Posts by Rapunzel

38

22,000 Dead So Far in Myanmar

by Rapunzel in

jw
friends

and i wonder, where could god be now?

) either god wanted to eliminate evil and could not.

if option number two is the case, god is evil.

BTS - I apologize if I offended you with my query. I appreciate all of your posts, and I meant no disrespect when I asked if I could infer sarcasm/irony in your previous post. I guess you and I see things differently. Again, I apologize if I offended you.

M.J. - For me "perfection" would be the elimination/absence of suffering. I don't necessarily wish for eternal youth/life, or eternal bliss. I simply wish for the absence of suffering. It's ironic how we humans can most assuredly and justifiably condemn God for utterly lacking justice, using the very sense of justice that God supposedly endowed us with!!

Alpaca - It is a pleasure for me to read your posts; it's wonderful to have a person of your intelligence contributing to the discussions here. I know next to nothing of either cosmology or geology. But I do realize how scientists and thinkers in these two fields conceptualize time [and space.] They think in terms of eons, not years or generations. May I quote the French philosopher, Pascal who said: "When I consider the short duration of my lifetime, absorbed in the eternity that precedes and follows it, the tiny space I fill and I can see. lost in the infinite immensity of the spaces of which I know nothing and which know nothing of me, I am dismayed and astonished to find myself here rather than there; for there is no reason to be here rather than there; now rather than then. Who put me here? By whose order and conduct have this place and time been destined for me?"

DanT.M. - What you write reminds me of an idea in Jewish philosophy regarding the horror of murder/homocide. The notion is that when someone [person A] kills another person [person B], not only does person A kill person B, he/she also effectively kills every other person who would have been born from person B. Anyone who kills another person is also slaughtering countless succeeding generations.

But of course, most people don't even consider the horror of this idea, which reminds me of an infamous quote by Joseph Stalin who said: "The death of one man is a tragedy; the death of millions is a mere statistic." Burma is a small and hopelessly poor nation of absolutely no geo-political or strategic importance. Within days, this story will be forgotten. After all, Miley Cyrus did show part of her ass, you know. And that's important! That's news that sells!

JaguarBass - I also want to thank you for your sensitive and insightful posts. I think you're a real "cool" and intelligent person.

And, finally, BTS - I also appreciate your posts a lot. I'm sorry if I offeded you.

38

22,000 Dead So Far in Myanmar

by Rapunzel in

jw
friends

and i wonder, where could god be now?

) either god wanted to eliminate evil and could not.

if option number two is the case, god is evil.

Rapunzel

Hi Alpaca: I understand the basic point of your post. Basically, you believe that a distinction can be made between natural disasters and moral evil. I mean no disrespect; II simply wish to say that I disagree. To reiterate, for me, there is absolutely no distinction between what is termed "natural evil" and "moral evil." For me, the existence of both is the strongest evidence against the existence of an all-powerful and benevolent God [as conceived of in traditional theology].

In regard to animals, they suffered long before the arrival of homo sapiens on the scene. In ancien Greek terms, the world is much more chaos than cosmos. Considered in universal terms, creation is a blood-bath - horrifyingly violent and unjust. Simply stated, there is no justice in creation. There is no moral order, no moral rhyme or reason. Observing "God's creation - life itself - is like watching a never ending "gore-film", a horror movie. These may seem like naive words at first, but not if one thinks about it.

A basic question of mine is: Why does the life of an organism depend on the death of another organism? Why does life require death to sustain itself? This is the case from the "lowest" form of life to the "highest." It seems that one form of life must die in order for another form of life to live. Why must itbe so? To put it poetically, why must the gazelle or the antelope die in order for the lion to live? Why can't life be self-sustaining and sufficient unto itself.

Please let me not be misunderstood. I'm no naive witness waiting for the new system in which lions snuggle with sheep. I know very well that this will never be the case. My question is much more basic. Again, it is: Why must there be death/sufffering in order for there to be life. I disagree with Leibnitz who thought that our world was the best imaginable. In my opinion, it's far, far from it. I can easily imagine a world in which life is self-sustaining and sufficient unto itself. I can easily imagine a world that is total cosmos - total order as opposed to utter chaos.

Another poster asked how I define evil. Simple. I define evil as suffering. I define it as pain. I find it paradoxical that we humans were supposedly made in the image of our "loving Creator," endowed with a sense of justice. And yet, this very same "loving creator" brings into existence a world utterly devoid of justice. In response to this horror, we humans are suposed to "suspend" our innate, natural sense of justice and simply say: "Oh well, God has his reasons. It's all a mystery that will be explained to us by and by." To that, I say - "Bullshit!" Why would God endow humans with a sense of justice, only to create a world utterly devoid of justice.

I hate to sound dogmatic, but make no mistake about it - Natural evil is the same as moral evil. There is no justifiable excuse for the existence of suffering and pain in the world. If there were an all-benevolent, all-powerful god, this god could easily put a stop to evil. The logic of Epicurus is inescapable. It is so easy to imagine a world in which there is no suffering.

38

22,000 Dead So Far in Myanmar

by Rapunzel in

jw
friends

and i wonder, where could god be now?

) either god wanted to eliminate evil and could not.

if option number two is the case, god is evil.

Rapunzel

BTS - That's like my saying: "I'm a millionaire in theory, but not in effect." Should I, or should I not, infer sarcasm in your response?

38

22,000 Dead So Far in Myanmar

by Rapunzel in

jw
friends

and i wonder, where could god be now?

) either god wanted to eliminate evil and could not.

if option number two is the case, god is evil.

Rapunzel

According to the latest figures, there were 22,000 poor souls who lost their lives as a result of the cyclone in Myanmar (Burma). In my estimation, in the end, the final tally will anywhere from 35,000 to 40,000 dead, along with about another 50,000 displaced and homeless. For those who know nothing of Myanmar (Burma), it is truly a "basket case" of a country. It is a country ruled by a vicious military junta - a collective of brutal, sadistic, paranoid thugs. And, no, I'm not talking about Bush and his administration; I'm talking about another collective of brutal, sadistic, paranoid thugs. Another collective of paranoid thugs who exert total control of one of the poorest nations on earth. My point is that those more than 50,000 people who will find themselves displaced are, in effect, screwed. As the Bible says, many of those now living in Burma "will envy the dead." Even if the military sadists in control of Myanmar were to want to help their people [which is not the case], they would still lack any and all means to do so. In the coming days, weeks, and months, there will be tens of thousands dying of disease, starvation, and dehydration [Maybe it's hard for people in North America to imagine, but typhoons and cyclones in Asia disrupts and destroy both water and food supply. Crops are washed away, and potable water is contaminated. As a result, there develop diseases such as cholera, dysentry, and malaria.]

And I wonder, where could God be now?

There are people who will say: "But, what happened in Burma is not God's fault! That cyclone was not a moral evil; it was a natural evil!" However, in my opinion, natural evil is moral evil; in my mind, there is no distinction between moral and natural evil. In my mind, the eistence of both moral and natural evil precludes the existence of God, or at least the existence of God as God is conceived in traditional theology - both benevolent and omnipotent.

According to Lactantius, Epicurus went straight to the heart of the matter, which is:

1.) Either God wanted to eliminate evil and could not

2.) Or he could and did not want to

3.) Or he neither could nor wanted to

4.) Or he could and wanted to

This could be termed the tetralemma of religion. If option number one is the case, then God is impotent. If option number two is the case, God is evil. If option number three is the case, God is both impotent and evil. Which leaves option number 4 - the only hypothesis which corresponds to the cherished, traditional concept of an all-powerful and benevolent God. This leads to the question: "Where does evil come from, and why does God do nothing to eliminate it?

In his Theodicy, Leibnitz asks: "If God exists, whence evil? If God does not exist, whence good?"

"Theodicy," a phrase first coined by Leibnitz, refers to the problem of the existence of evil in the world. The term is based on the Greek words theos ["god"] and dike [justice]. I find the juxtaposition of the words God and justice to be ironic - an oxymoron, in fact. As the French philosopher Emile-Auguste Chartier [also called the pseudonym, "Alain"] said: "Justice does not exist, which is why we need to create it."

To conclude, let me quote Prometheus who exclaimed : "I hate all the gods."

60

Dispelling Watchtower Myths of RC Beliefs

by Amazing in

jw
friends

over the last two years, as i moved back to the catholic church, i have been confronted with objections by several people regarding certain catholic teachings.

these concerns are almost always the same, and are founded in mythology created by the watchtower society, and some evangelical denominations.

god can and does use fallible men to do infallible things?

Rapunzel

Christianity, itself, has "pagan" origins. The story of Jesus is merely a "re-hashing" - a "re-cycling", or reinterpretation - of the myth of Horus and other "pagan" narratives. Does anybody recall Jesus' miracle of "transforming" water into wine in the second chapter of the gospel of John? That was already "old hat" in that era. It was a common practice among the priests of Dionysus. In fact, Jesus is often referred to as "Dionysus in new clothing."

And what of the notion of the "virgin birth"? Again, this is merely an old "pagan" idea. The commonly quoted scriptue at Isaiah 7:14 - "a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son..." - is, in fact a mistranslation. As Strong'sConcordance points out, the term in question "can refer merely to the unmarried status of the one so described. The child immediately in view was the son of the prophet and his wife who (cf Isa. 8:3) who served as a sign to Ahaz that his enemies would be defeated by God." In the Hebrew scriptures, there is no indication whatsoever of an expected or awaited "virgin birth." Why would there be, when the Jews were supposed to be hostile to any such pagan notion? The very thought of a virgin birth is utterly risible and ludicrous. But it is also pagan. In the pagan tradition, gods born of a virgin were a dime a dozen. In fact, a virgin birth was almost a required aspect of a pagan god's "pedigree."

Everything aboutthe Jesus myth - from his dying and reviving, to his halo - is merely a "re-working" of pagan narratives. And don't forget the wandering "star" that greeted his birth. Yet another pagan myth grafted on to the narrative.

20

Elitist Blueprint For World Government Revealed

by What-A-Coincidence in

jw
friends

http://www.jonesreport.com/article/05_08/01elitist_blueprint.html.

elitist blueprint for world government revealed.

new book written by insider - 6,000 globalists control the planet and plan to completely end national sovereignty, manifesto for dealing with "antiglobalist" resistors unveiled.

Rapunzel

David Icke represents the epitome of delusional paranoia; his psycho-pathological "theories" don't even approach the level of half-way decent science fiction. And his talk of "Jewish bankers" in search of world domination constitutes hate speech. There is something drastically wrong with the guy. He may well be suffering from some neurological impairment. I think that all conspiracy theorists suffer from some degree of clinical paranoia. It's their choice, I suppose, to either seek help or not. However, there are limits to free speech. When Icke [or anyone else] crosses the line and starts spouting hate speech, I think that they should be held accountable.

If anyone has a strong enough stomach, he/she can google "Icke paranoia,"

39

Where do you start to find the answers to God?

by Hope4Others in

i thought i have relatively had everything figured out, like life, death, god does he exist or does he not.

is the bible make believe?.

can we really be sure that it is inspired, after all we were not around to see the process being done.

Rapunzel

Hope-4-Others - I didn't quite understand your first post about "space" being the fourth dimension and "time" being the fifth. In fact, height, length, and width constitute the classical [Newtonian] three dimensions. It was Einstein who discovered that time was the fourth dimension. He discovered that time could be warped or distorted; it was not a constant, as had been previously conceptualized.

4

1919 home coming letter (from prison) pdf

by bereanbiblestudent in

this is a letter send out when rutherford came out of prison.

a pdf of this was already available at watchtower documents llc, but this is the canadian branch version.. to download click the link and there will be a download link available there.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/s8qdfa.

Rapunzel

I just get a message that IE cannot display the message

50

Atheist need to start fighting fire with fire LITERALY

by 5go in

i was watching some program on the inquisition.

you know that thing christianity would love for you to forget happened.. when the court system of rome failed the christian courts took over they instituted trial by ordeal.. simply put any accused of a crime would be tortured tested to see if they were innocent by many forms of painful test to see if god would come to the accused's defence.

if they were innocent then no harm would happen to them because of their faith, of course pretty much 100% of the time they were hurt an were summarily executed punished with all the love of jesus in mind.. atheist should due the same accuse all of christians of crimes and force them into trial by ordeal to prove their innocence and backed by god.

Rapunzel

5go - You should have written: "I and the world will accept no other proof." Again, you display an obvious difficulty in handling homophones. You should go back to school and learn how to ~~right rite Wright~~ write! Your writing is as inane as your logic.

50

Atheist need to start fighting fire with fire LITERALY

by 5go in

i was watching some program on the inquisition.

you know that thing christianity would love for you to forget happened.. when the court system of rome failed the christian courts took over they instituted trial by ordeal.. simply put any accused of a crime would be tortured tested to see if they were innocent by many forms of painful test to see if god would come to the accused's defence.

if they were innocent then no harm would happen to them because of their faith, of course pretty much 100% of the time they were hurt an were summarily executed punished with all the love of jesus in mind.. atheist should due the same accuse all of christians of crimes and force them into trial by ordeal to prove their innocence and backed by god.

Rapunzel

5go - Your sentence should read: "Atheists should do the same. They should accuse all of Christians of crimes and force them..."

The words "atheist" requires an "s" to make it plural.

Although due and do are homophones [they are two words with the same pronunciation], they are in fact totally different in meaning and are by no means interchangeable. Due can used as an adjective or a noun, but it cannot be used as a verb. The modal, should, requires a verb to follow it. Therefore, due cannot be used with should because due is not a verb.

You can't say "all of Christians" because all of refers to an uncountable quantity ["I ate all of the cake"], whereas "Christians" is a countable noun [one Christian, two Christians, three Christians, four Christians, etc.].