Tod
16 Mar 2009, 02:54 AM
Yahweh is generally believed by most of today's Jews and Christians to be an Omnimax being who is infinite in power, knowledge, goodness, and justice. Most would add that he is omnipresent as well.
What is amazing is that many of them simultaneously believe the Bible is inerrant, and the majority of them that believe the Bible at least basically represents Yahweh, if not inerrantly.
It doesn't take an indepth reading of the Bible to see contradictory teachings on Yahweh's attributes. You don't have to go much further than the beginning to see this:
Yahweh God said, 'It is not right that the man should be alone. I shall make him a helper. So from the soil Yahweh God fashioned all the wild animals and all the birds of heaven. These he brought to the man to see what he would call them; each one was to bear the name the man would give it. The man gave names to all the cattle, all the birds of heaven and all the wild animals. But no helper suitable for the man was found for him. (Gen. 2:18-20, emphasis added)
Okay, so the all-knowing Yahweh thought that perhaps the first man would find an animal a suitable "helper" (i.e. "mate")?? The omniscient Yahweh didn't realize that a human being might require the mental stimulation and physical attraction of another human being to be happy?? What, at first Yahweh thought maybe a cow or a platypus might make a good mate or "helper" for Adam? If those verses are even slightly accurate, than Yahweh is a humongous idiot who is far from omniscient.
Then we have the "sin" of Eve. Okay, first of all, Gen. 2:16 tells us only that Yahweh told Adam not to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil: Eve didn't even exist yet. Then we fast forward to chapter 3, and we have the fall of Adam and Eve. The serpent tricks Eve into trying the fruit, and she entices Adam, who also succumbs.
The author of I Timothy in the NT tries to blame this situation all on Eve: A woman ought to be quite, because Adam was formed first and Eve afterwards, and it was not Adam who was led astray but the woman who was led astray and fell into sin. (I Tim 2:12-14)
Eve wasn't the one Yahweh told not to eat the fruit: Adam was. That would be like telling your eldest son to make sure he and his sister didn't get into the cookie jar, and when the baby sister talked the older brother into breaking the rules, blaming it all on her, putting no blame on the one you as the parent deemed most responsible to communicate directly with and hold responsible for the actions of the other.
At any rate, there should have been no wrong done on the part of Adam or Eve in the case of eating the fruit, at least, not logically and not if an Omnimax being was involved. If Adam didn’t know right from wrong before eating the forbidden fruit (Gen 3:22), how would he have recognized it was wrong to disobey God and eat the fruit? He couldn’t have recognize it was wrong until after he ate the fruit and it was too late by the time he took a bite. If he couldn’t have recognized his actions were wrong, how is it just at all, much less infinitely so, to punish him for eating the fruit? Why would God create people without the knowledge of right from wrong and expect them to do the right thing in the first place? That's retarded.
Why did Adam’s sin infect all of mankind? God’s own moral dictates forbid punishing people for the sins of their ancestors (Ez. 18-20 & Deut. 24:16). If the nature of this species-wide infection of sin is out of God’s hands, what of his omnipotence?
Then we have his omniscience: he knows all things. He has a plan. He is perfect. He knows every person's heart from womb to tomb, and he knows all that there is, or ever will be, to know: past, present, and future.
Yet, he had to test Abraham in Gen chapter 22 to see if he'd sacrifice his son at Yahweh's command. Why do we test people? It is because we DON'T know what a person knows or will do. In school, we test for knowledge, because a teacher can't read minds and know what students have and have not absorbed of the class material. A suspicious spouse tests her husband's fidelity with a sexy decoy. Why? Because she DOESN'T know what he will do, and wants to see what he will do so she WILL know. Any test is given because the test giver doesn't know something and wants to determine something. Yahweh didn't know what Abraham would do, so he tested him, ergo Yahweh isn't omniscient. Yahweh even qualifies his past ignorance prior to the test by saying now I know you fear God. You have not refused me your own beloved son. (Gen. 22:12, emphasis added).
"NOW I know," implying He didn't know before. Abraham is so grateful, he names the place "Yahweh provides." (Gen. 22:14). However, Yahweh claims in Ex. 6:3 I am Yahweh. To Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob I appeared as El Shaddai, but I did not make my name Yahweh known to them.
"El Shaddai" means "God Almighty," a title. So clearly this latter verse says that Abraham never knew God's proper, personal name "Yahweh," and instead knew him only by the title of "El Shaddai." Yet Gen. 22:14 says that Abraham clearly did know Yahweh's personal name, because he named a place after Yahweh!
Then you have the case of Sodom and Gomorrah:
Then Yahweh said, 'The outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is so great and their sin is so grave, that I shall go down and see whether or not their actions are at all as the outcry reaching me would suggest. Then I shall know. (Gen. 18:20-21, emphasis added)
So Yahweh wants to know something about S & G, indicating he doesn't know. However, once he "go[es] down and see[s]," he will "Then...know."
Then Yahweh tells Abraham about his plans:
Abraham stepped forward and said, 'Will you really destroy the upright with the guilty? Suppose there are fifty upright people in the city. Will you really destroy it? Will you not spare the place for the sake of the fifty upright in it? Do not think of doing such a thing: to put the upright to death with the guilty, so that upright and guilty fare alike! Is the judge of the whole world not to act justly?' Yahweh replied, If I find fifty upright people in the city of Sodom, I will spare the whole place because of them.
Abraham then says what if there's only 45, or 40, or 30, and eventually down to I shall not destroy it, [Yahweh] replied, 'for the sake of the ten. (Gen. 18:32)
So what do we have here? Yahweh shares his plans with Abraham, and Abraham has the better idea?? The mere mortal is able to talk the all-knowing, perfect Yahweh out of his, what should be, perfect and inerrant plan? Indeed, that is exactly what we have! The mere mortal Abraham has a stronger sense of justice than the allegedly infinitely just Yahweh, who has to have it explained to him why it isn't just to punish the innocent for the crimes of others!
Only one person in the city was found to be forthright and pure in Yahweh's eyes: Lot. His family alone was spared. Why was Lot just and good in Yahweh's eyes? Yahweh sent a couple of angels down as spies (Gen. 19:1) to see if there were any good people in S & G (because the all-knowing Yahweh didn't know, and had to find out through his angels, of course).
Lot found the angel spies and invited them into his home (Gen. 19:1-3). Next, ...the house was surrounded by the townspeople, the men of Sodom both young and old, all the people without exception. Calling out to Lot they said, 'Where are the men who came to you tonight? Send them out to us so that we can have intercourse with them.' Lot came out to them at the door and, having shut the door behind him, said, 'Please, brothers, do not be wicked. Look, I have two daughters who are virgins. I am ready to send them out to you, for you to treat as you please, but do nothing to these men since they are now under the protection of my roof.' (Gen. 19:4-8)
Okay, first we have the absurd. How reasonable is it to think that the entire town, thousands of people, all formed a single-minded rape gang bent on raping these two men? That's just downright silly. This is clearly very biased propaganda of the worse and most primitive kind. What's Lot doing living in this town if it's THAT bad???
Then we have the horror of Lot offering his own daughters to a rape gang to spare a couple of strangers AND the fact that this made Lot a virtuous man. Is this the Bible that governs the lives of people who claim to put Family Values first??? I'll be damned if I'm giving my little girl to a rape gang to save strangers, and if that's what it takes to be a righteous dude, I guess I'll be happy to be evil.
Of course, believers will babble on about how times were different back then, as if arguing situational ethics helps their case for objective morality from God. They do the same thing when it is pointed out that Yahweh condoned slavery: The male and female slaves you have will come from the nations round you; from these you may purchase male and female slaves. As slaves, you may also purchase the children of aliens resident among you, and also members of their families living with you who haev been born on your soil; and they will become your property, and you may leave them as a legacy to your sons after you as their perpetual possession. These you may have for slaves; but you will not oppress your brother-Israelites. (Lev. 25:44-46)
It was a different time and culture, believers will point out. Situational ethics hey??? I find that pill particularly hard to swallow since Yahweh outlined the death penalty for such crimes as: working on the sabbath, preaching another religion, being a rebellious son, being a drunkard son, striking your parents, cursing your parents, being a woman and not being a virgin when married, being a woman who commits adultery (seems to be okay for men), and being a male homosexual (seems to be okay for woman!).
Other religions, working on the sabbath, not being a virgin when married, and being homosexual were common cultural phenomena back then: why does God allow slavery to adhere to different cultural values, but not other things? I'm not buying it!
As pointed out earlier, Yahweh claims in both Deut. 24:16 and Ez. 18:19-20 that it isn't just to put people to death for the sins of their relatives. However, how often does Yahweh order this exact thing? In I Sam 15:2-3 Yahweh orders the utter genocidal annihilation of the Amalekites for the sins of their ancestors four hundred years prior:
This is what Yahweh Sabaoth says, "I intend to punish what Amalek did to Israel-laying a trap for him on the way as he was coming up from Egypt. Now, go and crush Amalek; put him under the curse of destruction with all that he possesses. Do not spare him, but kill man and woman, babe and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and donkey." (I Sam. 15:2-3)
Then, later in 2 Samuel we read of how David sent Uriah the Hittite to the front lines of battle so he could steal Uriah's wife Bathsheba (II Sam. chapter 11). To punish David for his sin, Yahweh sends Nathan to tell David Yahweh, for his part, forgives your sin; you are not to die. But since you have outraged Yahweh by doing this, the child born to you will die... Yahweh struck the child which Uriah's wife had borne to David and it fell gravely ill...on the seventh day the child died. (II Sam. 12:13-18, emphasis added)
For a final example of Yahweh contradicting his own laws against punishing the innocent for the crimes of the guilty, I offer you one of the more bizarre stories in the Bible.
In the final chapter of II Sam, chapter 24, we read that Yahweh's anger was arosed against Israel, and he incited David against them. 'Go,' he said,'take a census of Israel and Judah.' (24:1, emphasis added)
So Yahweh "incites...David [to]...take a census of Israel and Judah." Guess what he does next?? He gets angry with David for taking the census HE incited David to take in the first place!!
But afterwards David's heart misgave him for having taken a census of the people. David then said to Yahweh, 'I have committed a grave sin by doing this. But now, Yahweh, I beg you to forgive your servant for this fault, for I have acted very foolishly. When, however, David got up next morning, the following message had come from Yahweh to the prophet Gad, David's seer, Go and say to David, "Yahweh says this: I offer you three things; choose which one of them I am to inflict on you. ...'Which do you prefer: to have three years of famine befall your country; to flee for three months before a pursuing army; or to have three days of epidemic in your country?...It was the time of the wheat harvest, So Yahweh unleashed an epidemic on Israel from that morning until the time determined; plague ravaged the people and, of the people from Dan to Beersheba, seventy thousand died. (II Sam. 24:10-15)
So Yahweh "incites" David to take a census, declares it a sin, and punishes David by killing 70,000 Israelites that had nothing to do with David's sin! He violates his own sense of justice on so many levels it is pathetic; hardly the work of an Omnimax being.
If there was ever a more petty, cruel, barbaric, insecure, narcissistic/borderline, and most importantly, contradictory being than Yahweh, I'd love for somebody to point em out!
What is amazing is that many of them simultaneously believe the Bible is inerrant, and the majority of them that believe the Bible at least basically represents Yahweh, if not inerrantly.
It doesn't take an indepth reading of the Bible to see contradictory teachings on Yahweh's attributes. You don't have to go much further than the beginning to see this:
Yahweh God said, 'It is not right that the man should be alone. I shall make him a helper. So from the soil Yahweh God fashioned all the wild animals and all the birds of heaven. These he brought to the man to see what he would call them; each one was to bear the name the man would give it. The man gave names to all the cattle, all the birds of heaven and all the wild animals. But no helper suitable for the man was found for him. (Gen. 2:18-20, emphasis added)
Okay, so the all-knowing Yahweh thought that perhaps the first man would find an animal a suitable "helper" (i.e. "mate")?? The omniscient Yahweh didn't realize that a human being might require the mental stimulation and physical attraction of another human being to be happy?? What, at first Yahweh thought maybe a cow or a platypus might make a good mate or "helper" for Adam? If those verses are even slightly accurate, than Yahweh is a humongous idiot who is far from omniscient.
Then we have the "sin" of Eve. Okay, first of all, Gen. 2:16 tells us only that Yahweh told Adam not to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil: Eve didn't even exist yet. Then we fast forward to chapter 3, and we have the fall of Adam and Eve. The serpent tricks Eve into trying the fruit, and she entices Adam, who also succumbs.
The author of I Timothy in the NT tries to blame this situation all on Eve: A woman ought to be quite, because Adam was formed first and Eve afterwards, and it was not Adam who was led astray but the woman who was led astray and fell into sin. (I Tim 2:12-14)
Eve wasn't the one Yahweh told not to eat the fruit: Adam was. That would be like telling your eldest son to make sure he and his sister didn't get into the cookie jar, and when the baby sister talked the older brother into breaking the rules, blaming it all on her, putting no blame on the one you as the parent deemed most responsible to communicate directly with and hold responsible for the actions of the other.
At any rate, there should have been no wrong done on the part of Adam or Eve in the case of eating the fruit, at least, not logically and not if an Omnimax being was involved. If Adam didn’t know right from wrong before eating the forbidden fruit (Gen 3:22), how would he have recognized it was wrong to disobey God and eat the fruit? He couldn’t have recognize it was wrong until after he ate the fruit and it was too late by the time he took a bite. If he couldn’t have recognized his actions were wrong, how is it just at all, much less infinitely so, to punish him for eating the fruit? Why would God create people without the knowledge of right from wrong and expect them to do the right thing in the first place? That's retarded.
Why did Adam’s sin infect all of mankind? God’s own moral dictates forbid punishing people for the sins of their ancestors (Ez. 18-20 & Deut. 24:16). If the nature of this species-wide infection of sin is out of God’s hands, what of his omnipotence?
Then we have his omniscience: he knows all things. He has a plan. He is perfect. He knows every person's heart from womb to tomb, and he knows all that there is, or ever will be, to know: past, present, and future.
Yet, he had to test Abraham in Gen chapter 22 to see if he'd sacrifice his son at Yahweh's command. Why do we test people? It is because we DON'T know what a person knows or will do. In school, we test for knowledge, because a teacher can't read minds and know what students have and have not absorbed of the class material. A suspicious spouse tests her husband's fidelity with a sexy decoy. Why? Because she DOESN'T know what he will do, and wants to see what he will do so she WILL know. Any test is given because the test giver doesn't know something and wants to determine something. Yahweh didn't know what Abraham would do, so he tested him, ergo Yahweh isn't omniscient. Yahweh even qualifies his past ignorance prior to the test by saying now I know you fear God. You have not refused me your own beloved son. (Gen. 22:12, emphasis added).
"NOW I know," implying He didn't know before. Abraham is so grateful, he names the place "Yahweh provides." (Gen. 22:14). However, Yahweh claims in Ex. 6:3 I am Yahweh. To Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob I appeared as El Shaddai, but I did not make my name Yahweh known to them.
"El Shaddai" means "God Almighty," a title. So clearly this latter verse says that Abraham never knew God's proper, personal name "Yahweh," and instead knew him only by the title of "El Shaddai." Yet Gen. 22:14 says that Abraham clearly did know Yahweh's personal name, because he named a place after Yahweh!
Then you have the case of Sodom and Gomorrah:
Then Yahweh said, 'The outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is so great and their sin is so grave, that I shall go down and see whether or not their actions are at all as the outcry reaching me would suggest. Then I shall know. (Gen. 18:20-21, emphasis added)
So Yahweh wants to know something about S & G, indicating he doesn't know. However, once he "go[es] down and see[s]," he will "Then...know."
Then Yahweh tells Abraham about his plans:
Abraham stepped forward and said, 'Will you really destroy the upright with the guilty? Suppose there are fifty upright people in the city. Will you really destroy it? Will you not spare the place for the sake of the fifty upright in it? Do not think of doing such a thing: to put the upright to death with the guilty, so that upright and guilty fare alike! Is the judge of the whole world not to act justly?' Yahweh replied, If I find fifty upright people in the city of Sodom, I will spare the whole place because of them.
Abraham then says what if there's only 45, or 40, or 30, and eventually down to I shall not destroy it, [Yahweh] replied, 'for the sake of the ten. (Gen. 18:32)
So what do we have here? Yahweh shares his plans with Abraham, and Abraham has the better idea?? The mere mortal is able to talk the all-knowing, perfect Yahweh out of his, what should be, perfect and inerrant plan? Indeed, that is exactly what we have! The mere mortal Abraham has a stronger sense of justice than the allegedly infinitely just Yahweh, who has to have it explained to him why it isn't just to punish the innocent for the crimes of others!
Only one person in the city was found to be forthright and pure in Yahweh's eyes: Lot. His family alone was spared. Why was Lot just and good in Yahweh's eyes? Yahweh sent a couple of angels down as spies (Gen. 19:1) to see if there were any good people in S & G (because the all-knowing Yahweh didn't know, and had to find out through his angels, of course).
Lot found the angel spies and invited them into his home (Gen. 19:1-3). Next, ...the house was surrounded by the townspeople, the men of Sodom both young and old, all the people without exception. Calling out to Lot they said, 'Where are the men who came to you tonight? Send them out to us so that we can have intercourse with them.' Lot came out to them at the door and, having shut the door behind him, said, 'Please, brothers, do not be wicked. Look, I have two daughters who are virgins. I am ready to send them out to you, for you to treat as you please, but do nothing to these men since they are now under the protection of my roof.' (Gen. 19:4-8)
Okay, first we have the absurd. How reasonable is it to think that the entire town, thousands of people, all formed a single-minded rape gang bent on raping these two men? That's just downright silly. This is clearly very biased propaganda of the worse and most primitive kind. What's Lot doing living in this town if it's THAT bad???
Then we have the horror of Lot offering his own daughters to a rape gang to spare a couple of strangers AND the fact that this made Lot a virtuous man. Is this the Bible that governs the lives of people who claim to put Family Values first??? I'll be damned if I'm giving my little girl to a rape gang to save strangers, and if that's what it takes to be a righteous dude, I guess I'll be happy to be evil.
Of course, believers will babble on about how times were different back then, as if arguing situational ethics helps their case for objective morality from God. They do the same thing when it is pointed out that Yahweh condoned slavery: The male and female slaves you have will come from the nations round you; from these you may purchase male and female slaves. As slaves, you may also purchase the children of aliens resident among you, and also members of their families living with you who haev been born on your soil; and they will become your property, and you may leave them as a legacy to your sons after you as their perpetual possession. These you may have for slaves; but you will not oppress your brother-Israelites. (Lev. 25:44-46)
It was a different time and culture, believers will point out. Situational ethics hey??? I find that pill particularly hard to swallow since Yahweh outlined the death penalty for such crimes as: working on the sabbath, preaching another religion, being a rebellious son, being a drunkard son, striking your parents, cursing your parents, being a woman and not being a virgin when married, being a woman who commits adultery (seems to be okay for men), and being a male homosexual (seems to be okay for woman!).
Other religions, working on the sabbath, not being a virgin when married, and being homosexual were common cultural phenomena back then: why does God allow slavery to adhere to different cultural values, but not other things? I'm not buying it!
As pointed out earlier, Yahweh claims in both Deut. 24:16 and Ez. 18:19-20 that it isn't just to put people to death for the sins of their relatives. However, how often does Yahweh order this exact thing? In I Sam 15:2-3 Yahweh orders the utter genocidal annihilation of the Amalekites for the sins of their ancestors four hundred years prior:
This is what Yahweh Sabaoth says, "I intend to punish what Amalek did to Israel-laying a trap for him on the way as he was coming up from Egypt. Now, go and crush Amalek; put him under the curse of destruction with all that he possesses. Do not spare him, but kill man and woman, babe and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and donkey." (I Sam. 15:2-3)
Then, later in 2 Samuel we read of how David sent Uriah the Hittite to the front lines of battle so he could steal Uriah's wife Bathsheba (II Sam. chapter 11). To punish David for his sin, Yahweh sends Nathan to tell David Yahweh, for his part, forgives your sin; you are not to die. But since you have outraged Yahweh by doing this, the child born to you will die... Yahweh struck the child which Uriah's wife had borne to David and it fell gravely ill...on the seventh day the child died. (II Sam. 12:13-18, emphasis added)
For a final example of Yahweh contradicting his own laws against punishing the innocent for the crimes of the guilty, I offer you one of the more bizarre stories in the Bible.
In the final chapter of II Sam, chapter 24, we read that Yahweh's anger was arosed against Israel, and he incited David against them. 'Go,' he said,'take a census of Israel and Judah.' (24:1, emphasis added)
So Yahweh "incites...David [to]...take a census of Israel and Judah." Guess what he does next?? He gets angry with David for taking the census HE incited David to take in the first place!!
But afterwards David's heart misgave him for having taken a census of the people. David then said to Yahweh, 'I have committed a grave sin by doing this. But now, Yahweh, I beg you to forgive your servant for this fault, for I have acted very foolishly. When, however, David got up next morning, the following message had come from Yahweh to the prophet Gad, David's seer, Go and say to David, "Yahweh says this: I offer you three things; choose which one of them I am to inflict on you. ...'Which do you prefer: to have three years of famine befall your country; to flee for three months before a pursuing army; or to have three days of epidemic in your country?...It was the time of the wheat harvest, So Yahweh unleashed an epidemic on Israel from that morning until the time determined; plague ravaged the people and, of the people from Dan to Beersheba, seventy thousand died. (II Sam. 24:10-15)
So Yahweh "incites" David to take a census, declares it a sin, and punishes David by killing 70,000 Israelites that had nothing to do with David's sin! He violates his own sense of justice on so many levels it is pathetic; hardly the work of an Omnimax being.
If there was ever a more petty, cruel, barbaric, insecure, narcissistic/borderline, and most importantly, contradictory being than Yahweh, I'd love for somebody to point em out!