From: jlamb@ux4.cso.uiuc.edu (Jeffrey Richard Lamb)
Subject: Re: god exists, 2nd part
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana
Date: Fri, 22 Jan 1993 18:34:51 GMT

5g72wheelerj@vms.csd.mu.edu (John C. Wheeler) writes:

>(continued from previous posting) much of the Jewish Orthadoxy, agree
>that the book of Ecclesiastes was written at least two generations
>after Soloman's death, although the author claims to be Soloman.
>     III - Ever take a look at the 2nd bozook of 2nd Kings (specifically
>verses 23-25)? It's a wonderful story about god sending 2 female bears
>to tear 42 small children (youths in the NRS trans.) to shreads for
>making fun of Elisha's baldness; let's not forget that "Jesus loves
>the little children."

Also, according to the Bible the wages of sin is death. The incident
with the bears deserves some explaination. First the word is "youths"
(which if you go back to original text indicates at least 13 years of
age (probably older) and remember also that people were geting married
at that age). This indicates boys of (considered at that time) adult
age who had not yet married. They were mocking God's messenger and God's
purpose. Because of this they should have been struck down, yet God did
nothing until Elisha cursed them. It was this act they ended in their
injury (My translation says mauled, but they could easily have died (no
significant difference to the point)). This is all consistent with the
rest of the Bible. The New Testiment had not come around yet. . . (I'll
deal with that in a minute).

>     III' - Along the same lines, let's not forget the 19th chapter
>of Genesis, in which Lot offers his two virgin daughters to a mob
>and is then sighted as the only rightous man in the cities; or the
>passage at the chapter's conclusion in which Lot himself then impregnates
>them himself.

Ok. The story for evyone who doesn't know: Lot was hanging out in the city
of Sodom and Gomorrah. He was there and he saw this two men (who just hap-
pened to be angels). So he tells them to come stay in his house, so they
don't have to stay in the square. (Cause he know S&G is a Baaad placce).
Anyway the people of the city come to Lot and yell at him to send the men
out to them so they can have sex with them (I told you it was a bad place).
Anyway. Here's Lot, living in a day and age, when disgrace is a big deal. He
decides (right or wrong, I'm not sure) to offer his two daughters to the
crowd, in hopes of saving the men. It doesn't work. The angels (through God's
power blind the men. They escape etc). The point is Lot had a difficult
decision to make. As far as he knew. He was in a Catch 22. He decided that
it would be better for him to have his family disgraced and his daughters,
than to let the strangers be disgraced. It was a decision that was made. God
was merciful to them. "The Lord was merciful to them" (vrs 16), not because
they deserved it, but because of a couple reasons 1) God had promised old
Abraham a bunch of nations, and Lot dying wouldn't help that at all. 2) Lot
had shown some type of good heart by helping the strangers. The point is: It
is still consistent with the Bible. 

Now the daughters. Lot and his daughters went into some mountains nearby.
The daughters decided that since their boyfriend were fried (they were
left in S&G (because they didn't listen to God's warning)) they would
continue the family line through their father. This they did without his
knowledge. They got him drunk with wine and slept with him. Yet "He was
not aware of it when she lay down, nor when she got up." Still consistent.

>     IV - Let's also not forget some of the very last words of Moses,
>as he surveyed Canaan across the Jordan: "A perverse and crooked 
>generation shall be burnt with hunget and devoured with burning heat
>. . . the sword without and terror within shall destptroy the young
>man and the virgin, the suckling and the man with grey hair . . . I
>will make mine arrows drunk with blood and my sword shall devour flesh . . .

These were the words of God against the Israelites. When Moses came down
from Mount Sinia the Children of Israel were winning a great sin against
God. God decided they would suffer in the wilderness for a generation
before they got to the promised land. The old to the young part, meant
that they would wander until everyone who was alive and participated in
that sin would die before they saw the land. It was a just punishment,
consistent with the rest of the Bible and handed down. (And carried out)
by God.
The point is these are not Moses's thoughts, but God's. Moses is realizing
that the Word of God (spoken before at Sinia) has come true (again).

><<Can it be doubted that this man's ideas and personality have certainly
>left their mark upon history (even as I type, I think of Even Greater
>Serbia, the slaughter by Cortes (cross and sword in hand) of the entire
>Aztec nation, Puritan "religious freedom" (hence we now have Rhode 
>Island, Connecticut, and witchburning stories), the Spanish Inquisition,
>etc. . . but I am straying from the immediate issue>>.

This is not God's work. It is not punishment by God's hand. (And it's
not in the Bible). (I might even go so far as to say that these things
are wrong, but that's another issue outside this discussion).

>     V - There are also great stories in Judges, like the one about
>sinated Eglon, a Moabite tyrant so fat that Ehud couldn't pull his
>sword back out; or Jephthah, who swore if god gave him victory, he'd
>sacrifice the first thing he saw when he got home - which turned out
>to be his daughter.  

>At any rate, there are obviously many things in the Hebrew mythology
>known as the old testament which are entirely contradictory with the
>doctrine and theology espoused in the new testament (one of which is
>the fundamental shift in emphasis from material/physical/community 
>oriented rites to the personal/spiritual/"my kingdom is not of this
>earth."  My contention is the following: if one chooses to place faith
>in one thing or another, that is his decision; but that person hits
>murky waters when attempting to empirically legitimate such; if I were
>to buy the new testament, I would be revolted by the old, and vice versa.
>Summarily, faith is beyond the bounds of rationality.

The New Testiment is a New Deal. Think of it like a business deal. Go says:
"Ok, man do WHATEVER you want EXCEPT eating from this one tree. It's fruit
is no sweeter. The other trees have plenty of fruit. Just don't do it. You
can do anything but eat from this tree." Man say, "er. . . o-tay" and goes
to eat some fruit.
God says, ok you couldn't handle that so here, "These are the laws. Obey
them. They are simple. Straightforward. Learn it. Do it."
Man says, "er. . . o-tay" and ignores the laws and everything else etc.
God says, "Ok they can't handle this. I'm going down as Jesus to show! them
the way to live. Since they can't seem to understand a drescription." So
Jesus comes down and lives perfectly.  This is where we are now. (Also
in the future God is going to say, "Ok. That's enough. The people who could
handle it (under any set of laws (for us it happens to be the new testiment))
are coming with me and we're going to have a kingdom like it should be."
This is in Revelations).
The point is the New testiment is the new deal. God promised us this if this,
but we couldn't handle it, so he said decided to forget that deal and offer
us a better one (the New Testiment). The old Testiment could have applied to
today if God had decided to do it that way, but he didn't. The old testement
is still useful for a variety of reasons (most specificly insight into this
God person), but now the old testiment promise has been replaced by the New
Testiment Promise. None of this is contradictory since the Bible is taken
as a whole. The Bible is a history remember. Trying to proof the invalidity
of the Bible through New/Old contradictions is foolish. It would be like 
sighting two passages in different parts of the bible that say:
1) Fred is 30 years old.
2) Fred is 60 years old.
Obviously this is a contradiction, but big deal. True Fred can't be 30 and
60 at the same time, but why does he have to be. No-one would argue this
side, but people still argue Old vs. New.

(BTW, great attack. Ask me more if you want. (It's all in the spirit of
intelligent discussion anyway)).

-- 
H. Ross Perot | "How do you always manage to    | Jeff R. Lamb
for President | decide?" 			| Midnight Arrow
of the United | "How do you let others decide   | Champion of Reality
States in '96 | for you?"	   -Ayn Rand 	| (jlamb@ux4.cso.uiuc.edu)
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