If indeed you believe that jwism and christianity are from the same mold, I would say that you must be living in the U.S. - i.e. christianity means something else to many others
I see it as an onerous task to explain to you why I believe Christ chose to 'suffer for our sake' - it is intertwined in the actions of man, free will, individuality, wholeness, contrite reality.................................
That's not something I believe, the Bible is pretty clear on that one. Only Christians has the right to exist in the future kingdom, you must convert or die. Non Christians do not qualify for life. The WTS has just been a bit more direct about it then most Christians. Just scratch a Christian anywhere in the world and you will find out, it isn't just in the US.
Well, I think it is far more then an onerous task. It is completely impossible. Christ "suffer for our sake" doesn't hold water if you sit down and think about the whole concept for a bit. That idea is only tenable as long as you don't think about it. It was never meant for closer scrutiny as the rest of the Bible doctrine. When you start to really think critically about it, it is collapsing fast.
There is of course a third option and that is an amoral 'God', who would then accurately reflect the experience of nature which survives and progresses without the need of morality or behavioral judgments. A sort of pantheism without borders.
Which is just the "God" of the concluding discourses of Yhwh in Job (38ff).
Which is just the "God" of the concluding discourses of Yhwh in Job (38ff).
Yes, the ones that read :
"Where were you when I dumped half the Indian Ocean on your children and killed them without mercy. Where were you when I failed to protect you from my Creation and the Bubonic Plague then killed two-thirds of the population of Europe? These things are the fringes of My ways."
Apparently the writer of Yhwh's discourse didn't know too much about tsunamis :
Or who shut in the sea with doors when it burst out from the womb?-- when I made the clouds its garment, and thick darkness its swaddling band, and prescribed bounds for it, and set bars and doors, and said, 'Thus far shall you come, and no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stopped'?
Anyway that's the general picture I guess: a totally inhumane god who is no less interested in feeding lions and raining on the desert than in mankind's specific plight, and is completely alien to any moral judgement.
Why is it that on the one hand some people blame or ridicule God for events such as the recent Tsunami and then on the other if someone should say such an event is directly caused by God those same people turn around and degrade the person for claiming such a ridiculous thing. You all like to eat your cake and have it too I see. Oh well, no matter.
narkissos- this is the first reply of yours I take issue with. Seems to be groping at straws to pick on the verses in Job to prove "god" wrong. From a perspective(human) of only a mile or two away the tsunami's weren't even visible. The oceans haven't jumped their boundaries. Nature taking it's course doesn't disprove "god". Jesus showed that weather was a randon phenomenon when he "calmed the storm", which was an UNNATURAL phenomenon. Showing things could be changed if "god" so chose.
If this natural disaster had occured in an unpopulated area nobody would give it a second thought and certainly not blame "god" or use to prove his non-existence. This only proves that "god" is not currently involved with the affairs of men. It's the only reasonable explanation, while still believeing in a "god". All other explanations paint "god" as evil. Which if that's true we are all truly SCREWED, truth or no truth.
I for one don't blame God for anything. As Stendhal put it, "God's best excuse is that he doesn't exist."
But those who dobelieve in God can't avoid the questions: is He the cause of whatever happens or not? If He is, why is He? If He is not, why is He not? Back to the eternal problem of theodicy.
