God come from?
The Big Bang Theory, while there are a few serious alternative theories, BB seems the best and its rough progress over time along with evolutionary theories, does have some correlation when compressed with the Genesis line, so if everything came from then where did God come from? Is it possible that as well as the material things that flowed from the BB non material things also were created and developed in parallel with the material. I know that it is possibly a modernish thing but we refer to God the Father and to Mother Earth, now, assuming Genesis is as above, is it not possible that the story Adam and Eve could indeed have been telling of the uniting of the Earthly Mother with the Heavenly Father commencing the evolution of the Earth and of humanity and not as man has believed for thousands of years simply a man and a woman?
This idea that may be, in fact probably is, an old one I don't know but it has JUST occurred to me so I have put it to you. It does seem strange that while man willingly worships a metaphysical and unprovable God without question. But we do not look upon the very thing from which we came, that provides food and shelter for us in life, and accepts us back to it in death, as more than dirt and water, all the positives are given to the usually masculine God.

My head hurts now!

[Plutonium]

Translations of any text depend for their accuracy on the diligence and ability of the translator and to argue on the origins of this or that bit of texts translation is merely a futile waste of time that could be put to better use defining what God is, for a start.

I do not think it is futile to discuss translations of the Bible or other texts. You are right that much may depend on the diligence of a translator, which is why it is best to compare different translations, and also if possible look at the text in the original language.