I - an atheist - am morally better than the Christian God

[Whateverman]

Do you see me calling you a liar?

By telling me I don't understand the things I say I do, yeah. I see it clearly.

Prove I know nothing about your religion or your holy book.

Prove you're not projecting when you call me an ignorant dumbass.

ps. you wont, and you wont even try, because projection is exactly what that was.

[Sparko]

By telling me I don't understand the things I say I do, yeah. I see it clearly.

Prove I know nothing about your religion or your holy book.

Prove you're not projecting when you call me an ignorant dumbass.

ps. you wont, and you wont even try, because projection is exactly what that was.

You have already shown your ignorance in this very thread and I pointed it out at the time. Feel free to go back and read your own posts and my replies to them. I am not interested enough to go back myself to prove something we both already know is true. I will however, keep pointing out your ignorance in your future posts, so stay tuned.

You don't even understand what objective morality is, and keep calling it "Christian objective morality" - of which there is no such thing. Objective Morality is objective for everyone. That's why it is objective.

Have you ever read the bible (all of it, not just a verse here and there?)

This whole thread is just a straw man argument based on your lack of understanding Christianity and God.

PS - here's an idea. Show me that you understand Christianity by explaining the gospel of salvation to me in your own words using bible verse references to back it up.

[Hypatia_Alexandria]

I trust textual criticism to give us accurate translations.

You do not understand textual criticism otherwise you would not have made some of your comments to me.

[Sparko]

You do not understand textual criticism otherwise you would not have made some of your comments to me.

Yes, I do. It is the science of studying and documenting text variants of ancient manuscript in order to determine in which ways they have changed over time and in order to determine what the originals said. The fact that we have so many new testament manuscripts to study means we can be reasonably certain what the original autographs said, probably to within 95+%, and the deviations that we are unsure of are mostly in non-important areas of the text, like number errors, or spelling, or word order.

So I am confident that our modern bibles are accurate and the areas that are not are clearly marked as such in the footnotes.

[Hypatia_Alexandria]

Yes, I do. It is the science of studying and documenting text variants of ancient manuscript in order to determine in which ways they have changed over time and in order to determine what the originals said. The fact that we have so many new testament manuscripts to study means we can be reasonably certain what the original autographs said, probably to within 95+%, and the deviations that we are unsure of are mostly in non-important areas of the text, like number errors, or spelling, or word order.

So I am confident that our modern bibles are accurate and the areas that are not are clearly marked as such in the footnotes.

The Living Bible; while modern punctuation as found in the may also affect affect interpretation.

The use of punctuation subtly altering meaning and interpretation was noted as early as 1818. Consider the following two versions of Luke 23.43:

Verily, I say unto thee, This day thou shalt be with me in Paradise.

and

Verily I say unto thee this day, Thou shalt be with me in Paradise.

It has been noted that a huge doctrinal difference hangs on the precise placing of that comma, with Protestants generally opting for the first version.

We know that there are hundreds of thousands of variants within the Greek MSS of the NT and while those may not in, and of, themselves [at least according to some theologians] challenge basic tenets of faith, they do raise questions.

[Sparko]

The Living Bible; while modern punctuation as found in the may also affect affect interpretation.

The use of punctuation subtly altering meaning and interpretation was noted as early as 1818. Consider the following two versions of Luke 23.43:

Verily, I say unto thee, This day thou shalt be with me in Paradise.

and

Verily I say unto thee this day, Thou shalt be with me in Paradise.

It has been noted that a huge doctrinal difference hangs on the precise placing of that comma, with Protestants generally opting for the first version.

We know that there are hundreds of thousands of variants within the Greek MSS of the NT and while those may not in, and of, themselves [at least according to some theologians] challenge basic tenets of faith, they do raise questions.

I agree about the paraphrased translations, but they are clearly pointed out to be such in the introduction section. They are not meant for serious bible study, but more for readability. But the fact that we have several thousand versions and fragments of the NT and most all agree with each other does mean that the copiers of the manuscript took great care to transcribe the books accurately. And it does allow us to reconstruct what the autographs would have said. The NT has more manuscript evidence than any other documents of that time period. We can be sure that the bibles we have today are very accurate and very close to the original. And sure, punctuation can make a difference, but even the example you gave is not something that is a core doctrine. Whether the Thief ended up in paradise with Christ that day, or later makes no difference to Christianities core beliefs.

This is not an excuse for you to avoid reading the bible for yourself in it's entirety. Have you done so?

[Starlight]

We can be sure that the bibles we have today are very accurate and very close to the original. And sure, punctuation can make a difference, but even the example you gave is not something that is a core doctrine. Whether the Thief ended up in paradise with Christ that day, or later makes no difference to Christianities core beliefs.

I would say that the thing that has the biggest effect by far on core doctrines is translation and associated interpretation. Particularly of some specific key terms - 'faith', 'justification', 'righteousness' etc.

Christian doctrine can look very different if you shift the meaning of a few key terms, or interpret them in a slightly different context (e.g. the New Perspective on Paul).

While textual variants cast into doubt perhaps only the one issue of whether the thief on the cross and/or ourselves are judged on the day of our deaths, translations and associated interpretations cast into doubt a significant number of reasonably core doctrines. It was my own study of New Perspective scholarship and of the NT that led me to conclude that Protestants are wrong with respect to what the bible actually teaches on all their distinctive views about atonement, salvation, and judgment (the Eastern Orthodox Christians are far more correct), and they are wrong almost entirely due to translation mistakes with respect to key terms, and the mistaken interpretations that result from that.

It's not surprising that the churches that continued to speak Greek as their native language didn't drift very far from NT teachings in their doctrines, whereas those Christians who entirely reinvented their doctrines (e.g. during the Protestant Reformation) at a time when their own knowledge of Greek was very limited and before many other ancient Greek documents and tablets had been discovered and before anything approaching any comprehensive analysis of koine Greek had been done, totally botched their translations and interpretations of key words. Their resultant theology owed more to their own creation, loosely inspired by their ideas of what the bible might be thought to say, than it did to what the bible writers actually believed.

[37818]

Yep, that's basically what Tass said, Adam was perfect until he wasn't. Except that is a contradiction, isn't it?

No.

What you are not understanding is finite perfect is not the same as infinite perfect. Finite perfect can fail. Infinite perfect never fails. The term "perfect" as it is used does not require it to be infinite perfect.

[37818]

Can you demonstrate that I know nothing of Christianity . . . .?

What do you understand as to be the difference between the myriad of professing Christiaities and the genuine? That you cannot, demonstrates that you understand nothing of the genuine gospel of Christianity where it matters. 2 Corinthians 4:3, ". . . But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: . . ." Or you would not be one of the lost.

[JimL]

No.

What you are not understanding is finite perfect is not the same as infinite perfect. Finite perfect can fail. Infinite perfect never fails. The term "perfect" as it is used does not require it to be infinite perfect.

So the term perfect doesn't really mean perfect.

[JimL]

What do you understand as to be the difference between the myriad of professing Christiaities and the genuine? That you cannot, demonstrates that you understand nothing of the genuine gospel of Christianity where it matters. 2 Corinthians 4:3, ". . . But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: . . ." Or you would not be one of the lost.

Unless of course, you are the one who is lost.

[Whateverman]

What do you understand as to be the difference between the myriad of professing Christiaities and the genuine?

The difference is largely subjective and unclear. The vast majority of "professing Christiaities (sic)" all accept the divinity of Jesus Christ and his resurrection, the existence of sin, and the need for salvation. Everything else is just theological white noise.

That you cannot, demonstrates that you understand nothing of the genuine gospel of Christianity

That's arrant nonsense.. There's no requirement - anywhere - that in order to fully understand Christianity, I need to agree with your personal opinions about which people are Christians and which aren't.

And really, since I've already demonstrated that I know of the supposed divinity of Jesus Christ and his resurrection, the supposed existence of sin, and our supposed need for salvation - any claim that I know nothing about the Christian religion is a hateful lie. It's a lie aimed at diverting the conversation away from the thread subject.

It's a lie crafted to hide the fact that Christians largely cannot refute the argument in the OP.

[Whateverman]

Unless of course, you are the one who is lost.

Narrow is the gate...

A passage most Christians online never seem to think applies to themselves.

[Starlight]

What you are not understanding is finite perfect is not the same as infinite perfect. Finite perfect can fail. Infinite perfect never fails. The term "perfect" as it is used does not require it to be infinite perfect.

[Tassman]

No.

What you are not understanding is finite perfect is not the same as infinite perfect. Finite perfect can fail. Infinite perfect never fails. The term "perfect" as it is used does not require it to be infinite perfect.

Nonsense. Perfect means by definition "being entirely without fault or defect" - Merriam-Webster. It is an ideal standard. Anything less than this is NOT "perfect".